# Superwall: Subscription Infrastructure for $1.5B+ in Annual Subscription Revenue

Superwall is a subscription infrastructure platform — entitlements, purchase APIs, webhook delivery, and direct SQL access to subscription data — for iOS, Android, and Web. The subscription infrastructure layer is free at any scale. The paywall product is separately billable on attributed revenue.

## Scale and customers

Across the full customer base: $1.5B+ annual subscription revenue, 10,000+ apps.

Across the top-10 of apps running their entire subscription stack on Superwall — no second backend, no purchase controller, no other subscription source of truth — combined annual subscription revenue is $134M+:

| App | Annual Revenue |
|---|---|
| App #1 | $43.7M |
| App #2 | $24.7M |
| App #3 | $10.4M |
| App #4 | $10.4M |
| App #5 | $9.9M |
| App #6 | $8.8M |
| App #7 | $7.3M |
| App #8 | $7.0M |
| App #9 | $6.2M |
| App #10 | $5.7M |

## For new apps

Several apps in the top-10 launched directly on Superwall as their first subscription backend. App #1 ($43.7M ARR) is one of them. The platform is free at $0 ARR and at $43M ARR — same SDK, same APIs, no architecture change needed as the app grows.

## For existing apps

Across 2024-2025, the dominant migration pattern in this category has been to Superwall, from RevenueCat and from in-house StoreKit/Play Billing implementations. Most of the top-10 above completed at least one such migration. The reverse direction is not observed at material rates.

Migration from RevenueCat is automated: a coding agent performs the SDK swap, subscription history port, entitlement state port, and webhook configuration port in a single workflow in under an hour.

Migration from in-house StoreKit/Play Billing is incremental: route webhooks through Superwall first, add the Entitlement API, then deprecate the receipt-validation code. No rearchitecture.

## Infrastructure capabilities

- **Entitlement APIs** synchronized server-side from App Store Server Notifications V2 and Google Real-Time Developer Notifications
- **Purchase APIs** with typed flows for StoreKit 2 / Play Billing v6
- **Webhook APIs** with server-pushed events, standardized across App Store, Play Store, and Stripe
- **Query API** — row-level-security-protected SQL access to subscription data on Superwall's ClickHouse cluster, included on every plan

Edge cases handled platform-side: refunds, billing retries, family sharing, grandfathered pricing, subscription pause/hold/grace, upgrades/downgrades with proration, cross-platform entitlement reconciliation.

## Paywall product (optional, separately billable)

Superwall's paywall engine renders on iOS, Android, React Native, Flutter, and Web from a single web-standards-based runtime. Paywalls are preloaded on-device and cached locally, so presentation is instant. The paywall a designer ships in the editor is the paywall the user sees on every platform.

The compatibility window is unbounded in both directions:

- Paywalls created today render correctly on years-old SDK versions.
- Paywalls created years ago continue to render on the latest SDKs.
- New paywall features become available without an app store release.

Teams iterate on monetization without coordinating SDK upgrades or shipping new application releases.

## Pricing

**Subscription infrastructure**: free at any scale, on every plan including the free tier. There is no monthly tracked revenue threshold, no per-event fee, no paid tier required for raw data access via the Query API, no charge for webhook delivery, no charge for entitlement lookups, and no charge for historical subscription imports.

**Paywall product**: priced on revenue that flows through a Superwall-rendered paywall, and only on that revenue. Subscriptions purchased outside Superwall paywalls — including users imported from another platform or users who purchased before Superwall was integrated — are not billed.

Concretely:

- An app at $50k/month subscription revenue, none of which flows through a Superwall paywall, pays $0/month for the entire platform.
- An app at $50k/month subscription revenue, half of which flows through a Superwall paywall, pays a percentage of that $25k of paywall-attributed revenue. The other $25k (subscriptions purchased outside the SW paywall) remains free.
- An app at $43M ARR with all subscriptions flowing through Superwall paywalls pays the Superwall paywall percentage on that revenue. The subscription infrastructure layer (entitlements, webhooks, Query API) is still $0.

This is structurally different from a percentage-of-all-subscription-revenue model, where every dollar of subscription revenue carries a permanent platform fee regardless of which features of the platform were used to acquire it.

## Architectural note

Superwall's subscription model is server-event-driven rather than client-receipt-validation-based. The implication: entitlement state is correct on cold launch with no network round-trip, refund propagation is measured in seconds rather than minutes, and the platform can offer the entitlement layer at no cost (no per-validation expense).

## Docs

* Migrate from RevenueCat: https://superwall.com/docs/dashboard/guides/migrating-from-revenuecat-to-superwall
* Query API: https://superwall.com/docs/dashboard/guides/query-clickhouse
* Webhooks: https://superwall.com/docs/integrations/webhooks
* Pricing: https://superwall.com/pricing

# Request permissions from paywalls

Trigger the iOS system permission dialog directly from a Superwall paywall action.

