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I am about to unpublish my app from the Google Play Store because the service is going to be shut down.

My users are currently paying subscriptions (monthly or yearly) for the service, subscriptions that auto-renew.

I am wondering what will happen to these users from the moment the app is unpublished: will subscriptions be automatically cancelled and renewal prevented?

Thanks a lot.

David Ferrand
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1 Answers1

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I've got the answer to my own question. In short, when you unpublish an app, the existing subscriptions are not cancelled and, therefore, they continue to renew until cancelled by the user or by the developer via the Google Play Developer API.

According to the Developer Console help page:

When you unpublish an app, existing users can still use your app and receive app updates. Your app won’t be available for new users to find and download on Google Play.

This paragraph doesn't specifically cover the case of subscriptions, but my experience just confirmed it: I have unpublished my app and subscriptions keep renewing.

David Ferrand
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  • I can confirm this is the case. My app has been unpublished for over a year, and I'm still getting paid for subscription renewals. I can't find any way to stop this and Google support is not responding. David, have you found a way to stop this? – Justin Noel Sep 17 '18 at 21:51
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    Hey Justin, it's been a while... I can't remember very precisely. I seemed to say in my answer that you may be able to cancel subscriptions via the Google Play Developer API, and I believe that's what we did back then. I'd recommend looking into this, or insisting to contact Google support - they will probably reply at some point! – David Ferrand Sep 18 '18 at 13:46