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Status: Decided — historical analysis retained Companion docs: Pricing Strategy | Tier Comparison
Decision (July 3, 2026): Model A wins. High IQ launches with Guest / Free / Pro at 12.99/mo(12.99/mo (99.99/yr) with a 7-day free trial, Historical Import included in Pro with usage caps, and Studio deferred to v4.0. Model B (paid-account-always) is rejected — its core “30% Basic capture” assumption is unsupported (real-world benchmark: fewer than 2% of installs pay in cannabis tracking apps). The full decision and reopen conditions live in Pricing Strategy. Everything below is preserved as the historical comparison that informed the decision; numbers flagged in callouts should not be reused in projections.

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Why this page exists

The High IQ launch model (app is pre-launch, on staging) is a three-tier access structure — Guest (no login), Free (logged in), Pro (12.99/mo,7−daytrial),with∗∗Studio∗∗(12.99/mo, 7-day trial), with **Studio** (19.99/mo) planned for v4.0. That model treats logged-in tracking (stash, favorites, manual order entry) as free, and puts every AI feature behind Pro. A different structural option is on the table: make every logged-in account a paid account, and split paid users into three rungs based on what they actually use — non-AI tracking, current AI features, and unlimited / future AI features. This page lays the two models next to each other so we can see exactly what we gain, what we lose, and which one is more likely to maximize lifetime revenue and profit. This was a comparison page; the decision has since been made (see banner above). It is kept because the trade-off analysis remains useful for the post-launch paywall experiments.

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The two models at a glance

Three access levels. Logged-in tracking is free. AI is the paywall.Historical Import: included in Pro with usage caps under the decided model (earlier drafts proposed 14.99/14.99 / 29.99 / $49.99 one-time SKUs — rejected at launch).
The single biggest difference: Model A keeps logged-in tracking free and uses AI as the only paywall. Model B charges from the moment you create an account, on the bet that the privilege of having an account that holds your data is itself worth $5.99/mo, and that AI is a separate climb on top of that.

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Feature-by-feature: who gets what

This is the same feature set as the Tier Comparison page, but mapped against both models so we can see exactly which features move tiers under Model B.

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Browse and discovery (no change between models)

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Tracking and personal data (the tier that moves)

Model B promotes rankings, badges, and basic collection management down from Pro to Basic. The reasoning: these are gamification + tracking features, not intelligence features. They reward identity and engagement, which is exactly what the Basic tier is selling.

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Intelligence (current AI features)

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Unlimited / Creative / Future

In Model B, Historical Import is no longer a separate one-time SKU. Buying “AI Unlimited” is the way to get the full archive. This trades a $49.99 one-shot purchase for a subscription that re-pays itself every ~3 months while adding everything else as well.

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What each model is really betting on

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Model A is betting that…

  • Free is a real feature. A free logged-in tier creates investment (stash, favorites) before the paywall. The user has data they do not want to lose, which lifts conversion.
  • AI is the universal paywall. Every AI feature is gated, and AI is what people will pay for. Tracking is free because tracking is not the moat.
  • A high free-to-paid funnel matters more than ARPU at the bottom. Capturing as many free accounts as possible expands the eventual paid pool.
  • Studio (v4.0) lifts ARPU later. When AI media ships, the most engaged users move from 12.99to12.99 to 19.99 without disrupting today’s structure.

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Model B is betting that…

  • An account is itself the product. If you want your data persisted on our servers, in the cloud, with sync across devices, that is worth $5.99/mo on its own. Free email, free Notion, free everything has trained users to expect this — but the cannabis vertical has fewer free incumbents and a higher willingness to pay.
  • The paid-only floor lifts ARPU dramatically. Today, the average revenue per logged-in user is dragged down by the free tier. Model B forces every account to pay something, which uplifts ARPU on every logged-in user.
  • AI is a climb, not a wall. 5.99−>5.99 -> 11.99 -> 19.99isa∗ladder∗ofupsell,notabinary"youpayoryoudon′t."Mostusersthatpay19.99 is a *ladder* of upsell, not a binary "you pay or you don't." Most users that pay 5.99 will eventually try AI Pro.
  • Historical import is a retention hook, not a one-time SKU. Folding it into AI Unlimited turns a one-shot 49.99intorecurring49.99 into recurring 19.99/mo (which exceeds $49.99 in 3 months and continues forever).

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Side-by-side: pros, cons, risks

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Revenue modeling: Model A vs Model B at the same scale

To compare apples to apples, assume the same top-of-funnel: 10,000 monthly app installs. The difference is what happens after install.

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Model A (Current)

Standard freemium funnel. 95% of installs become Free, 5% of Free converts to Pro over time.

