(March 13): Apple Inc is lowering the fees it collects from app developers in China, a major concession in a hugely lucrative market where the company faced the risk of antitrust intervention by local regulators.
The company said in a statement on Thursday that its typical commission on purchases will drop to 25% from 30% for its mainland China App Store. The move is effective March 15 and applies to apps for both iOS and iPadOS, Apple said on its developer website, noting the shift follows “discussions with the Chinese regulator”.
The iPhone maker is also trimming the rate for mini apps — the lightweight programmes that run within platforms like Tencent Holdings Ltd’s WeChat — to 12% from 15%. Developers who generated less than US$1 million ($1.28 million) in revenue during the prior year will also get the same rate.
The reduction of the so-called Apple tax marks a major climbdown by the Cupertino, California-based firm in its most important market after the US. It aims to resolve a long-running dispute between Apple and Chinese internet giants like Tencent and TikTok owner ByteDance Ltd, which effectively rival Apple’s operating system by hosting swaths of third-party developers within their super-apps.
“For Tencent and all developers, this will usher in a more open and mutually beneficial platform environment, which will help stimulate innovation,” Shenzhen-based Tencent said in a statement online. WeChat mini apps are a growing business segment for China’s internet pioneer and the reduction in Apple’s fees is projected by Jefferies analysts to add a low-single-digit percentage gain to its 2026 earnings.
Apple said on its website that it’s committed to terms that remain fair and transparent to all developers and to “always offering competitive App Store rates to developers distributing apps in China”. The US company has long policed its ecosystem to preserve quality and security, but in recent years, its once-universal 30% fee on in-app purchases has drawn scrutiny from global regulators.
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Apple previously shook up its commission structure in the EU to come into line with the bloc’s laws, which included allowing third-party app stores that bypassed its own. It’s not making such an allowance in China, only lowering rates. Elsewhere, the company now also allows apps in the US to freely point customers to the web to complete in-app transactions, bypassing its payment system. In Japan, Apple lowered its commission to 21% on some third-party in-app payments, among other major changes in response to local regulators.
“It’s a win for any app developers making significant revenue in China,” said Rich Bishop, founder of AppInChina, a firm that helps overseas developers distribute software in the country.
Bishop said that while fee reductions in other regions were driven by legislative mandates, Apple’s move in China appears to be a preemptive measure prompted by informal government pressure. “In other countries, laws were implemented which then required these fees to drop,” he said. “In China, it’s just the government saying, ‘We think these are too high. Please come down.’ That’s a very different way of doing things.”
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Bloomberg News reported last year that China’s antitrust watchdog, the State Administration for Market Regulation, is investigating Apple’s app fees in the region. Agency officials have been in discussions with Apple executives and app developers dating back to 2024 regarding the issue.
In another resolution to a high-profile standoff, Apple in November struck a deal with developers like Tencent to handle payments of purchases in mini games and apps. Previously, such payments were typically routed to methods outside Apple’s reach.
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