Early Access Program

The Hermit Early Access Program provides our most ardent fans with an exclusive experience: you get to use all our newest features before everyone else. Your early feedback and requests will help shape our upcoming features.

Every new version of Hermit has different features in the Early Access Program.

Frequently Asked Questions

• Is Early Access separate from Premium?

  Yes, Premium is a one-time purchase that gets you perpetual access to all current and future Premium features forever.

  Early Access is a membership program which gets you early and exclusive access to new and upcoming features, for a short amount of time, typically one or two releases before Premium or Free users.

  When features are fully ready for everyone, they will “graduate” from the Early Access Program, and will be available to everyone.

• But I already paid for Premium!

  Thanks for your early support — your purchase has made it possible to make Hermit the awesome productivity tool it is today, and for us to deliver the customer service experience that we have become known for!

  But while your purchase was a single one-time payment, we committed to offering you free updates and free new features for a lifetime. Creating, designing, and building new features takes valuable engineering resources. It’s not free.

• But why a subscription?

  The truth is that the app does not make enough revenue from one-time purchases to remain a viable project with a secure long-term future. During a usual week, we make an average of about $20 a day, out of which Google takes a 30% cut, and then there’s taxes on top of that. This comes to about minimum wage for one hour every day.

  Having a recurring stream of revenue will help us bring more features to you faster.

• Why do I have to subscribe?

  Simple, you don’t have to! For our Premium users, Early Access is completely optional. If you paid once, you will be able to use current and future Premium features forever, even without joining Early Access, or even if you unsubscribe later.

• Did you consider any other options?

  Yes, other apps have taken different approaches. None of them are ideal, and we are not fans of any of them.

  • Some apps went out of business after accepting payment from people. No more updates, even if the app is incompatible with future versions of the operating system. That’s the case on iOS, and it’s even worse on Android, because Android users consistently buy fewer apps than iOS users.

  We want to continue investing in Hermit and building new features for a long time to come, and we are not planning on abandoning Hermit any time soon.

  • Some apps stopped honoring previous purchases and required separate payment for a major update. This is also how the vast majority of desktop software works. If you purchased Microsoft Office in 2003, you would not automatically qualify for an update to 2007 without paying again.

  We’ve committed to providing you lifetime updates with a single one-time Premium purchase, and we will continue to honor that.

  • Most other apps on Android monetize their user base using some form of advertising or tracking personal information. Even your favorite open-source browsers & privacy-friendly tech companies are indirectly funded by the advertising industry:
    • Google Pays to Put Search Back on Firefox Browser in U.S.
    • Google pays Apple $3 billion to be the default search engine on the iPhone

  We are committed to securing your privacy. Of course, this makes it very hard for us to make money in today’s tech industry.

• OK, I get it now! Looks like you’ve given this a lot of thought. But why charge for Early Access?

  Charging for Early Access directly ties our revenue to the popularity of our new features! Think about it, people will only subscribe while we continue innovating. If we stop innovating, you will stop contributing. We like this, it motivates us to work harder!

• Alright, where do I sign up?

  Thanks, we’re glad you’re on board with us, and thanks for choosing to support a power-user-friendly, privacy-friendly browser that’s under active development.

  You can subscribe to the Early Access Program from within the app. Subscriptions are handled directly by Google. If you change your mind, you can unsubscribe at any time just as easily.

Finally, check out this comic strip for a laugh about this topic: Sad, but so true!