Apple removes Freecash iOS app, threatening a $100M rewarded UA channel
Apple removed Freecash from the iOS App Store without prior notice, disrupting a platform paying out over $1M daily to 60 million registered users worldwide.
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Apple today removed the Freecash iOS app from the App Store without advance notice, according to a public statement published on LinkedIn by Moritz Holländer, Founder and CEO of Berlin-based Almedia GmbH. The removal affects what had become one of the most prominent rewarded User Acquisition (UA) platforms in mobile advertising - an app that grew by 12 million new users in 2026 alone and had reached number 2 in US App Store overall charts for multiple consecutive weeks.
The incident raises pointed questions about platform governance, the durability of large-scale mobile advertising investments, and Apple's approach to a category that had, until now, appeared to have secured its place within the ecosystem.
What Freecash is and how it operates
Freecash, the flagship product of Almedia GmbH, is a rewards platform that pays users real money for completing tasks - playing games, trying new apps, signing up for services, and completing surveys. The commercial model is direct: advertisers, predominantly mobile gaming studios, pay to acquire engaged users, and Freecash distributes a portion of that revenue to members as cash. Payouts are available through PayPal, bank transfer, gift cards, and cryptocurrency. According to Almedia, the platform has paid out more than $50 million in total to users, with the last 30 days alone representing over 13 million euros in withdrawals.
The platform maintains 273,850 reviews on Trustpilot, with an average of 4.8 stars, and holds 150,000 or more reviews on the App Store itself with a rating of 4.7 stars. Average time to a first reward is listed at 17 minutes and 12 seconds. These metrics made Freecash an unusual case: a performance-marketing tool with unusually strong user satisfaction scores in a category that has historically been dogged by quality concerns.
Almedia is registered in Berlin as Almedia GmbH, HRB 252752 B at the Register Court Berlin (Charlottenburg), with Moritz Holländer and Jan Sommerfeld as managing directors. The Financial Times' FT1000 recognised Almedia as the fastest-growing advertising company in Europe and the third fastest-growing company on the continent overall.
A sector that had finally earned legitimacy
Rewarded user acquisition has not always occupied comfortable ground within the App Store ecosystem. According to Holländer's statement, "Rewarded apps have had a complicated relationship with Apple, not because anything was wrong with them, but because Apple's guidelines struggled to keep up." The category faced previous removals - including Freecash itself - at earlier points in its development.
The landscape shifted roughly a year ago. Apple updated its guidelines to formally accommodate rewarded platforms, a move the industry interpreted as a durable signal. Almedia responded by accelerating investment heavily. According to Holländer, the company "spent more than $100M on user acquisition across DSPs, TV, and social" in 2026 alone, with the explicit goal of growing the platform. That figure reflects a strategic commitment of a scale rarely disclosed publicly by bootstrapped companies - and the scale underlines why the sudden removal, with no prior warning, landed with such force.
The AppsFlyer 2025 Performance Index, analysed in detail by PPC Land, found over a third of leading user acquisition sources are now rewarded, highlighting how the channel has moved from a niche segment to a core part of the mobile advertising stack.
The removal and its immediate consequences
The removal occurred on April 13, 2026 - the day before Holländer's public post. It came without what Holländer described as "proper explanation or heads up." He confirmed the App Store Connect console showed the app's status as "Removed from App Store." No specific App Store guideline subsection was cited in Holländer's statement as the reason given by Apple.
The impact is not limited to Almedia alone. According to the LinkedIn post, "Advertisers, including many of the world's top gaming studios, rely on us to engage their users." Freecash's daily payout of more than $1 million to users is also now disrupted on iOS. Almedia confirmed the platform remains accessible via mobile web for existing iOS users - a contingency it has maintained from prior episodes - but stressed that a web experience does not replicate native app engagement or discoverability.
The app's trajectory in the preceding months makes the removal particularly striking. According to Almedia's February 3, 2026, press release, Freecash had ranked number 1 overall on the iOS App Store in the United Kingdom, Germany, and the Netherlands, alongside number 2 in the United States and France, number 4 in Canada, and number 5 in Australia. It also hit number 1 in the Entertainment category across those territories as well as Austria. Top-5 Entertainment rankings extended further to China, Italy, Belgium, Japan, and Sweden, with number 6 in Poland and number 13 in South Korea. These figures, based on iOS store rankings from January 2026, reflect both the global scale of Almedia's investment and the organic reach Freecash had built.
The $100M bet and what it means for the industry
The scale of Almedia's user acquisition spend is the most significant commercial detail in this story. Committing more than $100 million across DSPs, television, and social media in a single year is not a small-company hedge; it is a strategic wager made on the assumption that the rules of the road were settled. Holländer is unambiguous about this: "We and the whole industry finally felt safe, so it came across surprising and frustrating that our app was just removed again without proper explanation or heads up."
The Apple App Tracking Transparency framework has already generated regulatory friction in Europe, with the French competition authority ruling in March 2025 that ATT's implementation was anticompetitive. Apple has also tightened App Store age controls and data disclosure requirements as recently as November 2025. These moves illustrate a pattern of evolving policy at the platform level that leaves third-party businesses operating in grey-area categories exposed to abrupt change, regardless of prior apparent acceptance.
