Superwall says its infrastructure is free. I'm a RevenueCat customer, so I ran the numbers.
💡 TL;DR
Superwall's infrastructure is free on its published pricing (4 Nov 2026); its paywalls are billed separately. At $4,200 a month the fee gap with RevenueCat is $42, and moving can cost more than that for years.
Jake Mor, Superwall's CEO, posted on X: "who's ready for free RevenueCat? (finally)". I saw it and got curious, because I'm a RevenueCat customer and I like the product. So I ran the numbers.
Superwall's subscription infrastructure is free at any scale on its published pricing (4 Nov 2026), and its paywalls are billed separately. For an app making $4,200 a month, the difference in fees is $42 a month, with or without Superwall paywalls (without them, the two aren't like for like). The hours you spend moving can cost more than that for years.
I have no commercial ties to any of these companies, other than being a RevenueCat customer.
To run the numbers I built a calculator as an afternoon project. The prices below come from the official pages as they read on 4 Nov 2026. The math is here so you can catch me out :-)
Below $2,500 a month, fees are no reason to move
Below $2,500 a month, RevenueCat, Superwall's Indie plan (paywalls included), Adapty, Qonversion and Apphud all list $0. Purchasely doesn't publish prices.
RevenueCat's rule is free under $2,500, then 1% of all revenue. At $2,500 the fee applies to all $2,500, so it's $25.
An app making $4,200 a month
This app is made up. Say it makes $4,200 a month and all of it could go through paywalls.
- RevenueCat: $4,200 x 1% = $42 a month. That includes its paywall editor and A/B testing.
- Superwall Indie, with Superwall paywalls on all revenue: free up to $10k of monthly attributed revenue, so $0.
The difference is $42 a month, or $504 a year. Nice to have, but first you have to move.
Moving means changing every entitlement check, testing purchases again and shipping a release, and App Review gets a vote too. Here is one illustrative payback. The hours and the rate are made up, so please use your own:
- Cost of the move: 40 hours x $75 an hour = $3,000
- Payback: $3,000 / $42 a month = about 71 months, just under 6 years
Superwall says a coding agent does the swap "in under an hour". I haven't tried it, and I would still test purchases by hand. If the whole job is 8 hours, that's 8 x $75 = $600, and $600 / $42 = about 14 months.
Users on old versions also keep the old SDK until they update, so I think you would run both for a while. That's my reading. Superwall's migration guide doesn't cover it.
How Superwall's plans compare with RevenueCat
Superwall's Indie plan never costs more than RevenueCat in listed fees. Its fee is based on MAR, monthly attributed revenue, which Superwall defines as only the revenue attributed to a Superwall paywall. RevenueCat's is based on MTR, all the revenue it tracks. For the same app, I don't see how MAR could exceed MTR, though that's my inference, because neither company compares the two. Up to $10k of MAR, Indie is $0. Above that, Indie is 1% of a number equal to or smaller than the one RevenueCat charges 1% on.
Startup and Scale can cost more, because they add a monthly base fee. Here all revenue goes through Superwall paywalls, so every Superwall figure includes paywalls:
| Monthly revenue | RevenueCat | Superwall Indie | Superwall Startup | Superwall Scale |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| $1,000 | $0 | $0 | $59 | $209 |
| $4,200 | $42 | $0 | $91 | $241 |
| $50,000 | $500 | $500 | $549 | $699 |
Those two plans also come with more features, for example surveys and localization on Startup, and refund protection on Scale.
If you build your own paywalls, the picture changes. With no Superwall paywalls, Superwall lists $0 at $50,000 a month, against $500 for RevenueCat. The two aren't like for like, because RevenueCat's $500 includes paywalls and experiments. But if you really don't need them, the same $3,000 move pays back in $3,000 / $500 = 6 months.
Three things in the fine print
- Superwall bills only paywall-attributed revenue. Its page says "Subscriptions purchased outside Superwall are free" and "Imported & pre-integration users are never billed". I read that as: an app moving over doesn't pay on the subscribers it already has. My calculator doesn't model this.
- RevenueCat's fee covers the whole product. The page says "All of RevenueCat's features", and lists a paywall editor and A/B testing. So 1% at RevenueCat and 1% at Superwall pay for different things, on different revenue.
- RevenueCat also offers Growth Tools on your own infrastructure. You "only pay on the conversions from the tools you use", at "1% of MTR on what you track". The page says "Talk to us" and gives no threshold, so I left it out of the numbers.
Where this leaves me
So what do I do with all this, as a RevenueCat customer? I haven't decided. For now I'm just assessing, and these numbers are part of that.
If your numbers already point one way, I'd like to hear why.
Why I like seeing this competition
When one company is the default, I think it's easy to stop reading pricing pages. Jake's post got me to open all of them.
Both teams deserve some credit here. RevenueCat's FAQ gives a plain example: "For $2.5K, we'll charge you $25". One fee covering the paywall editor and A/B testing is also simple to reason about. Superwall includes direct SQL access to your subscription data on every plan, and its pricing page works through its own example at $50k a month. Adapty, Qonversion and Apphud publish their prices too, each with a different threshold.
I'd like both companies to keep pushing each other. More public prices means a dev can choose by what the product does for their app.
One more thing to check while you're at it
For many apps this fee gap is small, so while your spreadsheet is open, maybe ask a second question: what does your price look like abroad? I build PricePush, so keep that in mind. It turns one price into localized prices for every country and updates both stores in one click. Localized prices can lift international revenue without ad spend. Results vary. I haven't seen anyone measure how that compares with fees, so I can't tell you which one matters more for your app. Did you ever check what your price looks like in India or Brazil?
Try your own numbers
The calculator opens on the $4,200 example, with all revenue on Superwall paywalls. Change the revenue, the paywall share and the plan to match your app.
If you want more detail, I also put together Superwall vs RevenueCat, RevenueCat pricing, RevenueCat alternatives and Adapty vs RevenueCat.
If I got a number wrong, let me know and I'll fix it.
Sources
Checked 4 Nov 2026.
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