Why do you have to pay for Apple Developer Program

Question

Created Apr ’18

Replies 6

Boosts 1

Views 7.9k

Participants 6

Hi

I am a registered apple developer and I am constantly fustrated with the tools provided by Apple. I think this would not be such a problem if they supplied all the resources required to a certain level and it didnt take a cut of my sales.

I find that if you want to develop for iPhone you have to own a physical device e.g. In the simulator I cannot test In App Purchases. I know that is a simulator not an emulator but you would expect the almost baseline features to be supported.

What i woulld to know is what my annual membership pays for? Perhaps a one of fee would be suffice? Especially as Apple takes a cut of my sales anyway.

Thanks,
G

Boost

Answer 1

john daniel OP

Apr ’18

Your annual membership pays for your apps to have access to Apple's App Store and other infrastructures. Should you also choose to use Apple's payment system, then that is where the extra 30% comes in.

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Answer 2

Claude31 OP

Apr ’18

It pays for the software you use and for the service you get.

So, ultimately, question is : should we pay for Software (I think yes), how much: that's pricing strategy and we know it can be very different depending on vendor (remember Borland ?).

Note that you can use XCode without payment (with limitations of course)

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Answer 3

GP2 OP

Apr ’18

What i'm trying to get is why I pay for a product which doesn't allow me to do all the required testing. The product provided by apple seems to be still in production. It just seems over the top when you look at the other side of App Development Android

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Answer 4

scandeiro OP

Nov ’22

People like Steve Jobs are missed in the leadership [...] does anyone here really know where we're going?

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Answer 5

webtop OP

Feb ’24

Personally, I've never understood this. Nobody else does this. I wanted to get into Flutter development, but I don't want to code for Android. Maybe if they got rid of the $99 for single entities, developers would write more apps for iOS, then the sales cut would be more profitable.

A fee to create, and then a fee to sell is just wrong in every way.

3

Answer 6

milox OP

Apr ’24

No real reason, other than Apple is just greedy. With all the requirements and hoops you have to jump through these days to develop for iOS and submit apps, terrible and outdated development environment, an additional 15-30% fee on top of that, the 99$ annual fee is entirely unjustified especially when literally no one else does this anymore.

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