The fitness app market is characterized by high initial motivation and rapid churn. People download your app on January 1st because they hate themselves. By January 15th, they hate the gym more. You must structure your pricing to capture value while motivation is peaking.
The Annual Plan Imperative
Most indie developers default to a $9.99/mo subscription. The math on this is fatal:
- Cost to acquire a trial user: $15
- Trial to Paid conversion: 40%
- Cost per paid user (CAC): $37.50
- Revenue month 1: $7.00 (after Apple's 30% cut)
You are in the hole by $30.50. You need the user to stay for 5 months just to break even. Given fitness app churn rates, only 20% of users will make it to month 5. You are losing money on every user.
The Fix: The Decoy Effect
Price your monthly plan at $14.99 or $19.99. Price your annual plan at $69.99. The monthly plan exists only to make the annual plan look like a steal. You want 70%+ of your users choosing annual. You get the cash upfront, which you can immediately recycle into ads.
The Hard Paywall vs Freemium
Do not build a freemium app unless you have massive venture capital to burn on server costs for free users.
Use a Hard Paywall: Users download the app, go through onboarding (where you demonstrate value), and hit a paywall offering a 7-day free trial. If they don't subscribe, they can't use the app. This filters out low-intent users and maximizes immediate cash flow.
Price Testing
You should be testing pricing constantly. Use tools like RevenueCat to run A/B tests on your paywall. Test $59/yr vs $79/yr. You might find that $79/yr has a slightly lower conversion rate, but the higher LTV more than makes up for it.
Do The Math
Use our calculators to see how pricing impacts your business viability.