Your payments infrastructure is the foundation that determines whether you can scale globally, retain customers, and actually make money on each transaction. AI app builders face unique monetization challenges — from evolving regulations and taxes to the potential for more frequent chargebacks — that require more than a basic payment processor can solve for.

Below, we walk through:

• The SaaS fundamentals every AI app business needs to master.
• Monetization challenges unique to AI businesses.
• How to monetize a web app versus a mobile app.
• How FastSpring can help.

FastSpring allows you to offload the complexity of global payments, VAT/GST and sales tax compliance, consumer payments support, and many other aspects of payments management. Spend less time managing your payments and compliance and more time building groundbreaking AI products! Set up a demo or try it out for yourself.

Start With SaaS Fundamentals

At their most basic, the majority of AI apps are still fundamentally SaaS businesses. Whether it’s a monthly subscription to your writing assistant or an annual plan for your analytics platform, the majority of AI tools run on recurring revenue.

So while you may be selling AI services instead of project management software, the core monetization principles are similar to those of subscription businesses.

Before diving into AI-specific challenges, you should nail the basics — things such as:

• Communicating well with customers around subscription terms, payments, and any changes to your business or delivery model.
• Managing and mitigating churn.
• Choosing a payment provider.

But subscriptions come with complexity. You also need to handle free trial conversions, manage failed payments through dunning processes, and deal with upgrades, downgrades, and cancellations.

Companies that have navigated this model (such as FastSpring customer Stardock) know you need a payment partner built specifically for subscription management — not just one that can process one-time charges.

Things to Consider When Selling Software or Apps Globally

When you’re selling AI apps worldwide, you need to solve several problems simultaneously:

Preferred payments and checkout that vary by region. Localized payment methods are critical for conversion. Customers expect to see prices in their currency and be able to pay using familiar methods. Customers in the U.S., for example, expect to see Apple Pay and Google Pay, while customers in Brazil prefer to pay with Pix, and customers in India want to use UPI.

Global tax calculation and remittance. If you’re selling digital services to customers based in the EU, you need to collect VAT at each buyer’s local rate and file those taxes accordingly. In the U.S., sales tax requirements vary state by state, and some states even let individual counties or cities set their own rates and rules. Each requires separate filing. Handling this yourself means registering with tax authorities in, potentially, hundreds of jurisdictions. Plus, you’re liable for any fines or penalties resulting from doing so incorrectly.

Data and platform governance. You need to process payment data securely according to regional requirements, meet data residency rules in certain jurisdictions, and maintain PCI compliance. These aren’t optional — they’re legal requirements that can shut you down or cost you hefty penalties if not followed.

Why You Want a Merchant of Record (Not Just a Payment Processor)

When choosing how to handle payments, your first and crucial choice is whether to use a basic payment service provider (PSP) or partner with a merchant of record (MoR).

A payment service provider (such as Stripe) gives you the tools to process transactions, but you remain legally responsible for every transaction. You’re in charge of calculating, collecting, and remitting taxes — in every jurisdiction where your customers live — and you carry the liability for any fraud. (Stripe is launching an MoR service, but how it will perform is still unknown.)

A merchant of record, on the other hand, becomes the legal seller of your product. FastSpring is an MoR, so we assume liability for transactions — meaning you can spend less time worrying about managing taxes and chargebacks and more time building a great product.

As the liable party for the sale, an MoR such as FastSpring handles:

• Global tax compliance. You don’t need to figure out VAT rates across EU countries, navigate state-by-state sales tax rules in the U.S. (and in some cases even city-by-city variations), or file returns in those jurisdictions. An MoR automatically calculates, collects, and remits those taxes for you.
• Consumer support for payment issues. When someone’s card declines or they have a billing question, your MoR’s support team handles it.
• Fraud prevention and risk management. Using a simple payment service provider and acting as your own merchant of record could lead to less financial industry credibility, as AI services are often perceived as riskier than other tech verticals — and in turn, that could lead to lower approval rates. Conversely, the established credibility of an experienced merchant of record such as FastSpring (with over two decades of experience!) helps improve transaction approval rates, which means higher revenue and less headaches.
• Checkout and payment localization. Instantly offer global payment localization including currency conversion, checkout translation, global tax management, and localized payment processing.
• Global compliance. Your MoR maintains PCI-DSS certification, data protection regulations, and customer authentication requirements so you don’t have to. Learn more in FastSpring’s Trust Center.

FastSpring allows you to offload the complexity of global payments, VAT/GST and sales tax compliance, consumer payments support, and many other aspects of payments management. Spend less time managing your payments and compliance and more time building groundbreaking AI products! Set up a demo or try it out for yourself.

Questions to Ask When Evaluating Payment Solutions

Before committing to a payment solution — be it a payment processor or merchant of record — ask these questions to help you evaluate:

• Does it handle global tax collection and remittance automatically, or do you need to register, collect, and file in every jurisdiction where your customers live?
• Which payment methods are supported? Can customers in your target market(s) use their preferred options?
• How does it handle subscription management? What about usage-based or metered billing? Does it offer a portal for customers to self-manage subscriptions, billing, and payment methods on file?
• Does providing consumer payment support fall to you or to your payment provider?
• Does it integrate with your existing tech stack?
• What are your actual, all-in costs — including processing fees, tax filing, compliance management, and operational overhead? 

