Apple Developer Program: Fee, Enrolment and Account Types

Sooner or later every Apple developer has to decide when to pay for the Apple Developer Program, and in whose name. The fee is small, but the choice between enrolling as an individual and as an organisation decides whose name appears on the App Store, and changing it later takes a support request. This guide covers what you get, what it costs, the two kinds of membership, and fee waivers. Apple's details below come from its own pages as of 5 February 2026.

Shipping on Android too? The Google Play version of this guide is Google Play Developer Account: Fee, Types and Verification.

The short version

• A free Apple Account already gets you Xcode, documentation and testing on your own devices. You need the paid program to distribute apps.
• The program is 99 USD per membership year, or the local equivalent where Apple lists one.
• Enrol as an individual and your legal name is the seller. Enrol as an organisation and your company's legal entity name is the seller, but you need a legal entity and a D-U-N-S Number.
• Nonprofits, accredited educational institutions and government entities that meet Apple's conditions can ask for a fee waiver.

What you get without paying

As of 5 February 2026, Apple's Choosing a Membership page says that with just an Apple Account you can use Xcode, download software, read the documentation and sample code, post on the forums, file bugs in Feedback Assistant, and test your apps on your own devices. Xcode calls this a Personal Team.

That is enough to learn, prototype and run an app on your own phone. It is not enough to put anything in front of anyone else.

What the paid program adds

The same comparison lists what membership adds:

• App distribution on the App Store, plus custom and proprietary apps through Apple Business Manager and Apple School Manager.
• App Store Connect, for app management, testing and analytics, which includes TestFlight.
• Advanced app capabilities and services.
• Ad hoc distribution for testing and internal use.
• Notarisation and Developer ID for Mac apps distributed outside the Mac App Store.
• Access to developer events for members, or extra event content.

If you want testers on TestFlight, you need to be a member. Our TestFlight beta testing guide covers what you can do with it.

What it costs

As of 5 February 2026, Apple's enrolment page says the Apple Developer Program is 99 USD per membership year, and that prices may vary by region and are shown in local currency during enrolment. Apple's program enrolment help adds that if you enrol through the Apple Developer app, membership is an auto-renewable subscription that renews until cancelled. The separate Apple Developer Enterprise Program, for distributing proprietary apps to your own employees, is 299 USD a year.

On renewal, Apple's help says the Account Holder can renew from 30 days before the membership expires. Put the date in a calendar; an expired membership is not a problem you want to find on release day.

Individual or organisation?

This is the decision that matters. As of 5 February 2026, Apple's enrolment page and help set out these differences:

Points people miss

• A trade name is not enough. Apple does not accept DBAs, fictitious business names, trade names or branches. If you trade under a name but have not set up a company, you enrol as an individual and your own name is the seller.
• Use your legal name on your Apple Account. Apple says an alias, nickname or company name in the name fields of your Apple Account delays approval.
• The person enrolling must be able to bind the company. Apple lists owners and founders, executives, senior project leads, or an employee given that authority by a senior employee. If you are not the owner, you will be asked for a reference.
• Your website has to be real. A social media page or a registrar's parking page will not do.
• Apple may ask for notarised business documents when you enrol an organisation.

Which should a small team choose?

If you have a company, or expect to have one soon, enrol as an organisation. The company name appears as the seller, and you avoid a conversion later. Apple's help says that if you enrolled as an individual and need to convert to an organisation, you contact Apple.

If you are one person building an app on the side, enrolling as an individual is faster and needs no D-U-N-S Number. Just be comfortable with your own name on the product page. Apple's help also covers contractors: if you are building an app for a client to sell on the App Store, the client should enrol and add you to their team.

An organisation needs a D-U-N-S Number before it can enrol, and getting one takes time. Our guide to getting a D-U-N-S Number for Apple walks through it.

Fee waivers

As of 5 February 2026, Apple's fee waiver help page says nonprofit organisations, accredited educational institutions and government entities that meet certain requirements can ask for the annual fee to be waived. The conditions include:

• Being a legal entity with the relevant status, not an individual, sole proprietor or single-person business.
• Not having signed the Paid Applications Agreement to offer paid apps or in-app purchases, or having terminated it.
• Not otherwise selling digital goods or services through any of your apps.

You ask for the waiver during enrolment, or later as the Account Holder before your membership expires. The Account Holder confirms you are still eligible at each renewal. If you stop meeting the conditions, the waiver is removed and the normal fee applies.

Enrolling

You can enrol through the Apple Developer app or on the web, and Apple's enrolment help notes that in India enrolment is through the app. Individuals review the license agreement and buy the membership during enrolment. Organisations do so once Apple Developer Support has checked their details. If you pay by card as an individual, use your own card: Apple says otherwise your enrolment is delayed and you are asked for photo ID.

How FeedbackKit fits in

Membership gets your app onto the App Store and into testers' hands. It does not tell you what those people want next. Once you have users, ask them in the app, where they already are, rather than hoping they write it in a review.

That is what FeedbackKit does. Users post requests and vote inside your app, a new request starts with its submitter's vote, and voting stops when a request is Completed or Rejected, so the board shows what is still open. You see the same requests in the web dashboard and in the native admin apps for iPhone, iPad and Mac. The Swift SDK docs cover setup and the pricing page lists the plans. Here is how voting looks in FeedbackKit, with sample data from a fictional hiking app:

Enrol in the right name, put the renewal date in your calendar, and give your users a place to say what they want. Start free with FeedbackKit when your app is ready for them.