docs/html/google/play/billing/index.jd

page.title=Google Play In-app Billing
@jd:body

<p>In-app Billing is a Google Play service that lets you sell digital content from inside
your applications. You can use the service to sell a wide range of content, including downloadable
content such as media files or photos, virtual content such as game levels or potions, premium services 
and features, and more. You can use In-app Billing to sell products as</p>

<div class="sidebox-wrapper">
<div class="sidebox">
  <h2><strong>New in In-App Billing</strong></h2>
  <ul>
  <li><strong>New order number format</strong>&mdash; Starting 5 December, orders are reported in Merchant Order Number format. See <a href="{@docRoot}google/play/billing/billing_admin.html#orderId">Working with Order Numbers</a> for an example.</li>
  <li><strong>Free trials</strong>&mdash;You can now offer users a configurable <a href="/google/play/billing/billing_subscriptions.html#trials">free trial period</a> for your in-app subscriptions. You can set up trials with a simple change in the Developer Console&mdash;no change to your app code is needed.</li>
 </ul>
</div>
</div>

<ul>
<li>Standard in-app products (one-time billing), or</li>
<li>Subscriptions, (recurring, automated billing)</li>
</ul>

<p>When you use the in-app billing service to sell an item,
whether it's an in-app product or a subscription, Google Play
handles all checkout details so your application never has to directly process
any financial transactions. Google Play uses the same checkout backend service as
is used for application purchases, so your users experience a consistent and
familiar purchase flow (see figure 1). Also, the transaction fee for in-app
purchases is the same as the transaction fee for application purchases
(30%).</p>

<p>Any application that you publish through Google Play can implement In-app Billing. No special
account or registration is required other than an Android Market publisher account and a Google
Checkout merchant account. Also, because the service uses no dedicated framework APIs, you can add
in-app billing to any application that uses a minimum API level of 4 or higher.</p>

<p>To help you integrate in-app billing into your application, the Android SDK
provides a sample application that demonstrates how to sell standard in-app
products and subscriptions from inside an app. The sample contains examples of
billing-related classes you can use to implement in-app billing in your
application. It also contains examples of the database, user interface, and
business logic you might use to implement in-app billing.</p>

<p class="caution"><strong>Important</strong>: Although the sample application is a working example
of how you can implement in-app billing, we <em>strongly recommend</em> that you modify and
obfuscate the sample code before you use it in a production application. For more information, see
<a href="{@docRoot}google/play/billing/billing_best_practices.html">Security and Design</a>.</p>

<img src="{@docRoot}images/billing_checkout_flow.png" height="382" id="figure1" />
<p class="img-caption">
  <strong>Figure 1.</strong> Applications initiate in-app billing requests through their own UI
  (first screen). Google Play responds to the request by providing the checkout user interface
  (middle screen). When checkout is complete, the application resumes.
</p>

<p>To learn more about Google Play's in-app billing service and start integrating it into your
applications, read the following documents:</p>

<dl>
  <dt><strong><a href="{@docRoot}google/play/billing/billing_overview.html">In-app
  Billing Overview</a></strong></dt>
    <dd>Learn how the service works and what a typical in-app billing implementation looks
    like.</dd>
  <dt><strong><a href="{@docRoot}google/play/billing/billing_integrate.html">Implementing
  In-app Billing</a></strong></dt>
    <dd>Use this step-by-step guide to start incorporating in-app billing into your
    application. The instructions apply to both one-time and subscription purchases.</dd>
    
    <dt><strong><a href="{@docRoot}google/play/billing/billing_subscriptions.html">Subscriptions</a></strong></dt>
    <dd>Learn how subscriptions work and how to implement support for them in your app.</dd>
  <dt><strong><a href="{@docRoot}google/play/billing/billing_best_practices.html">Security
  and Design</a></strong></dt>
    <dd>Review these best practices to help ensure that your in-app billing implementation is
    secure and well designed.</dd>
  <dt><strong><a href="{@docRoot}google/play/billing/billing_testing.html">Testing In-app
  Billing</a></strong></dt>
    <dd>Understand how the in-app billing test tools work and learn how to test your in-app billing
    implementation.</dd>
  <dt><strong><a href="{@docRoot}google/play/billing/billing_admin.html">Administering
  In-app Billing</a></strong></dt>
    <dd>Learn how to set up your product list, register test accounts, and handle refunds.</dd>
  <dt><strong><a href="{@docRoot}google/play/billing/billing_reference.html">Reference</a></strong></dt>
    <dd>Get detailed information about Google Play response codes and the in-app billing
    interface.</dd>
</dl>