New changes to iOS and Patreon (Patreon)

Hey everyone!

You might have seen in the news / social media about Patreon and iOS. So we thought we'd explain how this might impact you.

What's happening?

Apple has a rule whereby any time someone signs up to a subscription through an iOS app, Apple will get a 30% cut.

In November, this will also apply to Patreon - meaning that Patreon creators will have to pay 30% of their donations to Apple (on top of the 5-8% they pay to Patreon) if that person signs up through the iOS app.

That's a massive chunk of change!

So Patreon is giving creators an option - they can either take the 30% hit themselves. Or they can increase their tier prices - but only for people who use the iOS app.

Will this affect you? Probably not, thankfully.

First: this has no impact on any existing Patreon pledges.

Second: This only impacts people who sign up to a Patreon via the iOS app. So nothing will change if you have an Android or sign up through your browser.

(You can also download the iOS app and log in to your Patreon account to get your benefits there while still paying the normal price).

Will this affect this Patreon? Not really.

Because yes: we will be charging 30% more for anyone who signs up through the iOS app. And that sucks.

But come November we'll make sure to start telling people to sign up through their browser so they get a "discount".

While the impact on us is small, this still sucks.

This approach leads to weird draconian rules, uneven pricing, customer confusion ("huh? why is the price higher on iOS compared to Android?!"), and bad store experiences.

We'll continue to keep you up to date as more changes come but hope this helps clarify things on our end.