Making a promo code redeem without kicking you out of the app
Small ship this week, but I sat on the why longer than the code.
I build an app people open in the hard ten minutes with a kid — a tantrum, a bedtime that came apart. Whoever's using it is, by definition, not in a state to go spelunking through Settings. So Apple's standard path for redeeming a code always bugged me: copy it, leave the app, App Store → tap your face → Redeem Gift Card or Code, paste, switch back, hope it took. Fine for a productivity tool. For someone at the end of their rope, that's where you lose them.
This release pulls it inside — a "Redeem a code" row opens Apple's native sheet over the app (RevenueCat's presentCodeRedemptionSheet underneath), and on success the entitlement just flips. No bounce out, no coming-back-and-wondering.
What I keep turning over: how much redemption friction is Apple's rails vs. self-inflicted by where we bury the entry point? Any iOS folks found a cleaner in-app offer-code flow than the StoreKit sheet?
Replies
you are further along than me on this, honestly, i haven't wired up the in-app sheet yet. but one thing worth flagging if you ever go cross-platform: the StoreKit redemption sheet is iOS-first. on macos it's gated to macos 15+, so the "flip the entitlement in-app" flow you just built doesn not cover everyone the same way. i got bitten by that last week.
on your actual question, i think it's mostly self-inflicted. apple owns the sheet, but we own where the entry point lives and how scary it looks. burying it in settings is a choice. the reframe that helped me: the code isn't the moment of value, it's a tax before the value, so put the effort into making the post-redeem state obviously worth it rather than fighting friction apple controls.
that "came back and wondered if it took" gap is the real one though. the silent entitlement flip is the right fix. nice ship.