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New in Electron 2: In-App Purchases

· 2 min read

The new Electron 2.0 release line is packed with new features and fixes. One of the highlights from this new major version is a new inAppPurchase API for Apple's Mac App Store.


In-app purchases enable content or subscriptions to be purchased directly from within apps. This gives developers an easy way to embrace the freemium business model, wherein users pay nothing to download an app and are offered optional in-app purchases for premium features, additional content, or subscriptions.

The new API was added to Electron by community contributor Adrien Fery to enable in-app purchases in Amanote, a note-taking Electron app for lectures and conferences. Amanote is free to download and allows clear and structured notes to be added to PDFs, with features like mathematical formulae, drawings, audio recording, and more.

Since adding in-app purchase support to the Mac version of Amanote, Adrien has noted a 40% increase in sales!

Getting Started

The new inAppPurchase API has already landed in the latest Electron beta:

npm i -D electron@beta

The docs for the API can be found on GitHub, and Adrien has been kind enough to write a tutorial on how to use the API. To get started adding in-app purchases to your app, see the tutorial.

More improvements to the API are in the works, and will soon be landing in an upcoming Electron beta release.

Windows Could Be Next

Up next, Adrien is hoping to open a new revenue channel for Amanote by adding support for Microsoft Store in-app purchases in Electron. Stay tuned for developments on that!