Several industry observers commented in the LinkedIn thread. "Absolutely ridiculous. Rewarded UA is now one of the largest channels most of our customers use," wrote one commenter. Another noted the asymmetry of power: "Little recourse for impacted entities - even ones as large as Freecash - other than soul-sapping automated ticketing queues; the whole system feels Kafkaesque now." One commenter invoked AppGratis, a French app-discovery platform removed from the App Store by Apple in 2013, as a historical precedent for platform removal of large, commercially successful apps that nonetheless fell outside evolving guidelines.
Almedia's response and broader ambitions
Holländer stated the company is "appealing via the official route to get our app back as soon as possible and working together with Apple to continue serving our users and partners." Beyond reinstatement, Almedia is seeking a structural resolution. According to the statement: "Beyond getting our app back, we want to work together with Apple to solve this permanently: for us and for the entire industry."
Almedia is not a company with shallow roots. Founded in April 2020, it has grown from a small Berlin startup to a team of 73 or more people, trusted by over 500 advertisers. The company acquired German cashback platform zave.it on August 14, 2025, adding a retail dimension to its rewarded ecosystem. On December 1, 2025, it launched Freecash cashback in Germany, enabling users to earn cashback at retailers including Rewe, Lieferando, Acer, and Adidas - an expansion of its data-driven platform into physical commerce.
According to Almedia's December 2025 press release, around 65% of Freecash cashback users are engaging with cashback for the first time, unlike traditional cashback networks. Freecash describes these users as a closed, community-driven group, making them particularly valuable to advertisers seeking measurable engagement rather than passive impressions.
The iOS removal complicates that broader vision. Freecash's cashback expansion depends on maintaining a large, active user base. Losing the iOS native app for any significant duration threatens user retention and the flywheel of engagement that makes the advertising proposition valuable to brands. As Almedia's February 2026 press release stated, the platform's model rests on "fast payouts and clear expectations," with earnings available for withdrawal as soon as they are credited - a characteristic that has built loyalty across more than 100 countries.
Why this matters for the marketing community
The removal of Freecash is not an isolated dispute between one company and a platform. It crystallises a structural tension that affects the entire mobile advertising industry. Rewarded UA has become a primary user acquisition channel for the biggest mobile games in the world. When a top-ranked app in this category - one that had invested more than $100 million in a single year on the strength of revised platform guidelines - can still be removed without warning, it reveals the limits of operating within a single-gatekeeper distribution system.
The Apple ATT fine by French regulators and Apple's criticism of the EU Digital Markets Act form a backdrop to this event. Regulatory pressure has pushed Apple toward greater openness in distribution in Europe, but the Freecash removal demonstrates that policy clarity does not necessarily follow from regulatory engagement - at least not yet.
Holländer framed the stakes directly: "The risk of unexpected removals creates uncertainty for everyone involved. We are here to build a long-lasting business and see Apple as a key partner in that." Whether Apple responds with the policy clarity the industry is now demanding will be closely watched by advertisers, developers, and regulators alike.
Timeline
- April 2020 - Moritz Holländer and Jan Sommerfeld found Almedia GmbH in Berlin
- August 14, 2025 - Almedia acquires German cashback platform zave.it, adding retail cashback capabilities to its rewarded ecosystem
- November 13, 2025 - Apple revises App Store Review Guidelines, introducing updated rules on age verification, AI data disclosures, and developer requirements
- December 1, 2025 - Almedia launches Freecash cashback in Germany, with partner retailers including Rewe, Lieferando, Acer, and Adidas; 65% of cashback users are first-time cashback participants
- December 3, 2025 - AppsFlyer 2025 Performance Index published, showing over one-third of leading user acquisition sources are now rewarded
- January 2026 - Freecash ranks number 1 in the iOS App Store in the United Kingdom, Germany, and the Netherlands; number 2 in the United States and France; top 5 across more than a dozen countries
- February 3, 2026 - Almedia publishes press release confirming Freecash global iOS App Store rankings and 60 million registered users
- April 13, 2026 - Apple removes Freecash from the iOS App Store without prior notice or detailed explanation
- April 14, 2026 - Moritz Holländer publishes public statement on LinkedIn disclosing the removal, confirming 12 million new iOS users added in 2026 alone, over $1M in daily payouts, and $100M+ spent on user acquisition in 2026; Almedia confirms appeal filed via official route
Summary
Who: Almedia GmbH, a Berlin-based adtech company founded in April 2020, operating the Freecash rewards platform; Moritz Holländer, Founder and CEO; and Apple, operator of the iOS App Store.
What: Apple removed the Freecash iOS app from the App Store on April 13, 2026, without advance notice or detailed explanation. The app had 60 million registered users, paid out more than $1 million per day, and was backed by more than $100 million in user acquisition investment in 2026 alone. Almedia has filed an appeal through the official App Store review process.
When: The removal occurred on April 13, 2026. The public disclosure was made by Holländer on April 14, 2026.
Where: The removal affects the iOS App Store globally. Almedia is headquartered in Berlin, Germany. Freecash serves users across more than 100 countries.
Why: No specific guideline violation was cited publicly by Apple. Almedia describes rewarded apps as having had a "complicated relationship" with Apple historically, noting the category experienced previous removals before Apple updated its guidelines approximately one year earlier. The company invested heavily following those guideline updates, making the renewed removal a significant commercial and operational disruption for both Almedia and its advertiser partners.