Mac App Store Trials

A way to make a "trial" would be to use an in app purchase. If the user has not purchased the in app, you can mark the open date somewhere and run the app unlocked for a certain period of time, say for 10 days or whatever (you'll want to show somewhere in your UI that the app is being run as a trial at this point so the user is aware of this).

Then when 10 days is up, you show an alert and tell the user his trial has expired and you take away some features. The app has to function in some capacity though, with limited features after the "trial" has ended.

Yea it's a hack. Yea it's a pain to implement, and yea it's confusing to explain to customers since the App Store doesn't provide any "real" support for trials (as you mentioned the button say "Get" not "Start Trial"). But apps do do this and do get approved on the store. It's been awhile since I took a look at iAP, there may be other ways to structure iAPs to make a trial.

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I appreciate the response but it drops off the cliff at "..but apps do do this and do get approved on the store...".

My read of what you say is:

"...risk dismissal for 'gamesmanship' to accomplish what others appear to be doing somehow with approval..."

You say that apps do this - So, are there specific instructions to be included to app review explaining the '2 Week Trial'?

Is there any consensus or best practices to avoid risk during the "pain (of) implementation"?

All of this feels like 'praying'...

>I appreciate the response but it drops off the cliff at "..but apps do do this and do get approved on the store...".

?My read of what you say is:

>"...risk dismissal for 'gamesmanship' to accomplish what others appear to be doing somehow with approval..."

Welcome to the App Store. There is never a guarantee that your app will be approved. Apple reserves the right to reject any app. I may have a "trial" app implemented with an in app purchase 😉. I gave you a very general description of one way you could do this.

If you design your UI properly that makes it clear to the user when he is in a trial (perhaps putting a "Register" button in the toolbar) and a label displaying when the trial expires, App Review will see it when you submit to them. I cannot tell you if your app will get accepted or rejected. Nobody on these forums will ever be able to pre-review your app.

Implementing a trial this way, I agree feels uncomfortable. It feels like a workaround sure.

macOS doesn't provide us with any DRM magic that will magically make trial builds for us, if that's what you are asking. Devs have to do much of the work to make a trial.

>All of this feels like 'praying'...

Yup. We in the dev community are always praying.

This is now very much permissible; see bullet point five in section 3.1.1 of the Review Guidelines for detailed instructions. "Price Tier 0" simply means that the IAP is free. You would then check the purchase date in the App Store receipt against the current date to see if the trial has expired. Since the IAP is non-consumable, it can only be purchased once per Apple ID, no matter how many devices the app is installed on (the date in the receipt would sync to each). Hope this helps!