What Makes AI Different: Unique Monetization Challenges

Once you’ve nailed the fundamentals for subscription-based businesses, you can begin to grapple with the unique challenges of monetizing an AI app.

Operating in a Young, High-Growth Market = Constant Change

AI companies are scaling globally faster than almost any previous software category. You’re not gradually expanding into new markets over several years — you’re able to serve customers worldwide pretty much from day one.

This creates challenges that more mature software categories simply didn’t face when they were at the same stage. Burgeoning AI companies are now faced with:

• Regulatory landscapes that vary dramatically by region, especially as they apply to digital services businesses. Evolving tax regulations (especially on digital goods or services) create compliance requirements that change based on where your customers are located — and these regulations will continue to emerge, grow, and evolve across the globe. For example, in 2024, five U.S. states simplified their criteria for tax nexus, which meant more businesses might meet the criteria for nexus sooner than they expected to — including digital goods businesses. And in 2025, the Philippines extended its VAT legislation to cover digital services supplied by foreign companies to consumers in the Philippines. If you use an MoR such as FastSpring, the MoR will worry about staying up to date with those types of regulations so you don’t have to.
• Evolving customer expectations and pricing norms. Unlike established software categories where pricing patterns are well understood, AI pricing is more fluid. Customers aren’t yet sure what they should pay, and you may not be sure what you should charge. To quickly and easily pivot your pricing as needed, choose a payment partner with agile pricing tools. For instance, FastSpring’s flexible Store Builder Library makes it easy for software and app sellers to update their product pricing quickly.
• Overly cautious payment processors. As we mentioned above, because the category is new and patterns aren’t established, some payment processors may be more likely to treat AI as high-risk. But since FastSpring processes billions of dollars across numerous software categories and has been for 20+ years, partnering with us means that you’ll benefit from better approval rates. Banks see transactions coming from a known, trusted entity with a proven track record, not an unproven AI startup.
• Technical challenges with usage-based billing. Unlike SaaS products that have been more commonly monetized with traditional monthly or annual subscriptions, AI services are particularly well served by usage-based billing, so support for that feature is something you’ll likely want from a monetization partner. If you want to be able to charge users in combination with real-time metering and tracking of usage, your backend needs to integrate with your payment systems. FastSpring supports usage-based billing through API integration and webhooks.

Monetizing AI Web Apps vs. AI Mobile Apps

Your monetization strategy will differ depending on whether you’re building a web app, a mobile app, or both.

AI Web Apps: The Direct Approach

Web-based AI apps have built-in advantages for monetization:

• No mandatory iOS and Android platform fees.
• Full control over the customer relationship.
• Direct access to first-party customer data.

To make web monetization work, you need:

• An optimized checkout experience with multiple payment methods, localized currencies, and trust signals that convince customers you’re legitimate and secure.
• A subscription management portal where customers can self-serve to upgrade, downgrade, view usage, update payment methods, and access their billing history.
• Integration flexibility through APIs for usage-based billing, webhooks for entitlements, and backend system connections that tie everything together.

FastSpring’s JavaScript Store Builder Library lets you quickly create a branded, seamless checkout experience that feels native to your app environment, while handling all the back-end complexity for you.

AI Mobile Apps: The App2Web Opportunity

If you’re building a mobile AI app, you’re facing 15-30% platform fees that eat into your margins. For AI apps with high compute costs, losing nearly a third of revenue to platform fees can strain the calculus at best  —  or make the economics totally unworkable at worst.

But that’s the cost of doing business with iOS and Android, right?

Not necessarily.

With app2web and web2app monetization strategies, you can sell an AI app outside popular app stores. You can recover some of that lost revenue by building a web store to monetize via the web and offering customers some kind of incentive — discounts, upgrades, in-app usage bonuses, etc. — for buying directly from you.

By doing so, you:

• Minimize the transactions on which you incur those hefty commission fees.
• Gain access to valuable first-party customer data that enables smarter acquisition campaigns, personalized promotions, and better lifecycle marketing.
• Improve margins, which is crucial when you’re paying for compute on every transaction.

While regulations around in-app steering and promotion of outside payment options vary from region to region and are ever evolving, you can always:

• Distribute your product through a web store. Selling your app’s solution directly to your consumers through your own store is an increasingly common and effective monetization strategy.
• Market your web store outside the app through social media, Discord communities, Reddit threads, email campaigns, and other channels where you aren’t restricted by app store rules.
• Build a web presence for existing users, and incentivize web store visits through exclusive offers or better pricing.

Making User Acquisition Smarter With First-Party Data

When you monetize through the web, you unlock first-party data that holds the power to supercharge your user acquisition strategy.

You can track attribution accurately, understanding which campaigns drive conversions.

You gain access to email addresses, payment preferences, referral sources, and session behavior — data points that enable sophisticated segmentation.

Then you can turn that valuable data into:

• Localized user acquisition strategies with geographic and behavioral segmentation, region-specific pricing and promotions, and language/payment method optimization.
• Targeted social campaigns where you build custom audiences from web purchasers, create lookalike audiences based on high-intent users, and retarget with actual conversion data instead of guesswork.
• Email marketing automation that drives users to web purchases, re-engages lapsed customers, and converts free users to paid plans.

Monetize Your AI App With FastSpring

FastSpring is built specifically for digital-first businesses that need to monetize globally, without getting bogged down building their own global payments infrastructures — or cobbling them together via disparate payment tools.

