Checklist · 2026-04-30 · ~1,800 words

How to disable iOS billing on Patreon: a November 2026 checklist

Apple's 30% in-app fee starts applying to Patreon iOS subscriptions on November 1, 2026 — both new pledges and renewals. The action that protects you is one Patreon settings toggle. The work that actually keeps your revenue intact happens in the two weeks before you flip it, the thirty days after, and one accounting check on the first payout. Six phases, below, with the receipts.

This is the long, calendar-shaped version of the toggle-flipping how-to. If you only need the five-click click-path, the five-step short version covers exactly that. This page is for creators who want the prep, the scripts, and the numbers around the toggle, not just the toggle.

Who this checklist is for

A Patreon creator running a paid tier through the Patreon iOS app today, with measurable iOS-billed subscribers, who plans to remain on Patreon (at least for now). If your plan is to leave Patreon entirely, the migration playbook is in our web-only explainer and the platform comparison is in the eight-platform alternatives ledger. Either of those still benefits from this checklist's audit-and-comms phases — you only skip the toggle and substitute a destination URL for "patreon.com on the web."

Phase 1 — Audit (two weeks before toggle day)

Goal: answer four questions on paper before you touch a setting. The answers determine your messaging, your DM list, and the bar for what counts as success.

What share of your active subscribers are iOS-billed? In Creator Settings → Membership → Payouts, the breakdown of revenue by payment source is published monthly. Sum the last three months. If the iOS share is under 15%, the entire exercise is low-stakes and you can compress phases 2–4 into a single weekend. If it is over 50%, slow down — you are about to ask half your fans to take an action.
Who are your top decile subscribers? Export the patron list (Members → Active patrons → Export CSV). Sort by tier, descending. The top 10% by spend usually represent 40–60% of revenue, and they are the cohort you will DM personally in phase 5. Identify them now.
What is your fan support volume on a normal week? Tickets, DMs, comments asking "is my subscription working?" — establish the baseline. The first week after toggle day will roughly double it; you need to know "normal" to know when you're back to it.
What does your tier description currently say about billing? Most creators don't mention it. After toggle day, a single line on each tier — "Subscribe via the web at patreon.com/yourhandle — iOS app users tap 'Subscribe on the web' on the join screen" — prevents about half the support tickets you would otherwise get.

Phase 2 — Comms (one week before toggle day)

Three artifacts. Write them now so toggle day is mechanical, not creative.

The all-fans announcement post. Locked-tier post on Patreon, plain language, three paragraphs: (a) what's changing on Nov 1, (b) what fans on iOS need to do at their next renewal, (c) why you are doing it now rather than in October. The web-only explainer has a copy-paste template at the bottom; trim it for your tone of voice.
The top-decile DM template. Personalised, addresses the patron by name, names their tier, and shows their specific dollar impact ("Apple takes $X out of your $Y/mo pledge starting Nov 1 — here's the one click to re-subscribe on the web"). The 30-percent fee page has the math you can paste into the calculation if needed.
The FAQ block. Five questions — "Will I be charged twice?", "Why is Patreon doing this?", "Does this affect Android?", "What happens if I do nothing?", "Can I just cancel and join again later?" — with two-sentence answers. Save it as a Patreon post pinned to your feed for the duration of the migration window. Cuts inbound support volume by another 30–40%.

Phase 3 — Toggle day (the actual flip)

Pick a Tuesday or Wednesday. Avoid Mondays (weekend backlog absorbs your attention) and Fridays (support tickets compound over the weekend when you can't reply). Aim for early in your timezone — you want a full business day to watch the dashboard.

Sign in to patreon.com on a desktop or mobile web browser. The iOS app deliberately doesn't expose this control — Apple would call it steering.
Open Creator → Settings → Payments and Taxes. Scroll to "In-app payments" (recent UI) or "iOS subscriptions" (older UI). Both are the same setting.
Toggle off. Confirm in the modal. Patreon queues an email to all currently-iOS-billed patrons, sent the next business day, explaining that they'll need to re-subscribe via the web at next renewal. You don't have to send anything yourself yet.
Update your tier descriptions immediately — phase 1 question 4. Add the one-line "Subscribe via the web" note to every paid tier.
Publish the all-fans announcement post (phase 2, artifact 1) within the same hour. Pin the FAQ post to your feed.
Set a 60-minute timer and stay on Patreon DMs + email + your Discord/Telegram support channel. The first hour is when confused fans surface, and a fast reply prevents most of them from concluding "Patreon is broken" and lapsing.

Phase 4 — Watch the inbox (days 1 through 7)

The first week roughly doubles your support volume. Most of it is the same three questions repeated. Pre-write canned answers and use them.

"My subscription stopped working." → It hasn't — your renewal will go through the web at next charge date, here's the one-click link.
"Will I be billed twice?" → No, Patreon cancels the iOS-billed renewal on their side when you re-subscribe via the web.
"Can I keep paying through the iOS app?" → After Nov 1, yes, but Apple will take an extra 30%; the web path is the same price to you with no extra cut.

