Following a landmark court decision, Spotify can now have subscription links within the iOS app in the US that allow users to make payments externally, bypassing all Apple payment systems. The company made the announcement today after it immediately sent out an update to its app, which Apple had to approve following the court’s orders.
With this update, users can now see all Spotify plans and promotions within the app and click on them to go to an external payment page. By doing so, the user is bypassing Apple’s payment system, which, as hassle-free as it is, also charged a 30% fee on top of the plan charges. Apple can also no longer charge a 27% fee for external payments made nor show scare-screens to the user when they click on external links, as per the court orders.
This free lunch to Spotify comes courtesy of Epic Games, who secured a landslide victory against Apple on April 30 in a US court, where the judge ordered Apple to stop charging developers a fee on external payment links and also to stop scaring users who try to click on external links. The court also found Apple in violation of a previous ruling that required Apple to allow developers to direct users to other payment systems. Moreover, an Apple VP was found lying on record, which will have its own separate ramifications.
Apple is currently in the process of appealing the court’s decision.