TikTok In-App Purchases
TikTok might be under assault by the U.S. government, banned in India and not even available in China, but in February it had the highest in-app earnings in the world. And it wasn’t even close: TikTok’s $189 million from in-app revenue almost doubled the next-most-profitable app, YouTube, which only reached $111 million.
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In what is starting to be a bit of a broken record, TikTok was also the highest earning app in January and December of 2023, according to mobile analytics vendors AppFigures. And November and September, too. In fact, it’s been the top-earning global app for at least 15 months running.
TikTok has pretty much two sources of revenue. One is advertising, which isn’t covered in this report (but is very lucrative as well). The second is in-app purchases: people buy coins for about $0.02 each (the minimum buy is 65 coins at a time). Those coins can then be given to creators during live-streams, as tips in comments, or used for yourself to boost a personal post and make it more visible to other people.
TikTok may be routing around the App Store to save money on commissions. According to new findings, the ByteDance-owned social video app is presenting some of its users with a link to a website for purchasing the coins used for tipping digital creators. Typically, these coins are bought via in-app purchase, which requires a 30% commission paid to Apple.
The feature may be hidden from most users, either by design or because it’s only shown to users in a specific group, like testers or high spenders. In any event, those who do have access to the new option are seeing a screen that encourages them to “recharge” — that is, buy more coins — via tiktok.com.
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In some cases, users are shown a screen that includes a message such as “Try recharging on tiktok.com to avoid in-app service fees” followed by a “Try now” link.
As she notes, this does not seem to comply with Apple’s guidelines for external purchase links.
Previously:
- No Alternative Payments in Louisiana
- Apple Going After Patreon
- Apple Pressures ByteDance and Tencent Over IAP
- StoreKit Purchase Link Entitlement for United States
- Apple Rejects Spotify Update That E-mails External Purchase Info
- Bypassing IAP With In-Game Currencies
- External Link for Reader Apps
- Super Follows and IAP
- Fanhouse vs. Apple
- Epic Direct Payment
- New App Store Review Guidelines: Gifts, Face ID, ARKit
- Apple Wants 30% of Tips From Chinese Chat Apps
