Apple Introduces Billing Grace Period For Apps With Auto-Renewable Subscriptions

Apple today announced a new grace period for the subscriptions that will be letting unsuccessful auto-renewal customers continue using the paid content of the app while Apple is trying to collect payments, in other words, customers can still access those premium features while giving them time to address the billing problem.

According to the company, the length of a grace period depends on how long the subscription last. For example, a one-week subscription will have a grace period of six days, while a subscription that has a duration of range from 1 month to 1 year have a grace period of sixteen days. If didn't enable the Grace Period, the subscriber’s days of paid service will then be paused until Apple is able to collect payment.

Billing Grace Period allows you to let subscribers whose auto-renewal failed due to a payment issue continue accessing your app’s paid content for a period of time while Apple continues to attempt to collect payment. There won’t be any interruption to the subscriber’s days of paid service or to your revenue if Apple is able to recover the subscription within the grace period of your subscription product. Without enabling Billing Grace Period, the subscriber’s days of paid service are paused until Apple is able to collect payment.

This will be a very beneficial feature for developers, as users who do choose no to update their billing immediately once the subscription fee expires may not have instant access to the premium benefits. It's worth to note that developers will need to turn on Billing Grace Period for apps in App Store Connect, otherwise, us as consumers won't be able to access the so-called grace period.