Track inbound volume against the phase-1 baseline. When daily volume returns to normal — usually around day 5–7 for an under-50%-iOS account, day 10–14 for a heavier one — phase 4 is over.

Phase 5 — Personal DMs (days 8 through 30)

The top-decile DM list from phase 1, sequenced over three weeks rather than blasted in one day. Forty DMs spread across twenty days reads as personal; forty DMs in one afternoon reads as a campaign and converts noticeably worse.

The DM template from phase 2 — patron name, tier, specific dollar impact, one click to re-subscribe. Reply to whatever response you get; this is the single most LTV-positive action you'll take all month. High-tier patrons who answer a personal message tend to upgrade their tier within 90 days, not the other way around. Don't let the DM be the only message they get from you that month.

Skip the bottom-tier patrons (under $5/mo). DM economics flip at that price point — replying to even one support follow-up costs you more than the lifetime value of the recovered subscription. The published Patreon email from toggle day is the only outreach that cohort gets, and that's the right call.

Phase 6 — Reconcile the first payout (day 30+)

The first monthly payout after toggle day is the one to read carefully. Three line items shift:

Gross subscription revenue drops by the lapsed-iOS attrition. Plan for 5–15% of the iOS cohort to not re-subscribe. On a $4,200/mo account with 60% iOS share, the pessimistic 10% attrition is a $252/mo haircut on gross.
Apple's 30% goes to zero on the web-billed share. If you flipped before Nov 1, this line was already zero; if you flip after, you'll see the cut shrink month-over-month as iOS renewals roll over to web.
Patreon's 8% Pro fee continues unchanged, scaled to the new (slightly lower) gross. Patreon's percentage is platform-wide and indifferent to billing path.

The math, on the same canonical $4,200/mo · 60% iOS show:

$4,200 / mo · 60% iOS · post-toggle steady state

Gross (after 10% iOS attrition)$3,948/mo

Apple 30% (none — web checkout)$0/mo

Patreon 8% Pro fee−$316/mo

Payment processing−$129/mo

You keep, monthly$3,503/mo

Compare against doing nothing — same account, Apple's 30% applied to the iOS slice from Nov 1, no attrition because no toggle, gross stays at $4,200/mo but you keep $2,971/mo. The toggle steady state is $532/mo ahead even with pessimistic attrition. In the optimistic 5%-attrition scenario the gap widens to $679/mo. Annualized, that's between $6,400 and $8,100 recovered each year — for one toggle and one month of focused comms work.

Three traps in the first payout

Don't read the gross drop as failure. The whole point of the toggle is to take a one-time gross hit (attrition) in exchange for a permanent net gain (no Apple cut on web renewals). Fixate on the net column.
Don't assume the iOS-billed share goes to zero immediately. Existing iOS renewals roll over on their original cadence — a fan who renews on the 23rd of each month triggers their web-renewal flow on the 23rd after toggle day, not on toggle day itself. Full iOS-share-to-zero usually takes 60–90 days.
Don't conclude anything from week one. The first week is bimodal — support volume spikes, gross volume hasn't moved yet. Your monthly net only stabilizes by day 30, so let the data settle before deciding anything strategic.

What this checklist deliberately doesn't cover

Switching off Patreon entirely. If your plan is to migrate the audience to your own domain, the iOS-toggle attrition month is the best window to do it — the migration cost is already priced in, and adding a destination URL that isn't Patreon converts at roughly the same rate. The patreon-vs-membership-site decision page frames when this is worth the second behavior change.
Apple Pay vs Apple in-app purchase. Different things. Apple Pay (Touch ID confirmation on a credit-card-on-file) on a web browser is fine — Apple takes nothing. The Apple-Pay-on-Patreon page covers the distinction in detail.
Google Play / Android billing. Google Play's commission is a separate question. Most regions on Patreon's Android app already route through web checkout, so the equivalent toggle is often already off — but check the "In-app payments — Android" line in your settings to confirm.
Refunds for double-billed fans. Rare in practice — Patreon prevents the double-charge case server-side — but if a fan reports it, the resolution is a Patreon support ticket on the fan's side, not yours.

If the recovery looks small

Two outcomes converge. Either the iOS share was smaller than you thought (the toggle was low-stakes, do it anyway, move on), or the 8% Patreon fee is now the bigger line item (in which case the next decision to evaluate is whether Patreon-on-web is the right home at all). On a $4,200/mo account, the 8% Patreon fee is ~$336/mo — bigger than the typical monthly attrition cost — and that fee is what KeepTier and the other self-hosted options replace. The eight-platform ledger has the side-by-side; the Memberful comparison covers the closest peer.

YOUR NUMBERS, NOT OURS

Plug in your monthly revenue and your iOS share — the calculator returns your specific Apple cut, your post-toggle steady state, and the gap between "toggle and stay" vs "leave Patreon entirely."

Open the calculator →