Definition
What it measures
Download-to-paid conversion is the percentage of people who install an app and go on to pay, measured over a fixed window such as 35 days from install. The denominator is every install, whether or not the user ever started a trial or reached a paywall. That makes it an honest top-of-funnel number: it captures how well the whole experience turns curiosity into revenue.
Not the same as trial-to-paid
Download-to-paid is routinely confused with trial-to-paid conversion, which is a different metric with a smaller denominator: the share of people who started a free trial and then paid. An app can have a high trial-to-paid rate and a low download-to-paid rate if few installs ever start a trial. Always check which one a benchmark is quoting. In RevenueCat's 2026 data, download-to-paid by day 35 was around 10.7% for hard paywall apps and about 2.1% for freemium apps.
Where pricing moves it
Because it counts every install, download-to-paid is highly sensitive to price fit across markets. A price set for a US wallet suppresses conversion everywhere else, so localizing prices to local purchasing power with localized pricing is one of the most direct levers on this number in non-US regions.
Examples
Example
An app gets 10,000 installs in a month. If 210 of them are paying by day 35, its download-to-paid conversion is 2.1%, a typical freemium figure. If the same app ran a hard paywall and converted 1,070, it would be at 10.7%. Neither number is trial-to-paid, which would only look at the users who actually started a trial.
Frequently asked
What is download-to-paid conversion?
It is the share of app installs that become paying customers over a set window, such as day 35. It counts all installs, not only people who started a free trial, which makes it a whole-funnel measure of how well the app turns downloads into revenue.
What is a good download-to-paid conversion rate?
It depends on the model. RevenueCat's 2026 data shows around 10.7% by day 35 for hard paywall apps and about 2.1% for freemium. Compare against your own model, and do not confuse these figures with trial-to-paid rates.
Is download-to-paid the same as trial-to-paid?
No. Download-to-paid uses all installs as the denominator. Trial-to-paid only counts users who started a free trial. They measure different things and are frequently mixed up in benchmarks, so always check which one a number refers to.
Further reading
- Subscription vs One-Time vs Hybrid: What Each Does to Your App RevenueSubscription, one-time, or both? A 2026 look at what each model does to your revenue over time, with the churn, reactivation, and commission math.
- How Much Money Do Subscription Apps Actually Make?How much money do subscription apps make? The real 2026 benchmarks, what separates the winners, and the revenue lever most founders never touch.