Our platform offers:

• Complete merchant of record services covering global tax compliance across 200+ jurisdictions, local payment methods and currencies, fraud prevention and risk management, and PCI compliance and data security.
• AI-friendly billing capabilities including out-of-the-box subscription management, flexible product catalog management, multiple pricing models (flat, tiered, hybrid), and support for usage-based billing (with proper integration).
• Developer-first integration through RESTful APIs for backend connections, webhooks for real-time event notifications, our JavaScript Store Builder Library, integration with RevenueCat for mobile apps, and backend integration for usage-based billing.
• Customizable checkout experiences with branded checkout; your choice of embedded, pop-up, or web storefront experiences support for trials, coupons, and promotions; and management of multiple subscription tiers.
• Fast implementation with quick setup for standard configurations, flexibility for complex requirements, pre-existing  compliance infrastructure, and the ability to focus your engineering resources on AI instead of payments.

FastSpring helps AI app developers navigate the complexity of global monetization and scale successfully. We’ve spent over 20 years helping digital-first companies grow, and we’ve built our platform specifically for businesses like yours.

FastSpring allows you to offload the complexity of global payments, VAT/GST and sales tax compliance, consumer payments support, and many other aspects of payments management. Spend less time managing your payments and compliance and more time building groundbreaking AI products! Set up a demo or try it out for yourself.

The post AI Monetization: How AI App Builders Can Handle Pricing, Global Expansion, and Compliance appeared first on FastSpring.

For example, using a one-size-fits-all approach to pricing and packaging tends to be less fair for players located in countries with lower disposable income, which also limits your ability to increase revenue and profit driven by players in those countries.

We know there is potential to make things more fair for players and increase profits at the same time — but how can we localize pricing without making players angry at a lack of pricing parity between countries?

In this article, we explore how optimizing global pricing and packaging is a delicate balance between driving transaction volume, profitability, and pricing parity. We’ll take you through a crawl-walk-run approach to finding the best formula for your game’s global P&P strategies that can deliver the most value to you and your players — without making them angry.

The ROI of Global Flexibility

Optimizing for profitability with your global P&P strategy is a fairly straightforward concept. The lower your price is in any particular country, the more transaction volume you’ll have, but with a lower profitability per transaction. If your transaction volume increases enough, your total profit for that country will increase, even if your profit per transaction is lower. Easy peasy.

The more complex part of global P&P is when pricing parity across countries is considered. 

For example, gaming is a global and social business. Your players are everywhere and likely interact with each other on Discord, Reddit, or other social media. If you offer players in India a lower price than you offer to players in the U.S., then your U.S. players may learn of your lack of pricing parity between countries and get angry with you. They may even try to game the system by using VPNs or other techniques to try to get access to the lower pricing. Not so easy… peasy.

So how do you localize your P&P globally to maximize profits without making players angry? 

I like to recommend a crawl-walk-run approach to price localization, starting with the least aggressive options and testing into more aggressive options over time.

Global Pricing and Packaging Strategies

(Ordered by Least to Most Aggressive)

1. No Localization: You offer the same currency and price globally.

2. Localized Currencies: You charge the same price in all countries, but offer local currencies pegged to the current exchange rate for that currency.

Pro tip: Changing prices frequently due to shifting exchange rates can be confusing for players. I recommend evaluating exchange rates about once a year to set prices instead of changing prices frequently or dynamically. That said, you should take note that exchange rates can change quickly depending on the country and world events, so prices that make sense in January might not make as much sense in March.

3. Localized Discounts and Promotions: You offer the same products at the same list price (adjusted for local currencies) in all countries, but you offer a limited time discount for that country (e.g., “We’re celebrating our growth in India with 20% off our June battle pass for India-based players!”). Players tend to be more forgiving of celebratory regional discounts causing a lack of price parity vs. a lack of parity for everyday list prices.

Pro tip: Use geo localization on your web store to gate offers to only show to players located in the countries you’re targeting. You can use IP addresses or the player’s billing address (for logged in players) to power geo localization on your web store.

4. Localized Products: You offer slightly different products for a lower price in specific countries (e.g. “Buy BattlePass Lite for a 50% discount. Excludes bonus skins included in the main battle pass.”). The logic behind this strategy is that if players in one country notice a cheaper price in another country, you can point out that this is because those players get less for that price. Lower price = less entitlements.

Pro tip: Try acknowledging that you’re offering players in certain countries cheaper options with less entitlements to help all players enjoy your game regardless of their access to disposable income. There’s nothing sneaky or wrong about trying to be inclusive and fair.

5. Localized Pricing: You offer the same products globally, but price differently per country. This is the most extreme example, in which your battle pass costs maybe $20 in the U.S., but only the equivalent of $5 in India. This comes with the greatest risk of player dissatisfaction due to the lack of price and value parity between countries for the same product.

Pro tip: As the most aggressive approach, this should be the last option you experiment with; however, this approach also offers the highest degree of control when optimizing for profits within a specific country. Additionally, if you are monetizing a casual game where players rarely if ever speak with each other, you may have lower risk of localized pricing causing players to be angry at a lack of price parity between countries.

So, What Is the Best Approach for YOUR Game?

