I was replying to reviews on my wallpaper app one morning when a familiar one stopped me: "I paid to remove ads and the ads are still there." As an indie developer, I get a version of that message every few weeks. What I didn't expect was to run the same checklist on myself that afternoon — the Pro plan I'd been using on my iPhone looked like the Free plan when I opened Claude in a browser on my Mac.
Let me put the short version first. A paid Claude plan is tied to where you bought it. If you subscribed on the web or in the Desktop app, the Billing page on claude.ai is the source of truth. If you subscribed inside the iOS or Android app, Apple or Google is. Most "still on Free" situations I've seen start with mixing up those two doors.
Reading the symptom — three signs tell you which route you're on
Start with what the screen is actually saying. "The payment didn't go through," "I paid but nothing changed," and "I'm not sure where I paid" each point to a different next screen.
| What you see | Likely route | First screen to open |
|---|---|---|
| The Free label next to your account name | Either | The email address you're signed in with |
| No invoices at all under Settings → Billing | Probably an app-store purchase | Your App Store or Google Play subscriptions list |
| No Cancel button on the Billing page | App-store purchase | In the app: your initials → Billing → Manage subscription |
| Emails titled "Your receipt from Anthropic" | Web / Desktop purchase | claude.ai → Settings → Billing |
The official "Paid plan billing FAQs" draws this line in its very first paragraph: the article covers subscriptions bought on the web, and if you subscribed through the iOS or Android app, payment and receipts live with Apple or Google. I had skimmed past that sentence, which is why I kept reloading the Billing page as if it would eventually change its mind.
Web and Desktop versus iOS and Android, side by side
Putting both routes against the same rows removes most of the guesswork.
| Item | Web (claude.ai) / Desktop (Mac, Windows) | iOS / Android in-app |
|---|---|---|
| Who bills you | Anthropic (card payment) | Apple App Store / Google Play |
| Payment methods | Credit or debit card only | Whatever your store account allows (carrier billing, gift balance, and so on) |
| Invoices and receipts | Settings → Billing → Invoices, or the "Your receipt from Anthropic" emails | Your store's purchase history (Anthropic does not issue them) |
| Changing the card | Settings → Billing → Update | Your store's payment settings |
| Cancelling | Settings → Billing → Cancel | In the app: initials → Billing → Manage subscription (or from the store itself, even if the app is deleted) |
| When cancellation takes effect | End of the current period on both routes; cancel at least 24 hours before the renewal date to avoid the next charge | |
| Redeeming a gift subscription | Web only | Not possible while a store subscription is active |
The row that surprised me is Desktop. It's called an app, but for billing it sits on the web side. If you upgraded inside the Mac Desktop app, your invoices and your Cancel button are on claude.ai, not in any store. And if you upgraded from the iPhone app, opening Billing in a Mac browser will show you an empty invoice list — not because you haven't paid, but because the party issuing the receipts isn't Anthropic.
The order I check in — email, then payment status, then route
When the account looks Free, I've settled on three checks in a fixed order.
First, the email address I'm signed in with. The official help article lists this first too, and for good reason. Signing in with Apple on the phone and with Google on the Mac is an easy thing to do without noticing. The Pro plan may be attached to an account under a different address, and the account in front of you may really be Free.
Second, whether a failed payment quietly downgraded the account. For web purchases, Settings → Billing shows the most recent payment status. An expired card or a declined renewal drops the plan back to Free, and the fix is the Update button on that same page.
Third, the purchase route. If the first two checks turn up nothing, I stop assuming it was a web purchase. If Claude shows up in the iPhone's subscription list or under Google Play subscriptions, that's the authoritative record.
Doubt the email first, the payment second, and the route last. Once I fixed that order, the reload-and-wait loop disappeared from my afternoons.
Fixing it — one screen per route
If you bought on the web or in Desktop, click your initials in the lower-left corner of claude.ai, then Settings → Billing. Open the latest invoice with View to confirm the payment went through; if it failed, use Update to replace the payment method. If it's paid and the label is still Free, sign out and sign back in with the same email. The step-by-step version of that sign-out routine is in What to do when the Pro upgrade doesn't unlock features.
If you bought on iOS or Android, tap your initials in the top-right corner of the app, then Billing → Manage subscription. If the subscription shows as active there, Apple or Google has your payment. If the browser still shows Free, it's almost always the email address. Check which account the app is signed in with, and sign in to the browser with that same address.
From the developer side of the counter, this shape is familiar. A store subscription belongs to the store account, the entitlement belongs to the service account, and the only thing connecting the two is which account the person was signed in to when they bought. When a wallpaper-app user tells me the ads are still there, my first question is which device and which account the purchase was made on — the same question I had to ask myself.
When none of that works
If all three checks come up clean — the store history or the invoice list shows a successful payment, the email matches, and the account still reads Free — you've reached the edge of what you can fix yourself. The next step is support.
What shortens that conversation is having four things ready: the route you bought on (web, Desktop, iOS, or Android), the purchase date, the email address you sign in with, and a copy of the receipt. For store purchases that's the Apple or Google purchase-history screen; for web purchases it's the "Your receipt from Anthropic" email. I once went several rounds with support because I couldn't say which route I'd used, so now it goes in the first message.
One boundary worth naming: if the payment itself is being refused — a declined card — that's a step before this article. Fixing a declined credit card on a Claude subscription is closer to what you need in that case.
Start by reading the email address you're signed in with
On the day the account looked Free, the thing I should have done first wasn't a reload or a cache clear. It was reading the address in the lower-left corner once. That single glance decides which route you're on.
If you hit the same label, click your initials and check whether the address shown is the one you paid with. Once the route is settled, there's only one screen left to look at.