Charge upfront is a legacy billing model, which means it’s no longer available to new creators. If you’re already using charge upfront billing, your current setup will remain in place, and your members’ experience won’t change.
How charge upfront billing works
With charge upfront billing, members pay to join your membership and then monthly on the 1st after signup. members’ first payment gives them access to your backlog of creations and their membership. We then process members' payments on the 1st of every month after that.
Each first-of-the-month charge gives members membership access for that month. For example, a member's January 1st payment gives them membership access throughout January.
Members' experience with charge upfront billing
New member experience
New members pay when they sign up. A member's sign-up payment gives them access to your back catalog. Following their first payment, members’ bills renew on the 1st of each month at approximately 12:00 am PT.
Existing member experience
If you switched to charge upfront before September 16, 2022, you may have existing members and be wondering what they’ll experience. Members who joined before you enabled charge upfront billing will experience no billing change unless they increase their membership.
|
Existing member upgrades |
Existing member downgrades |
|
Suppose an existing member upgrades their membership after you switch to charge upfront. In that case, they'll pay the difference between their previous and upgraded membership. After their initial upgrade payment, we will process their membership renewal payment on the 1st of each month from then on.
|
If an existing member downgrades their membership, they'll experience no change. Since they aren't unlocking new content and have paid for the current month in total, there is no need for an additional payment. When their membership renews on the 1st of the month, their membership access and payment amount will reflect their new subscription. |
How to manage members with charge upfront billing
If you’ve launched on or after September 26, 2022, with charge upfront, then you’re starting fresh and you can refer to your Relationship manager to manage new members.
If you switched to charge upfront before September 26, 2022, a new billing month appears in your Relationship Manager.
When you get your first new member after turning on charge upfront, the current month will populate as a billing month in your Relationship Manager. The new month will include new members who joined after you switched and exclude existing members.
Why the change? Once we start processing new members' payments charge upfront, our system needs to account for that transition month. All of your members will pay for their renewal on the 1st of the month, but only new members will have an initial sign-up payment.
Your existing members will populate in the upcoming month's income reports.
As an example:
|
Pre charge upfront > |
Charge upfront enabled > |
Every month after |
|
member A joins on April 12. They pay on May 1 when you bill members monthly, but not with upfront billing. member A's payment is listed under the April line item in your Relationship manager with a May 1 processing date. |
On May 13, you turn on charge upfront. member B signs up and pays on May 20. For May, a new line item appears to account for this new income with your new billing model. |
On June 1, we process all of your members' (new and existing) subscription payments. A line item appears for June and includes member A and member B's payments. Every month after May has all members regardless of their join date. |
Apple's requirement to use iOS in-app purchases
Apple requires that purchases made in the Patreon iOS app use their in-app purchase (IAP) system. This system only supports our subscription billing model, which means charge upfront memberships can’t be purchased through the iOS app (except for U.S. customers purchasing memberships — see below).
For U.S. creators: We previously required creators to migrate to subscription billing because of Apple’s enforcement of IAP.
On April 30, 2025, a U.S. court ruled in the Epic v. Apple case that Apple can no longer collect fees on purchases made outside of the App Store in the U.S.
Because of this ruling, the subscription billing migration is paused. Creators will not need to switch to subscription billing in 2025.
That said, Apple still requires subscription billing for iOS transactions outside the U.S. To make sure international fans can subscribe through the Patreon iOS app, subscription billing remains the only model supported for creators with non-U.S. audiences. Switching to subscription billing also unlocks access to powerful growth tools like Free trials, Autopilot, Discounts, Gifting, and Tier repricing.
We’ll keep monitoring this closely. While Apple may introduce new requirements in the future, for now you don’t need to take action, and your U.S. fans aren’t affected.
If you’d like to migrate to subscription billing, you can do so in your Settings. Our team will help guide you through the process. Read more about how to move from the 1st of the month to subscription billing.
FAQ
-
Members who upgrade pay the difference between their previous pledge level and their new pledge level. Say that member D was charged $10 on March 1. They then upgraded to $15 on March 7. On March 7, they paid $5 to upgrade. member D has paid a total of $15 for March.
-
Members who downgrade will be charged the new amount on the 1st of the month. There is no charge for downgrading, and they’ll retain their original membership access until the next billing date on the 1st. members who downgrade will not receive a refund.
-
You’ll find a detailed payment history for each member in your Relationship manager.