The best global P&P strategy for your game — and your players — depends on a near-infinite number of variables, from your type of game, the type of in-game items for sale, player concentrations, and so on. This means that the true best approach is to iteratively test, measure your results, and listen to your players at every step of your journey. 

My advice is to take a crawl-walk-run approach, starting at the top of the list of strategies above, and making your way down the list until your ability to drive profits clashes with your ability to keep players happy. Once you find the right global P&P strategies, the result should be a more fair experience for your players and higher profits for you.

If you’d like help with monetizing your game D2C including advice on your global P&P strategies, request a FastSpring demo or check out FastSpring for gaming.

The post A Crawl-Walk-Run Guide to Global Pricing and Packaging for Games appeared first on FastSpring.

This shift unlocks entirely new ways to convert users, increase revenue, and build direct customer relationships.

In our recent webinar with Business of Apps, FastSpring experts break down the current rules, the business opportunity behind app2web (“steering”), and what it takes to launch a successful strategy quickly.

Below, you’ll find the full replay plus a few of our top takeaways.

Why App2Web Is a Big Deal for App Brands

App2web isn’t just about reducing platform fees (though that’s a major benefit). When FastSpring surveyed gaming companies — 100% of which develop games for iOS, and 96% of which develop for Android — the #1 reason for adopting direct-to-consumer web stores was actually improved access to customer data (for example, email addresses).

That first-party data is so important because it opens the door to:

• Better retargeting and audience segmentation.
• Increased conversion efficiency in paid media.
• More control over retention, churn reduction, and win-back.
• Direct communication outside the app marketplaces.

How to Launch App-to-Web Monetization in Weeks, Not Months

When you’re launching app2web monetization flows, there are some essential steps you’ll want to follow in order to handle entitlement flows, secure token handling, and data pass-through for a smooth checkout experience.

Some specific points to consider are:

• Adding a “Buy Direct” call-to-action in your app.
• Passing user and product identifiers into your web checkout.
• Offering fast, familiar payment methods like Apple Pay and Google Pay.
• Using entitlements via webhooks or API to return users seamlessly to the app.

And if this process feels complicated, FastSpring’s SteerSafe™ solution simplifies this flow, making it easier to roll out app-to-web monetization quickly.

Outside the US? Web2App Is Your Next Growth Lever

Because steering rules differ by region, non-U.S. users often need to follow a two-step path in order to get access to these benefits:

1. Drive them to a value-add non-payment experience (e.g., loyalty perks, community features, downloadable content) where you can convert users.
2. Re-engage them with marketing to complete a web store checkout.

This approach still drives first-party data capture, unlocks access to new monetization levers, and prepares your business for future regulatory changes already underway in markets like Japan and the EU.

About FastSpring

FastSpring is how mobile app developers sell in more places around the world. For over two decades, FastSpring has been a trusted payment provider you can use to sell apps or in-app purchases on your website, web shop, or embedded directly into your app with fully customizable and branded checkouts just for you. FastSpring allows you to offload the complexity of global payments, sales tax and VAT compliance, player payments support, and many other aspects of payments management. Spend less time managing your payments and compliance and more time making great games! To learn more about how FastSpring supports mobile app developers, visit fastspring.com/apps.

The post Webinar Recap: Launch App-to-Web Monetization ASAP appeared first on FastSpring.

• Amsterdam.
• Austin.
• Belfast.
• Dublin.
• Halifax.
• Santa Barbara.

FastSpring has been represented by an in-person sales team in Singapore for almost two years, and that team has quickly grown FastSpring’s presence while embedded in the local technology community. 

Growing demand for FastSpring’s merchant of record services in the dynamic and thriving Asia-Pacific region has led to the subsequent growth of our Singapore team, which will now be able to serve our APAC customers even better from a dedicated workspace. 

Leo Ng [foreground] takes a selfie with [background, left to
right] Tengxiong Yao, Jay Jia, and Jeslyn Ong.

The Singapore team now has a private office space within the bustling WeWork coworking location at 60 Anson Rd, Singapore 079914, Unit #17-135.

Related: FastSpring recently won the 2025 Golden Sail Award for Outstanding Global Expansion Ecosystem Service at GICC, one of China’s most recognized global business summits.

FastSpring remains focused on deep, local integration with tech communities all over the world to ensure we remain in touch and in tune with the customers we serve in the SaaS, software, video games, mobile apps, AI, eLearning, and other digital goods spaces. 

FastSpring powers global payments for software companies, video game publishers, and other digital goods businesses. As a merchant of record, FastSpring provides a fully managed payment solution including checkout, fraud mitigation, comprehensive sales tax and VAT compliance, and more. Founded in 2005, FastSpring is a privately owned company headquartered in the U.S., with offices in Canada, Ireland, the Netherlands, Singapore, and the U.K.

Set up a demo or try it out for yourself.

To view our homepage in simplified Chinese, click here.
若想浏览 FastSpring 中文官网，请点击此处。

To sign up for a personalized demo using a form in simplified Chinese, click here.
若希望使用中文提交表单并预约产品演示，请点击此处。

The post FastSpring Expands APAC Presence and Brings Together Singapore Team With New Office Location appeared first on FastSpring.

We are honored to receive the Golden Sail Award for Outstanding Global Expansion Ecosystem Service, further solidifying our reputation as a trusted growth partner for Chinese and APAC companies going global.

