Yes, you can test different prices on your website by assigning eligible visitors to an offer and keeping that price for them across visits and through checkout. Decide beforehand how you will treat a customer who sees both prices, and check the consumer-protection rules in the markets you sell to. Compare net revenue per original visitor over a planned observation window, keeping assignment through later billing outcomes. In our subscription test, the higher-priced offer without a trial had an observed 18.3% higher net revenue per visitor than the lower-priced trial offer after roughly four months; the four-offer comparison shows why the early signup leader did not settle the decision.
We tested four subscription offers: $17 or $27 per month, each with or without a seven-day free trial. After roughly four months of billing data, $27 without a trial earned the most net revenue per visitor: $2.78. The $17 trial attracted the most initial conversions but earned the least per visitor ($2.35). The revenue results gave us a clear answer: a higher signup rate did not mean a more valuable pricing offer.
Revenue per visitor after four months
Across 20,896 visitors, we compared actual net revenue for each offer. Revenue per visitor is each offer’s recorded net revenue divided by the number of visitors who entered that group. The four-month results, ranked by revenue per visitor:
| Subscription offer | Visitors | Net revenue per visitor | Cancellation share |
|---|---|---|---|
| $27/month, no trial | 3,368 | $2.78 | 27.1% |
| $17/month, no trial | 3,606 | $2.57 | 30.6% |
| $27/month, 7-day trial | 7,261 | $2.53 | 68.3% |
| $17/month, 7-day trial | 6,661 | $2.35 | 61.6% |
At $27, removing the trial produced 10.1% more net revenue per visitor ($2.78 versus $2.53). At $17, the no-trial offer produced 9.2% more ($2.57 versus $2.35). The top performer also earned 18.3% more per visitor than the $17 trial—the initial conversion leader. Cancellation share is canceled subscriptions divided by recorded orders, and was lower without a trial at both prices.
Why the signup leader did not earn the most
The $17 trial attracted the most initial conversions. That metric counted the start of the subscription journey, while the commercial decision depended on what each visitor was worth after payments and cancellations. The four-month revenue analysis provided that answer.
The difference was visible in cancellations. At $27, 68.3% of recorded trial orders had canceled, versus 27.1% without a trial. At $17, the figures were 61.6% with a trial and 30.6% without. The trials produced more starts, but that did not translate into more net revenue per visitor. This is why the revenue readout, rather than the early signup ranking, settled the pricing comparison.
What price and trial availability changed
The four-arm design let us compare the same price with and without a trial, as well as the two prices within each trial condition. No trial earned more per visitor at both price points. Among the four combinations, $27 without a trial delivered the highest revenue. That makes the outcome more specific than “higher prices win” or “free trials never work”: it was the combination of price and signup terms that produced the best economic result for this membership.
How we connected conversions to revenue
PostHog captured the experiment’s conversion path, and ThriveCart held the payment and subscription records. We analyzed the billing outcomes for each offer group, including recorded net revenue and cancellations. The results above use actual net revenue from the follow-up—not a forecast of lifetime value.
For your own subscription experiment, keep the original variant assignment connected to payments, renewals, refunds and cancellations. Calculate net revenue per visitor over a meaningful billing window, and let signup rate explain how that result developed. Our event tracking plan covers the handoff, and the revenue guide covers currency normalization.
The decision
$27 per month without a free trial was the strongest of the four offers on net revenue per visitor. It outperformed the trial version at the same price and both $17 offers over the observed follow-up. The lesson from our experiment is practical: when the offer affects billing and retention, decide from revenue per visitor after customers have had time to pay, renew or cancel—not from initial conversions alone.
Apply the result to your own pricing test
Choose your revenue observation window before launch, retain each visitor in their assigned variant, and compare the complete outcomes for each pricing policy. Use our metric-selection guide to choose the business outcome and our PostHog experiment guide to configure and verify the test.