Why I Don't Do Freemium — The Solo Dev's Case for Charging From Day One

Every indie dev I know has had this conversation with themselves: "Should I offer a free tier?" I had it too. Three times, actually — once for each Mac app I've shipped. Every time, I landed on the same answer: no. Here's why. The Freemium Trap Nobody Warns You About Freemium sounds smart on paper. Get users in the door, convert a percentage, grow from there. But here's what actually happens when you're a solo developer: Free users are the most expensive users you'll ever have. They file bugs. They request features. They leave 1-star reviews when something doesn't work perfectly. And they generate exactly $0 in revenue while consuming 100% of your support bandwidth. When I shipped Monk Mode — a Mac focus app that blocks feeds instead of entire apps — I priced it at $15 from day one. No free tier, no trial-that-nags-you-to-upgrade. Just a straightforward purchase. The result? Every single user who reached out had skin in the game. Bug reports were specific and helpful. Feature requests