FastSpring’s Senior Account Executive Jay Jia was present to receive the award for FastSpring, accompanied by Account Executive Leo Ng and Sales Development Representative for APAC Jeslyn Ong. 

Jay received FastSpring’s Golden Sail Award for Outstanding Global Expansion Ecosystem Service.

Jeslyn, Leo, and Jay in the FastSpring booth, excited about our award!

Related: Are you an APAC mobile app developer wanting to take your app global? Learn more about the many things that entails — and what FastSpring can handle for you — in 5 Moves for Mobile App Makers in APAC to Maximize Revenue.

About the GICC Golden Sail Awards

The GICC is one of China’s most recognized global business summits, held annually in Beijing. This year, the event drew over 160,000 professionals and 3,000 leading enterprises from industries such as technology, SaaS, ecommerce, and digital services.

The event’s awards celebrate outstanding companies driving innovation, globalization, and cross-border business growth, highlighting those contributing to China’s global digital transformation and “going global” success stories.

Other award categories include Outstanding Global Expansion Brands, Outstanding Cross-border Technology Solutions, Outstanding Global Expansion Ecosystem Services, Outstanding Cross-border Marketing and Operations, Outstanding Global Expansion Potential, and more.

Partner With FastSpring for Global Growth

If you’re looking for a merchant of record that will partner with you to grow your business internationally, FastSpring can help. 

We provide an all-in-one payment platform for SaaS, software, video games, mobile apps, AI, eLearning, and other digital goods, including VAT and sales tax management, payment localization, and consumer support. 

Set up a demo or try it out for yourself.

To view our homepage in simplified Chinese, click here.
若想浏览 FastSpring 中文官网，请点击此处。

To sign up for a personalized demo using a form in simplified Chinese, click here.
若希望使用中文提交表单并预约产品演示，请点击此处。

The post FastSpring Wins GICC 2025 Golden Sail Award for Outstanding Global Expansion Ecosystem Service appeared first on FastSpring.

FastSpring is excited to be a sponsor of the sixth Global Internet Industry CEO Conference, or GICC 2025. This conference is held at the InterContinental Beijing Sanlitun Tongying Center on Oct. 23. 

This 90% C-level attended conference focuses on global expansion opportunities that resonate with the world. Topics such as AI, ecommerce, social, gaming, and more will be covered across the main summit, a games sub forum, an exhibition area, and an online summit.

Where to Get Tickets

To purchase a GICC 2025 conference pass, VIP pass, or Game Forum ticket, visit the registration page.

How to Connect With FastSpring

Besides cosponsoring a seminar session, FastSpring will also be available at booth V11 in the exhibition hall to share our expertise on cross-border payments and global commerce in the software, gaming, mobile apps, and digital products spaces. 

Want to preschedule a personalized demo during the event? Visit our sign-up page to request a meeting with one of FastSpring’s experts.

Are you looking for a merchant of record that will partner with you to grow your business internationally? FastSpring provides an all-in-one payment platform for SaaS, software, video games, mobile apps, AI, eLearning, and other digital goods, including VAT and sales tax management, payment localization, and consumer support. Set up a demo or try it out for yourself.

The post FastSpring at GICC 2025 in Beijing appeared first on FastSpring.

And as our annual SaaS and software benchmarking data report has shown across the last few years, the shopping spike doesn’t just apply to physical goods like clothing, jewelry, toys, or electronics. 

End-of-year budget spending certainly contributes to this effect too.

Is your SaaS or software business ready to take advantage of the B2B and B2C spending sprees? 

FastSpring is a merchant of record for over 3500 companies that use our platform daily. By analyzing years’ worth of aggregate sales data, we have helpful insights to share about Q4 sales spikes for software and SaaS businesses.

Below, we share this year’s insights into:

• The latest U.S. trends in year-end SaaS and software sales data.
• The latest global trends in year-end SaaS and software sales data.
• How FastSpring can help you best capitalize on Q4 sales spikes.

FastSpring is a merchant of record that can help you easily grow your business internationally. We provide an all-in-one payment platform for SaaS, software, video game, and other digital product businesses, including VAT and sales tax management, payment localization, and award-winning consumer support. Set up a demo or try it out for yourself.

Our Data Sources and Analysis Methodology

Where the Data Are From

FastSpring helps companies sell digital products in over 200 countries, but to help us keep this study consistent and repeatable, we’ve pulled sales data from eight countries around the world. 

Each year, we include the U.S., Canada, Germany, Great Britain, India, Brazil, Australia, and China.

This data are specific to where the sales took place, not where the companies are located.

To show a glimpse into one specific country that’s also a large, often-targeted SaaS and software market, we also show the same trends for just the United States.

When the Data Are From

To highlight useful trend data while avoiding any major outliers skewing the data, we use aggregated data for the most current five calendar years. The data below represent sales across 2020-2024.

We also use a seasonal index to show quarterly or monthly sales against a year’s monthly or quarterly average (read more about that in the How section below).

What We Measured

FastSpring supports the sales of a vast array of digital products, including SaaS, software, video games, mobile apps, AI, and eLearning. 

To narrow this report to a specific type of industry, we’ve excluded everything but software and SaaS.

We also used U.S. dollars as the currency for all figures to make comparison easy and clear. 

How We Measured It

To establish a baseline, we calculated monthly and quarterly averages for each year. 

For a very simplified example, if four quarterly totals were $200, $200, $100, and $300, the quarterly average for the year would be $200. 