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Model B (Paid-Account)

Account creation friction reduces sign-ups by ~60-70% (this is the key risk). But every account that does sign up pays. The original draft assumed 30% of would-be Free users convert to Basic, with 35% of Basic climbing to AI Pro and 10% reaching AI Unlimited.
The 30% baseline below is a fantasy number — do not reuse it. The real-world benchmark is that fewer than 2% of installs pay anything in cannabis tracking apps (this doc’s own sensitivity note admits as much). At realistic capture rates, Model B underperforms Model A. The table is kept only to show the shape of the original argument.
The 30% capture assumption is the ballgame. If only 10% of would-be Free users will pay 5.99tocreateanaccount(insteadof305.99 to create an account (instead of 30%), Model B revenue drops to ~9,650/mo and is roughly equivalent to Model A. If the rate is 5%, Model B underperforms Model A. The decision rests on a single empirical question that we can answer with a paywall A/B test before fully committing.

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Sensitivity table — Model B revenue by Basic capture rate

Break-even capture rate is roughly 7.5%. Above 7.5%, Model B is more profitable than Model A. Below 7.5%, Model A wins. Cannabis-tracking tools historically convert under 2% of installs to paid — well below break-even. The original draft argued the rate would instead approach “10-30% App Store conversion for utility apps,” but that benchmark is misapplied: it describes trial-start or paywall-view-to-purchase rates for established brands, not install-to-paid for an unknown app behind a hard signup paywall. With no evidence of over-7.5% capture and strong evidence of under-2%, Model B was rejected.

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Pricing psychology — what each tier signals

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Why 5.99(not5.99 (not 4.99 and not $6.99) for Basic

  • $4.99 is impulse territory but signals “cheap” — risks devaluing the rest of the ladder.
  • **5.99∗∗isstillunderthe5.99** is still under the 6 mental threshold but earns 20% more revenue per Basic user vs $4.99.
  • $6.99 crosses the perceived “premium tier” line and may pull users either down to Guest or up to AI Pro — both bad outcomes for Basic specifically.
  • 5.99isalsoacleaner5.99 is also a cleaner 5/mo + $1 framing for marketing (“less than a coffee per month to keep your stash safe”).

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Why 11.99(not11.99 (not 12.99) for AI Pro

  • 12.99istheexistingProprice,so12.99 is the existing Pro price, so 11.99 represents a deliberate $1 price cut on AI to soften the optics of charging for things that used to be free (rankings, badges, collection).
  • 5.99+5.99 + 11.99 = $17.98 makes the math always favor AI Pro over stacking add-ons, which simplifies the upsell.
  • The 6jumpfromBasictoAIProispsychologicallysymmetricwiththe6 jump from Basic to AI Pro is psychologically symmetric with the 8 jump from AI Pro to AI Unlimited — each step roughly doubles in value.

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Why $19.99 for AI Unlimited

  • Matches the previously analyzed Studio price point (see Pricing Strategy).
  • Industry-standard “premium creative” price (Spotify Premium, Headspace, NotebookLM via Google AI Premium are all $11-20/mo).
  • Folds Historical Import (14.99−14.99-49.99 one-time) into recurring revenue — pays back the lost one-time SKU in 3 months.
  • The 19.99/moand19.99/mo and 149.99/yr (37% annual discount) tier doubles as the lifetime-value anchor for power users.

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Annual pricing (parallel to monthly)

Pushing annual on AI Unlimited harder is intentional — the deepest discount is reserved for the highest-LTV plan, which compresses churn risk and front-loads cash for the long-tail features (AI media generation costs are real).

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What we lose if we switch to Model B

This is the part that should not be glossed over. Moving away from a free logged-in tier costs us real things:
  1. The “data hostage” lever disappears. Today, Free users build a stash and favorites. Their data is the reason they convert to Pro. In Model B, they never build that data unless they pay first. We lose the strongest in-product upgrade hook — having something to lose.
  2. Account growth slows down dramatically. Top-of-funnel for the SEO -> install -> sign-up pipeline narrows. Even if revenue per account is higher, total accounts drops. That has knock-on effects on social proof, network effects (rankings, leaderboards, community badges), and our marketable user count.
  3. App Store positioning shifts. “Free with in-app purchases” reads differently than “Subscription required.” Many users filter out the latter without ever opening the listing.
  4. The Free tier was the upgrade story. “Track your stash for free, upgrade for AI” is a well-understood pitch. “Pay $5.99 to track your stash, pay more for AI” is a harder pitch, especially against Leafly / Weedmaps / AllBud which all have free tracking.
  5. Historical Import as a one-time purchase generates revenue from users who never subscribe to AI. In Model B, those users would not exist — they would either be Basic (no historical import) or AI Unlimited (subscription).

