Developer Tiers — split, caps, payouts

Imperal's marketplace works on a tier system. Each developer is in one of four tiers; the tier controls your revenue split, app cap, payout access, and rate limits. Higher tier = more money per call + bigger ceiling.

The four tiers

What "Payout enabled" means

On explorer tier you still earn — your developer share accrues just like every other tier. But you cannot withdraw to USD until you upgrade to indie or higher. When you upgrade, all your accrued earnings become payout-eligible immediately.

Think of explorer as "try the marketplace risk-free." Build, ship, see real users use it, watch earnings tick up. When the numbers justify, upgrade to indie and cash out.

What "Max apps" means

Hard cap on the number of developer_apps rows you can own with status ∈ ('draft', 'pending_review', 'active', 'suspended'). Permanently archived apps don't count. If you hit the cap, either delete an unused draft or upgrade.

What "Analytics window" means

The maximum days parameter for GET /v1/developer/apps/{app_id}/analytics?days=N. Beyond your tier's window the API returns 400.

• explorer: last 7 days only
• indie: last 30 days
• studio: last 90 days
• partner: full year (365 days)

What "Rate limit" means

Per-developer cap on Dev Portal API requests per minute (anti-abuse). Won't normally matter unless you're scripting bulk operations.

Upgrade math — when does indie pay back?

Indie costs 9,000 credits / year (~$9/year at default topup_rate=0.001 USD/credit). The 80/20 split vs explorer's 70/30 means you keep an extra 10 percentage points of every action call. Break-even depends on your action volume:

extra_per_action = action_cost × 0.10
break_even_actions = 9000 / extra_per_action

For a typical 5-credit action: extra = 0.5 credits, break-even = 18,000 calls per year. If you ship an extension that gets 100 daily active users invoking 6 actions each, that's 600 calls/day = 18,000 calls in 30 days — you're past break-even after one month, and the remaining 11 months are pure extra income vs staying on explorer.

Studio + partner — when does it matter?

Studio (85/15, 29k credits/year) pays back faster than indie ONLY if you cross ~80k actions/month — viable for popular productivity tools or developer-utility extensions used by other developers.

Partner (95/5, 79k credits/year) is for "marketplace anchors" — apps that drive measurable platform retention. The 95/5 split means you keep almost everything; Imperal effectively becomes infrastructure for you at that point.

Renewal & lapse

Tier subscriptions auto-renew once a year on the anniversary of your last upgrade. The renewal cost = current tier's annual price (deducted from your credit wallet — keep enough credits to cover, or set up auto-topup).

If renewal fails (insufficient balance + no auto-topup):

• You drop back to explorer tier (70/30, 1 app cap, no payout)
• Existing earnings stay in your balance (NOT clawed back)
• Existing apps stay active BUT their revenue_split_dev stays at the historic rate until you edit them
• Payouts already in status='approved' continue to process
• New payout requests blocked until you re-upgrade

Re-upgrade any time to restore your previous tier; no penalty for lapse, just lost time at higher split.

Partner tier today is admin-promoted only, not self-upgrade. We talk to you first about partnership terms (multi-month commitments, co-marketing, etc.). If you have a hit extension, reach out via Dev Portal → Support.

How to upgrade (or initially become a developer)

First time signing up as a developer:

1. Open Imperal Panel → Developer Portal → Become a Developer
2. Choose nickname (3-30 chars, unique) + starting tier
3. If choosing indie/studio: credit amount deducted immediately from your wallet for the first year
4. Your developer_tier is stamped + developer_registered_at = now
5. Auto-renew enabled by default; cancel any time via Settings

Upgrading existing developer to a higher tier:

1. Open Dev Portal → Settings → Tier
2. Select target tier (indie / studio)
3. Confirm — annual price deducted from your wallet immediately
4. Your developer_tier is updated; the revenue_split_dev default for your future apps changes to match the new tier; analytics window + rate limit re-apply

See also: Becoming a Developer for the full onboarding flow.

Caveat: existing apps keep their currently-set revenue_split_dev when you upgrade. New apps you create after the upgrade get the new tier's default. To bump split on an existing app: Pause → Edit Pricing → Save (admin re-review).

Tier locking — pricing IS pinned to tier at app creation time

If you create an app on explorer (70%) and later upgrade to indie (80%), your existing app's revenue_split_dev stays at 70 until you explicitly edit it — Imperal doesn't auto-bump because the original price was negotiated with users at the lower split.

To re-negotiate: Pause + Edit pricing in Dev Portal (admin reviews + approves, then prices re-sync and go live within seconds).

What stays the same across tiers

• Idempotency / ledger semantics
• BYOLLM pricing impact (platform_fee = 0 regardless of tier)
• Stripe Connect requirements for payout (Connect needed once)
• USD conversion rate (topup_rate, default $0.001/credit)

Tier-change audit trail

Every tier change is recorded in your credit audit trail — bring receipts if you ever need to dispute a charge or split.