Then once we had the period average for the year, we compared each period’s actuals to that period average to get a percentage.

So for example, if Q3 shows a percentage of 90%, it means the sales total that quarter was 10% lower than the year’s quarterly average. If Q4 shows a percentage of 111%, that means Q4 sales totals were 11% higher than the year’s quarterly average. 

We then combined that data across five years to get the five year averages and avoid any outliers causing a sharp spike that might have skewed the results too much. 

US Year-End Trends for SaaS and Software Purchases

The following data show the monthly and yearly averages for U.S. software and SaaS sales across the last five years.

5YR Average US SaaS and Software Sales by Month

In the U.S., the three highest monthly spikes of SaaS and software sales are in March (104%), December (105%), and as expected, November (112%).

5YR Average US SaaS and Software Sales by Quarter

Similarly, Q4 is the highest-performing quarter for software and SaaS sales at 106%, with Q1 at 99%, Q2 at 97%, and Q3 at 98%.

Global Year-End Trends for SaaS and Software Purchases

Global trends show even stronger spikes in November and Q4, thanks to particularly strong sales in China and Germany (more on that below). 

5YR Average Global SaaS and Software Sales by Month

Just like in the U.S., global sales of software and SaaS spiked slightly to 104% in March and 105% in December. 

But as expected, the spike in November was higher than just in the U.S., at 118% globally.

While Black Friday and Cyber Week have traditionally been anchored to the Thanksgiving holiday in the U.S., seasonal sales surges have caught on worldwide, perhaps thanks to other countries such as Germany observing Black Friday and Cyber Monday (or even an entire Cyber Week), and China observing Singles Day on November 11 (11.11). 

5YR Average Global SaaS and Software Sales by Quarter

Quarterly sales reflect a slightly smaller spike over the shopping holiday season when Oct.-Nov.-Dec. are averaged together, but the spike is still significant at 8%.

Because the quarterly spike isn’t as high as the single spike in November, it reinforces that software and SaaS companies should focus their marketing and sales efforts specifically in November to get the best return and see the most growth. 

5YR Average SaaS and Software Sales by Month per Country

To illustrate the changes in various countries (and give you an idea of which countries may be most worth targeting), we’ve also broken out the monthly data by country for the eight countries we included in this survey. 

Here’s what monthly software and SaaS sales fluctuations look like with five years of data for the United States (US), Canada (CA), Germany (DE), Great Britain (GB), India (IN), Brazil (BR), Australia (AU), and China (CN).

We mentioned the China and Germany shopping holidays in November above, but China also sees spikes in April and June, likely due to the 418 (April 18) and 618 (June 18) shopping holidays.

Regardless of other monthly spikes throughout the year, November is still the single highest spike for any of the eight countries we included — ranging from 112% in the U.S. and 117% in India on the low end, to 148% in Germany and 149% in China on the high end.

SaaS and software companies can capitalize on this trend with:

• Email promotions.
• Custom partner coupon codes (which they can help you promote).
• Social media campaigns.
• Upsell or bundle offers.
• Localized promotions that would especially appeal to customers in each of your targeted regions.
• A merchant of record partner for online payments that can help you easily sell your software or SaaS worldwide.

How FastSpring Can Help

Software companies that already use FastSpring know why we’re a trusted partner in the global payments space. (Check out what Avid and Stardock have to say about the great experiences they’ve had with FastSpring, or find more FastSpring customer stories here.)

But if you’re new to FastSpring (or to the merchant of record model), here are some of the reasons our customers love using FastSpring to sell their software around the world.

FastSpring Makes Global Payments Easy for You and Your Customers

Payments Localization

Making your product available for purchase in more countries is only part of taking a software business global. 

You also have to make it very easy for users to make the purchase, with the least hesitation possible.

That requires presenting a localized checkout experience — including automatic conversions to local languages and currencies, offering dozens of the most popular payment methods (which vary by region), intelligent payment routing to regional payment gateways (to help reduce failed payments), and more.

To support improved payment localization, we work closely with our customers and payment partners to understand which payment methods are the most valuable in different regions and industries across the globe. 

This has materialized in the release of UPI in India and Pix in Brazil throughout 2025. 

By the end of October 2025, we plan to improve our Pix capabilities with support for recurring payments on subscription purchases. We’re also excited to add Toss payments in South Korea, providing additional support beyond Kakao Pay in the region.

Custom Discounts, Offers, and Coupons

When you’re running campaigns for Cyber Weekend or other regional holidays, you’ll need a partner who can support customizable offers and coupons. 

This includes the ability to:

• Offer percentage discounts on individual items.
• Preapply coupons via custom links.
• Stack multiple coupons.

FastSpring already supports all of those today, but now, we’re adding the ability to apply discounts at the order level to add even more flexibility on promotional planning. Instead of offering discounts on a per-item basis, you can now apply the discount to the entire order — which translates into clearer promotions for your customers, and ultimately, more completed orders. This feature is set to launch by the end of October, with plenty of time for Cyber Weekend prep.

Robust At-a-Glance Reporting

Once you’ve launched your Cyber Weekend campaigns, you’ll need to monitor their success throughout the course of the promotional holidays. 

With FastSpring, you get access to our Welcome Dashboard, which provides an instant view of the health of your business and campaigns. This dashboard shows key metrics such as net sales, orders, subscriptions, and chargebacks — without the need for extra navigation. That makes it easy to understand at a glance how your campaigns are performing.

