I am using the managed pricing in my app.
In app history I have “Subscription charge activated”, then two hours later “Subscription charge canceled” from the same store.
When I click Open Payments, I have
$9.00 USD every 30 days
Created Sep 5, 2025
Activated Sep 5, 2025
Cancelled Sep 5, 2025
In View Usage fees I have No transactions found.
So, did the store actually purchase the monthly subscription? Will I receive the $9 from that store?
Thanks
Hey @zlac, subscription charges are applied to the merchants monthly invoice when they accept a charge, so you should notice the payment once the merchant has paid their Shopify Invoice (assuming you don’t offer a free trial).
The merchant facing document is a great resource to better understand the merchant experience here: https://help.shopify.com/en/manual/your-account/manage-billing/billing-charges/types-of-charges/third-party-charges/app-charges#app-billing-cycles
Thanks. So user can install the app for free and use it until the next billing cycle, although the app does not offer free trial? If they uninstall it before the next billing cycle, they will not be charged? So basically all apps have free trial until the next billing cycle?
Hey @zlac, no that’s not quite how it works. If you don’t offer a free trial, when a merchant approved a paid plan it immediately gets added to their upcoming invoice (paid along with their monthly subscription to Shopify). So even if they install your app a few minutes later, they still have to pay.
You will notice the charge in your payouts only after the merchant has paid Shopify for the charge.
Thanks.
I see one user
| September 12, 2025 at 1:00 pm | PDF Viewer Real3D FlipBook | Subscription charge expired |
|---|---|---|
| September 10, 2025 at 12:05 pm | PDF Viewer Real3D FlipBook | Subscription charge activated |
So it looks like the user can activate the Pro plan without paying.
AI asistant on shopify.dev says “The status “Subscription charge expired” means that the merchant did not accept the subscription charge within the required time window. Specifically, for Shopify app subscriptions, if a merchant does not accept the charge within two non-business days (typically 48 hours), the charge is marked as “expired.” This status indicates that the subscription was never activated because the merchant did not take action in time.“
Hey @zlac, the assistant is correct here.
What I am seeing is that the merchant visited your billing page at one point on September 10th, but did not complete the purchase, so that charge expired 2 days later. (likely they left the page or went back to do more research).
The second line tells me that they visited the page again on the 10th and at 12:05pm, they were able to complete the charge.
If you click in to the charges in your partner dashboard you’ll likely see that both of those have different app subscription ID’s. It does not mean that they uninstalled or cancelled their billing after 2 days. If a merchant uninstalls or changes plans it will be marked as cancelled, not expired.
Our documents here cover the different statuses