Subscription products

Subscription products are the building blocks of your recurring revenue. Milo Subscriptions adds two new product types to WooCommerce: Simple subscription and Variable subscription. This page covers simple subscriptions. For variable subscriptions, see Variable subscriptions.

Creating a simple subscription

1. Go to Products → Add New.
2. Enter a name and description as you would for any WooCommerce product.
3. In the Product data panel, select Simple subscription from the product type dropdown.
4. Configure the subscription options (see below).
5. Click Publish.

Subscription options

When you select Simple subscription, the General tab of the Product data panel shows the options specific to recurring billing.

Subscription price

The amount charged to the customer at every renewal. This is the base price before taxes, shipping, or sign-up fees.

Billing period

The unit of time between renewals. Options are:

• Day
• Week
• Month
• Year

Billing interval

How often the billing period repeats. For example, a billing period of Month with an interval of 2 bills the customer every 2 months.

Sign-up fee

An optional one-time charge added to the first payment. Use this for setup fees, activation charges, or discounted first-period offers where the first payment differs from later renewals.

Free trial

An optional trial period during which no charge occurs. Choose a trial length (for example, 7) and a trial period (days, weeks, months, or years). The first renewal charge happens at the end of the trial.

Length

How long the subscription runs before it completes automatically. Set to Never expire for open-ended subscriptions, or enter a number of billing periods for fixed-term subscriptions.

Fixed expiry date

An optional calendar date on which the subscription ends, regardless of when it started. This is useful for cohort-based products like annual memberships that always end on December 31.

Minimum periods

The minimum number of billing periods the customer must pay for before they are allowed to cancel. This can be set globally in Settings → General and overridden per product. A value of 0 disables the minimum.

Sign-up fees and trials together

You can combine a sign-up fee and a free trial. The customer is charged the sign-up fee at checkout, the trial runs as configured, and the subscription price begins at the first renewal.

Virtual and downloadable subscriptions

Subscription products support the standard WooCommerce Virtual and Downloadable options:

• Virtual: no shipping is required.
• Downloadable: grants access to files while the subscription is active. See Downloads.

Stock, tax, and shipping

Simple subscriptions use the standard WooCommerce tabs for:

• Inventory: manage stock and purchase limits.
• Shipping: set weight, dimensions, and shipping class.
• Linked products: up-sells and cross-sells.
• Attributes and Advanced: same as regular products.

Coupons

Subscription products support WooCommerce coupons. Coupon types specific to subscriptions include:

• Recurring product discount: applies to every renewal.
• Sign-up fee discount: applies only to the sign-up fee.
• Recurring product % discount and Sign-up fee % discount: percentage-based variants of the above.

Example configurations

Monthly SaaS plan with a 7-day free trial

• Subscription price: $29
• Billing period: Month
• Billing interval: 1
• Free trial: 7 days
• Length: Never expire

Annual membership with a sign-up fee

• Subscription price: $99
• Billing period: Year
• Billing interval: 1
• Sign-up fee: $20
• Length: Never expire

Prepaid 6-month course

• Subscription price: $50
• Billing period: Month
• Billing interval: 1
• Length: 6 periods

Next steps

• Variable subscriptions: sell the same product with multiple billing options.
• Billing options: understand how renewals, intervals, and periods work together.
• Renewals: learn how automatic and manual renewals are processed.