If you need to dig deeper, you can simply click into an individual dashboard to dig into more specifics around individual products, chargeback rates, churn rates, and even revenue recognition for the future.

With the wide variety of reports available, you won’t have to wonder how your campaigns are performing. Instead, you can glean clear insights into your campaign’s successes or make tweaks to your campaigns if something is trending in the wrong direction.

FastSpring has localized payments, flexible discounts, and visual reporting covered. Learn more about FastSpring’s global payments.

FastSpring Calculates, Collects, and Remits Global Taxes so You Don’t Have To

FastSpring doesn’t just facilitate payments — we’re a merchant of record, which means we become the entity actually selling the digital products.

That also means that we’re the ones who handle sales taxes and VAT. 

FastSpring’s team of experts stays current on global tax regulations so we can calculate, collect, and remit those taxes — so you don’t need to worry about it. 

Learn more about FastSpring’s global tax management. 

FastSpring Has World-Class Support for You and Your Users

FastSpring’s award-winning support team is standing by and ready to help both the companies that use FastSpring as their merchant of record, and the customers who purchase software, SaaS, and other digital products.

For consumer support, customers can submit an online request and get personalized assistance. FastSpring also provides a helpful list of support topics for consumers to browse, including Licenses and Downloads, Checkout and Purchasing, and more.

For software companies using FastSpring as their MoR, you can submit a request from within the FastSpring app, or simply visit our support page.

Read more about our Stevie® award for Front-Line Customer Service Team, our Globee® award for Customer Excellence in the “Achievement in Team Customer Success” category, or submit a seller or consumer support request.

Partner With FastSpring

For over 20 years, FastSpring has been a trusted payment provider that can help you easily grow your business internationally. As a merchant of record, we provide an all-in-one payment platform that includes VAT and sales tax management, payment localization, award-winning consumer support, and more — making us an excellent partner for SaaS, software, video games, mobile apps, AI, eLearning, and other digital goods businesses. 

Set up a demo or try it out for yourself.

The post Cyber Weekend Benchmarking Data: 2025 SaaS and Software Holiday Spend Report appeared first on FastSpring.

This year, FastSpring is thrilled to announce its role as a Gold Sponsor of MIGS, stepping into the spotlight to support innovation, collaboration, and growth within the games industry. 

MIGS 2025 is hosted by La Guilde du jeu vidéo du Québec in partnership with XP Gaming. The event will be held at Grand Quay, Port of Montréal from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. both days.

Where to Get Tickets

Still need tickets? Head over to the registration page to grab your ticket and get access to multiple show floors, expanded programming, and more opportunities than ever.

How to Connect With FastSpring

Watch for updates regarding our speaking session, and you may see an invite soon to join us for a Happy Hour at the event. 

FastSpring is how gaming publishers sell in more places around the world. For nearly two decades, FastSpring has been a trusted payment provider you can use to sell games or in-game items on your website, web shop, or embedded directly into your game with fully customizable and branded checkouts just for you. FastSpring allows you to offload the complexity of global payments, sales tax and VAT compliance, player payments support, and many other aspects of payments management. Spend less time managing your payments and compliance and more time making great games! To learn more about how FastSpring supports game developers, visit fastspring.gg/.

The post FastSpring Is Going Gold at MIGS 2025 in Montreal appeared first on FastSpring.

Expanding into new markets isn’t without its challenges. From navigating competitive landscapes to adapting to ever-changing regulations and cultural differences, companies need more than great products — they need strong partners. 

That’s where FastSpring comes in. As a trusted global commerce platform, we help businesses simplify cross-border payments, manage taxes and compliance, and deliver seamless purchase experiences to customers worldwide. By integrating resources and building the right partnerships, companies can overcome risks, unlock new opportunities, and achieve sustainable international growth.

If you’re attending GTC 2025, we’d love to connect. Stop by booth D24 to learn how FastSpring can support your journey to expand globally and thrive in today’s fast-moving digital economy.

Where to Get Tickets

Head over to the registration page to grab your ticket and get access to incredible speakers, and unparalleled networking opportunities 

How to Connect With FastSpring

Stop by booth D24 to speak with the FastSpring team and learn how to spend less time managing your payments and compliance and more time developing. 

Want to schedule a specific time to meet? Request a demo to have someone reach out to you.

Are you looking for a merchant of record that will partner with you to grow your business internationally? FastSpring provides an all-in-one payment platform for SaaS, software, video games, mobile apps, AI, eLearning, and other digital goods, including VAT and sales tax management, payment localization, and consumer support. Set up a demo or try it out for yourself.

The post FastSpring Sponsors Global Traffic Conference 2025 in Shanghai appeared first on FastSpring.

GamesBeat Next is known for its focus on emerging trends, new technologies, and the creative voices behind the next generation of games, making it the perfect space for us to connect with the global gaming community. 

Don’t Miss Our Session: Real World Examples of In-Game Steering That Actually Work

November 12, 2025, 2:30-3:00 PM, Pacific Hall

With the rise of in-game steering in the U.S., many publishers are left wondering: What actually works, and what is allowed?

Of course, many publishers are keen to keep examples close to their chest — which is why in this session, speaker David Vogelpohl will share anonymized but real-world examples of in-game steering for games live in app stores to give you insights into what other publishers are doing that actually works.

