7 Pricing Insights

Hello Friends 👋, I have recently switched my team & focus from Retention to Monetization & Acquisition on the Duolingo English Test. So I want to learn as much as possible about pricing and packaging. Finally, this weekend, I locked myself in a room and analyzed the purchase flow & offerings of the top 100 grossing apps on the App Store + 20 of my most used apps that didn’t make the list. I learned a few things along the way that I would like to share today:

#1 Forever plans are priced at X2.8

Regardless of whether the following pricing plan was monthly, yearly, or even weekly, forever plans are almost always priced between X2.7-X2.8, the next highest tier shown.

#2 Yearly plans are equivalent to 6 weeks or 10 months

Yearly Plans are priced at X6 weekly plans (or 90% discount) and X10 monthly plans (or 16% discount), depending on the other plan offered.

#3 Common price points: $4.99, $9.99, $59.99

Half the weekly plans are priced at $4.99, a quarter of monthly plans are $9.99, and 10% of yearly plans are priced at $59.99.

#5 67% off is the magic number

Aggressive discounters use 67% off between yearly and monthly plans. The most utilized pricing points are $9.99 (monthly) vs. $39.99 (yearly) or $14.99 (monthly) vs. $69.99 (yearly). Examples: Calm, Flo, and Loona.

#6 Streaming platforms like monthly-only plans

Unlike other categories like health & fitness, Education, and Productivity. More than half the streaming subscriptions only offer a monthly plan. Examples: Spotify, Apple Music, and Youtube Premium.

#7 Quarterly plans are underutilized

Of the 120 apps analyzed, only 14 offered a quarterly or semi-annual plan. However, the small list includes companies with a strong experimentation culture like Grammarly, Tinder, and Headway.