Apple lets you pay monthly installments for annual subscriptions - but there’s a catch

If you own an Apple device, chances are that you are using an app or two that requires you to pay a subscription fee for using its premium services. But here’s a thing about these subscriptions, a lot of them require you to pay for a year’s subscription fee upfront – something no one likes. To ease this pressure, Apple has introduced a new subscription plan, one that makes these payments easier to pay for users.

Apple has announced monthly subscription payments for apps available on the App Store. (Apple)

Shweta Ganjoo is a Chief Content Producer at HT Tech. She has over 10 years of experience covering technology, during which time she has focused on consumer tech devices, AI, social media, gadgets, and tech policy, delivering authoritative and reader-focused insights across India’s fast-evolving digital ecosystem.

She began her career in the early 2010s, building a strong foundation in digital-first reporting as India’s tech landscape rapidly expanded. Over the years, she has worked with leading media organizations including India Today Tech, Indian Express Group, and Techlusive, where she played a key role in scaling editorial content and audience engagement. At HT Tech, she drives product recommendation coverage, combining newsroom leadership with hands-on reporting experience.

Her expertise spans smartphones, wearables, smart home devices, AI, and social media ecosystems, along with regulatory developments shaping the tech industry. Shweta is known for her analytical approach to product reviews and news coverage, grounded in hands-on testing and real-world usability. She has conducted industry interviews, tracked emerging tech trends, and produced research-backed stories using verified sources and expert inputs. She holds a masters in Mass Communication, which complements her professional experience in digital journalism and content strategy, and aligns with her academic background in technology. Shweta follows a reader-first editorial philosophy, prioritising accuracy, transparency, and fact-checked reporting to deliver reliable, insightful, and practical insights.

How is Apple making subscription payments easier?

Apple has announced monthly subscription payments for apps available on the App Store. With this, Apple device users will be able to pay monthly installments for their subscriptions instead of paying a year’s subscription fee upfront. But there’s a catch.

These monthly subscription payments come with a lock-in period of 12 months. This means that you would still have to pay for a year’s subscription but the payment will be divided into 12 monthly installments. For understanding, if your annual subscription costs you ₹1,200, you would now be able to make the entire payments in 12 installments of ₹100 every month. If an app offers you a discounted annual subscription, the annual payment will get distributed into 12 monthly installments.

However, cancelling the subscription in the middle of the commitment year won’t automatically cancel the payments. Instead, your payments will continue and your subscription will remain active until the year-long commitment period ends. But that will prevent the subscription from renewing automatically after the year’s time frame ends. Also, failing to make a payment will lead you to lose access to your subscription.

Simply put, with its new subscription plan, Apple is giving users more flexibility in terms of making payments for their app subscriptions. The time frame for the subscriptions made through the App Store, however, remains the same, that is, one year.

Apart from this, Apple is also making it easier for users to track their monthly app subscription payments. App Store page for apps with active subscriptions will show monthly payment amount along with the due date for next payment.

Who is getting this feature?

Apple has confirmed that it has started rolling out this feature to all its users except the ones in the US and Singapore. Apple device users will get this feature with the release of iOS 26.5, iPadOS 26.5, macOS Tahoe 26.5, tvOS 26.5, and visionOS 26.5 in May this year.

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