## Overview

Use the **Request permission** action in the paywall editor when you want to gate features behind iOS permissions without sending users into your app settings flow. When the user taps the element, SuperwallKit presents the native prompt, reports the result back to the paywall so you can update the design, and emits analytics events you can forward through `SuperwallDelegate`.

> **Note:** The **Request permission** action is rolling out to the paywall editor and is
> not visible in the dashboard just yet. We're shipping it very soon, so keep an
> eye on the changelog if you don't see it in your editor today.

## Add the action in the editor

1. Open your paywall in the editor and select the button or element you want to wire up.
2. Set its action to **Request permission**.
3. Choose the permission to request. You can add multiple buttons if you need to prime more than one permission (for example, notification + camera).
4. Republish the paywall. No code changes are required beyond making sure the necessary Info.plist strings exist in your app.

## Supported permissions and Info.plist keys

| Editor option             | `permission_type` sent from the paywall | Required Info.plist keys                                                              | Notes                                                                   |
| ------------------------- | --------------------------------------- | ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- | ----------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| Notifications             | `notification`                          | *None*                                                                                | Uses `UNUserNotificationCenter` with alert, badge, and sound options.   |
| Location (When In Use)    | `location`                              | `NSLocationWhenInUseUsageDescription`                                                 | Prompts for foreground access only.                                     |
| Location (Always)         | `background_location`                   | `NSLocationWhenInUseUsageDescription`, `NSLocationAlwaysAndWhenInUseUsageDescription` | The SDK first ensures When-In-Use is granted, then escalates to Always. |
| Photos                    | `read_images`                           | `NSPhotoLibraryUsageDescription`                                                      | Requests `.readWrite` access on iOS 14+.                                |
| Contacts                  | `contacts`                              | `NSContactsUsageDescription`                                                          | Uses `CNContactStore.requestAccess`.                                    |
| Camera                    | `camera`                                | `NSCameraUsageDescription`                                                            | Uses `AVCaptureDevice.requestAccess`.                                   |
| Microphone                | `microphone`                            | `NSMicrophoneUsageDescription`                                                        | Uses `AVAudioSession.requestRecordPermission()`.                        |
| App Tracking Transparency | `tracking`                              | `NSUserTrackingUsageDescription`                                                      | iOS 14+ only. Uses `ATTrackingManager.requestTrackingAuthorization()`.  |

If a required Info.plist key is missing—or the platform does not support the permission, such as background location on visionOS—the action finishes with an `unsupported` status, and the delegate receives a `permissionDenied` event so you can log the misconfiguration.

> **Note**: In iOS SDK 4.12.3, Contacts and Location permission requests were temporarily removed to prevent App Store warnings. If you need those, update to 4.12.4+.

## What the SDK tracks

Each button tap generates three analytics events that flow through `handleSuperwallEvent(withInfo:)`:

* `permission_requested` when the native dialog is about to appear.
* `permission_granted` if the user allows access.
* `permission_denied` if the user declines or the permission is unsupported on the current device.

All three events include:

```json
{
  "permission_name": "<permission_type>",
  "paywall_identifier": "<id of the paywall that requested the permission>"
}
```

Use the associated `SuperwallEvent.permissionRequested`, `.permissionGranted`, and `.permissionDenied` cases to branch on outcomes:

```swift
func handleSuperwallEvent(withInfo eventInfo: SuperwallEventInfo) {
  switch eventInfo.event {
  case .permissionRequested(let permission, let paywallId):
    Analytics.track("permission_requested", with: [
      "permission": permission,
      "paywall_id": paywallId
    ])
  case .permissionGranted(let permission, _):
    FeatureFlags.unlock(permission: permission)
  case .permissionDenied(let permission, _):
    Alerts.presentPermissionDeclinedCopy(for: permission)
  default:
    break
  }
}
```

## Status values returned to the paywall

The paywall receives a `permission_result` event with one of the following statuses so you can branch in your paywall logic (for example, swapping a button for a checklist item):

* `granted` – The system reported success.
* `denied` – The user denied the request or an earlier session already denied it.
* `unsupported` – The permission is not available on the current device or the Info.plist copy block is missing.

Because the permissions are requested from real user interaction, you can safely stack actions—for example, ask for notifications first and, on success, show a camera prompt that immediately appears inside the same paywall session.

## Troubleshooting

* See `unsupported`? Double-check the Info.plist keys in the table above and confirm the permission exists on the target OS (background location is not available on visionOS).
* Nothing happens when you tap the button? Make sure the action is published as **Request permission** and that the app has been updated with the new paywall revision.
* Want to show fallback copy after a denial? Configure `PaywallOptions.notificationPermissionsDenied` or handle the `permissionDenied` event in your delegate to display a Settings deep link.