Fellow panelist and gaming veteran Mike DeLaet of Ares Interactive also shares his views on steering and a crawl-walk-run approach to safely leveraging D2C for your games.

If you’re interested in seeing real-world in-game steering examples that can help inform your own strategy, don’t miss this session!

Where to Get Tickets

Not registered yet?  Head over to the registration page to grab your ticket and be part of driving the next chapter of gaming — where creativity, innovation, and strategy come together to shape what’s next. From redefining how players discover games to transforming the way studios build them, the future is already in motion. 

How to Connect With FastSpring

To schedule a personalized meeting at the show, request a demo now to have someone reach out to you.

FastSpring is how gaming publishers sell in more places around the world. For nearly two decades, FastSpring has been a trusted payment provider you can use to sell games or in-game items on your website, web shop, or embedded directly into your game with fully customizable and branded checkouts just for you. FastSpring allows you to offload the complexity of global payments, sales tax and VAT compliance, player payments support, and many other aspects of payments management. Spend less time managing your payments and compliance and more time making great games! To learn more about how FastSpring supports game developers, visit fastspring.gg/. Click here to schedule a demo

The post FastSpring Is a Gold Sponsor at GamesBeat Next 2025 San Francisco appeared first on FastSpring.

With 25+ years of experience spanning Comcast, Fiserv, and Digital River, Jeremy has seen it all — from brazen carding attacks to operationally overwhelming waves of chargebacks. In this discussion, he breaks down how fraudsters operate, the costly mistakes companies make, and what you can do to stay ahead.

Listen for the full insights into:

• Why carding and account takeover attacks remain the most common (and expensive) threats to payment systems.
• How overlooking small data anomalies — like approval rates by BIN — can cost companies hefty decline fees.
• Why payment fraud isn’t just about fines, but also reputational risk, operational overload, and long-term damage to approval rates.

Listen or watch now!

Jump to video.  |  Jump to transcript.

Listen online or find it on more podcast services.

Podcast Full Interview: Video

The post EP35: Payment Horror Stories: The How and Why Behind the Most Vicious Attacks on Your Payment Stack appeared first on FastSpring.

To succeed in these regions, businesses must support local payment methods–like debit networks, mobile wallets, and bank transfers that locals already trust. Doing so removes friction, increases conversion rates, and drives new revenue.

That’s why we’re launching several key updates in our Spring 2025 release, including:

• UPI Support.
• New Taiwan Dollar (TWD) Support.
• Hipercard and Elo Support in Brazil.
• Checkout Conversion Dashboard.
• Improved Checkout Customizations.

UPI Support Opens the Door to 350M+ Digital Buyers

As a mobile-first economy, and with Indian regulations that are unfriendly to foreign-made payment methods, India’s digital consumer market is heavily reliant on government backed payment rails like UPI. Easy-to-use on mobile, and used by more than 90% of India’s online buyers, UPI eliminates purchase friction for buyers and opens up the vast majority of the Indian market to outside companies. 

With UPI, FastSpring users can:

• Replace low-converting card payments with instant, secure UPI transactions.
• Comply with Indian financial regulations and avoid foreign card blocks.

Learn More about UPI.

Offer Localized Experiences in Emerging Markets With Local Brazilian Cards and TWD in Taiwan

Websites that localize pricing have twice the conversion rate of those that don’t. To further help businesses who are expanding across the globe, we’ve added additional payment methods in Brazil with support for local cards like Elo and Hipercard on top of the domestic only Visa and MasterCard cards as well as enabling TWD in Taiwan. (Coming Q2 2025)

Learn more about Brazilian Cards and TWD.

Track Conversions in Real Time With the Checkout Conversion Dashboard

When selling products, understanding key points in the buyer journey is essential to improving conversion rates. With FastSpring’s new Checkout Conversion Dashboard, get a clear visualization of your users’ checkout conversion journey through monitoring user Sessions, Orders, and Completed Orders. Plus, pinpoint where buyers drop off and why.

With Checkout Conversion Dashboard, FastSpring users can:

• Visualize performance of products across an Area and Funnel Chart.
• Filter data by timeframe, product, country, and segment.
• Understand key points in the buyer journey like Sessions, Orders, and Completed Orders.

Learn more about Checkout Conversion Dashboard.

Improve Conversion Rates With Popup Checkout Themes and New Embedded Options

Brand cohesion throughout the entire purchase journey is a key lever in improving conversion rates. To better support our users, we’ve released the first of our new themes: Dark Theme. This brings a dark mode checkout to our modal popup offering that can be enabled by a simple toggle in checkout settings. Plus, we’ve streamlined our embedded checkout to simplify data entry and remove unnecessary checkout steps.

With the Spring Checkout Improvements, FastSpring users can:

• Match their checkout theme to their site’s branding for a more cohesive buyer experience.
• Reduce required steps in embedded checkout with a single field for MM/YY, fewer input fields, and improved usability icons (Coming Q2 2025)

Learn more about Checkout Customization.

With support for region-specific payments and tools to improve every step of your funnel, FastSpring makes it easier to scale globally, no matter the market you’re expanding into. Ready to learn more? Schedule some time with FastSpring today.

The post FastSpring Launches Support for Indian Payment Method UPI and More Market Expansion Features With Its Spring Product Releases appeared first on FastSpring.