Good news for people who use Family Sharing on their Apple devices. From now on you can also share in-app purchases with each other, so you don’t have to buy them twice. We show you how to activate this.
Share in-app purchases on iOS and macOS
With Apple’s family sharing features, family members can share their apps with each other, so they don’t have to be purchased again. Apple has quietly expanded its capabilities in this area.
From now on it is possible for family members to also share in-app subscriptions with each other. In addition, sharing now also applies to in-app purchases. Good news, because in 2020 more and more apps are using in-app purchases to earn money.
In a message to developers, Apple explains how it works. Apps must enable the family sharing feature themselves, once they do, you only have to buy an in-app purchase again to make it available to everyone in your family. There is a limit of a maximum of five family members.
Apple distinguishes between ‘consumable’ and ‘non-consumable’ in-app purchases. The difference is as follows.
- Consumable in-app purchases: Purchases that allow you, for example, to spend coins in games for skins and other one-time digital products.
- Non-consumable in-app purchases: A one-time in-app purchase that unlocks, for example, the pro features of a drawing app.
In this case it concerns the ‘non-consumable’ variant that you can share with the family. As mentioned it depends on developers whether they add this feature or not.
This is how you download an app with in-app purchases
To take advantage of it, another family member must download the app from the family owner’s purchase history. You do this as follows.
- Open the Settings app;
- Tap your Apple ID;
- Tap Family Sharing;
- Make sure that parts of purchases are turned on;
- Open the App Store;
- Tap your avatar in the top right corner;
- Tap Purchases;
- Tap the family owner’s name;
- Download the apps you want.
In this way, the in-app purchases are also transferred to your iPhone, iPad or Mac. Provided the developer supports the option. Since the feature is relatively new, it may take a while for apps to add the option for it.
Also read: Apple Family Sharing: This is how you share apps and subscriptions with family members