# 7-day free trial on the $24.99 yearly plan: +131% paywall conversion

- Outcome: Won
- Page type: Paywall (App)
- Elements: Free trials, Pricing
- Date shared: 2024-09
- Test run by: [Stardust](https://liftarchive.com/practitioners/stardust/)
- Commentary by: LiftArchive (our analysis, not theirs)
- Original source: https://superwall.com/blog/how-stardust-increased-ios-app-revenue-by-4x-in-six-weeks
- Page: https://liftarchive.com/test/stardust-add-7-day-trial/

Adding a 7-day free trial to Stardust's $24.99 yearly plan lifted paywall conversion by 131%. Across the test, trials raised proceeds per user by 78% and paying subscribers by 45%. Stardust, a cycle and pregnancy tracking app, ran this test, written up on the Superwall blog.

## Result

**+131% paywall conversion**

- Paywall conversion: +131% for the $24.99 yearly plan with a 7-day trial vs no trial.
- Every variant with a free trial converted better than the control.
- After the trials ended, adding a trial raised proceeds per user by 78% and paying subscribers by 45%.
- Yearly share: the winning variant raised the share of yearly subscriptions by more than 50%.
- Higher-price variants without a trial converted worse, with similar proceeds per user.

## Control

A $24.99 yearly plan with no free trial.

## Variant

The same $24.99 yearly plan with a 7-day free trial. It was one of five variants, which also tested higher prices with and without trials.

## Why it likely won (our reading)

- A free trial removes the risk of paying up front, so more users are willing to start.
- A low yearly price plus a trial is an easy yes for users who are unsure.
- The team waited for trials to end before calling it, so the gains held up after the trial-to-paid step.

## Caveats

This was a multi-variant test with five price variants, and the blog post was written by Superwall, which sells the paywall testing tool used. Sample size and duration were not shared.

## How to run this test

- Hypothesis: If we add a 7-day free trial to our yearly plan, then more users will subscribe because they can try premium before paying.
- Primary metric: Proceeds per user after trials end
- Guardrail: Trial-to-paid conversion
- Guardrail: Paying subscribers
- Guardrail: Refund rate
- Who should test it: Apps that sell a yearly plan with no trial. Apps that already offer a trial, or whose value is used up within the trial, may see less gain.

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Credit: Stardust ran this test and owns the result. Summary and commentary by LiftArchive (https://liftarchive.com/test/stardust-add-7-day-trial/).
Usage: Free to use, quote and build on, with credit and a link: name the practitioner or organization that ran the test and link to its LiftArchive page. The results belong to the practitioners who ran and shared them; the summaries and commentary are LiftArchive's.