Offer a trial period

DocsCurrentLast updated: June 20th 2023, @ 12:08:42 pm

Use a trial period to let subscribers try your product at a free or discounted price before regular billing cycles start. After the trial period ends, the regular billing period for the subscription begins. You can have up to 2 trial periods per plan.

The following sample requests show how to offer trial periods. Use these samples to adjust your code when you create a plan.

Example: Music service

The following example creates a trial period with the following characteristics:

$0 for the first month.
$15 per month following the trial period.

1curl -v –X POST https://api-m.sandbox.paypal.com/v1/billing/plans 
2-H "Accept: application/json" 
3-H "Authorization: Bearer ACCESS-TOKEN" 
4-H "Content-Type: application/json" 
5-H "PayPal-Request-Id: PLAN-18062020-002" 
6-d '{
7"name": "Premium Music Plus", 
8"description": "A premium plan with music download feature", 
9"product_id": "PROD-5RN21878H3527870P", 
10"billing_cycles": [{
11  "frequency": {
12    "interval_unit": "MONTH",
13    "interval_count": 1
14  },
15  "tenure_type": "TRIAL",
16  "sequence": 1,
17  "total_cycles": 1,
18  "pricing_scheme": {
19    "fixed_price": {
20      "value": "0",
21      "currency_code": "USD"
22    }
23  }
24}, {
25  "frequency": {
26    "interval_unit": "MONTH",
27    "interval_count": 1
28  },
29  "tenure_type": "REGULAR",
30  "sequence": 2,
31  "total_cycles": 0,
32  "pricing_scheme": {
33    "fixed_price": {
34      "value": "15",
35      "currency_code": "USD"
36    }
37  }
38}], "payment_preferences": {
39  "auto_bill_outstanding": true,
40  "payment_failure_threshold": 1
41 }
42}'

Example: Online tutorial service

The following example creates a trial period with the following characteristics:

$0 free trial for the first week.
$5 per week discounted trial for the next 3 weeks.
$10 per week following the trial period.

1curl -v –X POST https://api-m.sandbox.paypal.com/v1/billing/plans 
2-H "Accept: application/json" 
3-H "Authorization: Bearer ACCESS-TOKEN" 
4-H "Content-Type: application/json" 
5-H "PayPal-Request-Id: PLAN-18062020-003" 
6-d '{
7 "name": "Music Tutorial Premium Plus", 
8 "description": "Offering a premium music tutorial with download feature", 
9 "product_id": "PROD-5RN21878H3527870P", 
10 "billing_cycles": [{
11   "frequency": {
12     "interval_unit": "WEEK",
13     "interval_count": 1
14  },
15  "tenure_type": "TRIAL",
16  "sequence": 1,
17  "total_cycles": 1,
18  "pricing_scheme": {
19    "fixed_price": {
20      "value": "0",
21      "currency_code": "USD"
22    }
23  }
24}, {
25  "frequency": {
26    "interval_unit": "WEEK",
27    "interval_count": 1
28  },
29  "tenure_type": "TRIAL",
30  "sequence": 2,
31  "total_cycles": 3,
32  "pricing_scheme": {
33    "fixed_price": {
34      "value": "5",
35      "currency_code": "USD"
36    }
37  }
38}, {
39  "frequency": {
40    "interval_unit": "WEEK",
41    "interval_count": 1
42  },
43  "tenure_type": "REGULAR",
44  "sequence": 3,
45  "total_cycles": 0,
46  "pricing_scheme": {
47    "fixed_price": {
48      "value": "10",
49      "currency_code": "USD"
50    }
51  }
52}], "payment_preferences": {
53  "auto_bill_outstanding": true,
54  "payment_failure_threshold": 1
55 }
56}'

Offer a trial period

Example: Music service

Example: Online tutorial service

See also