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What we gain if we switch to Model B

  1. ARPU per logged-in account at least doubles in every realistic scenario where Basic capture > 10%.
  2. Stronger product signal — paid users churn less than free users by every benchmark, and we filter out the dabblers at signup.
  3. AI cost containment. Every AI Pro and AI Unlimited user is paying for the AI cost of generation. There are no free-tier users hammering AI features that cost us money to serve.
  4. Cleaner roadmap framing. Future AI features ship into AI Unlimited automatically. There is no “is this a Pro feature or a Studio feature?” debate every quarter.
  5. Higher-quality user feedback loop. Paid users complain louder, in more useful ways, about specific things. Free users churn silently.
  6. Easier to introduce annual / lifetime / family plans because every account is already a paid account.
1

Don't switch cold-turkey

Migrating existing Free users to Basic = mass churn event. Anyone with a stash needs to be grandfathered as “Legacy Free” indefinitely. Only new accounts after the switch see the paid signup wall.
2

Run a 90-day paywall A/B test

Build the Model B onboarding (paywall on account creation) for a 25% randomized cohort of new app installs. Measure:
  • Account creation rate vs control
  • Day-7 retention vs control
  • Revenue per install (90 days) vs control
  • Apple App Store star rating impact
The break-even is 7.5% Basic capture. If we hit 12%+ in the test, ship Model B.
3

Hybrid as the soft-launch option

If A/B is ambiguous, lean into stronger pre-paywall value (richer Guest tier, better paywall messaging). Historical note: the original draft declared “no free trials, ever” here — that absolutism was overturned by the July 3, 2026 decision. The launch model ships with a 7-day free trial; a no-trial variant is retained only as a post-launch A/B experiment (see Rollout Plan).
4

Reuse the Studio plan for AI Unlimited

The product, pricing, and RevenueCat scaffolding for Studio is already designed (see Pricing Strategy). AI Unlimited is functionally Studio renamed and repositioned. No additional engineering work to introduce it under either model.
5

Keep Historical Import as a fallback one-time SKU

Even under Model B, keeping Historical Import available as a one-shot $49.99 purchase gives Basic users a way to spend money without subscribing to AI. This recaptures revenue from the “I’ll never subscribe to AI but I want my full history” segment.

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Decision matrix

What actually happened (July 3, 2026): the draft sequence above recommended shipping Model B first. The decision went the other way — Model A ships at launch (Guest / Free / Pro with a 7-day trial), because it matches shipped code, keeps the free habit/virality loop, and doesn’t stake the launch on an unproven capture rate that benchmarks under 2%. Model B’s core idea survives as the rejected “Option B” alternative in Pricing Strategy, to be A/B tested post-launch only if trial-to-paid underperforms.

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Summary table — every plan in one view

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Open questions to resolve before deciding

Survey 100 current Free users with a single question: “Would you pay $5.99/mo to keep your stash, favorites, and order history?” Yes/No is enough. If under 40% say yes, Model B is high-risk. If over 60% say yes, Model B is the strong play.
Convex storage + sync is the only real cost. If it is under 0.10/moperuser,Basicisessentiallypuremargin(northof0.10/mo per user, Basic is essentially pure margin (north of 5.89/mo gross profit). If we are paying $1+/mo for AI features that we accidentally let Free users access, switching to Model B closes that leak.
Apple App Store rules permit hard paywalls on signup. The original draft argued a free trial introduces low-intent users and trial-churn, and that “Apple’s automatic 14-day refund window” provided equivalent risk reversal. Both claims are corrected in the decided model: Apple refunds are discretionary and case-by-case — there is no guaranteed 14-day window, so refunds cannot be the risk-reversal story. And a $12.99 ask from an unknown brand with no trial has no supporting data. High IQ ships with a 7-day free trial; the no-trial model survives only as a post-launch A/B test candidate.
The risk is that users who would have paid 12.99forProunderModelAinsteadpay12.99 for Pro under Model A instead pay 5.99 for Basic under Model B and never upgrade. The countermeasure is making AI features extremely visible inside Basic — preview thumbnails, blurred content, locked-state UI — so Basic users feel the gap every day. This is the same upgrade-hook design pattern documented in Pricing Strategy.
(Historical note: at decision time the app was pre-launch with zero subscribers, so this question was moot — retained for the record.) The draft’s answer: no change; existing subscribers keep their entitlement at their current price, new signups pay the new 11.99,andanyoneat11.99, and anyone at 12.99 grandfathers until cancellation.
Out of scope for this comparison, but worth flagging. Once every account is paid, a family plan ($24.99 for 4 accounts on AI Pro, e.g.) becomes a clean LTV expansion play. Hold for v2 of Model B.
  • Pricing Strategy — Original three-option analysis (Studio, Add-Ons, Hybrid)
  • Tier Comparison — Full feature-by-tier matrix for Model A
  • What’s in Pro — Customer-facing version of the current model
  • Roadmap — When Studio / AI Unlimited features actually ship