In-app purchases to unlock paid functions

Question

I am looking to release two version of my app: free and paid. The paid app will have a few more functions but no extra content as such. Originally I was going to release two separate apps on the market but it is proving difficult to keep a single code base and have two separate apps.

Would in-app purchases be a better way to do this? So I release a free app and then allow users to purchase a unlock for the extra functions. This would also mean that I wouldn't have to explicitly use the licensing part of the Android development as that is taken care of within the in-app purchasing.

Answer 1

There are three strategies which come to my mind:

1. Release two versions, a free version and a paid version. The paid version contains additional features. To make development easier, you should use Android Libaries. These prevent the duplication of code.

Advantages:

• Simpler to implement.
• Works on other markets as the Android Market because it is not dependant on it.

Disadvantage:

• If the user has some data in the free version, you must provide a import functionality for the paid version or the user will loose the data.
• You have two versions on the market which get different reviews.

2. Release App + Unlock App: a free version which contains all features but some features are locked. Unlock them using a "unlock app" which is a simple paid app released on the market.

Advantages:

• Simple to implement.
• Works on other markets as the Android Market because it is not dependant on it.

Disadvantes:

• Is not that intuitive because the user has a "useless" app installed.

3. Release one version: a free version which contains all features but some features are locked. Unlock them using in-app purchases.

Advantages:

• Finegrained solution: You can unlock different features for different prices.

Disadvantes:

• Not that simple to implement, the In-App-API is tricky
• Does not work without Android Market