CUPERTINO, June 10 -- The app on your phone that edits your photos and the one that hosts your podcast may soon arrive in a single bill, sold together at a discount, with Apple taking its 15 to 30 percent cut on the whole package. That is the promise Apple made to developers Monday at its Worldwide Developers Conference. Whether it is a gift to consumers or a calculated move to keep revenue flowing through a commission structure that courts are actively dismantling is, as the lawyers would say, a contested question.

For the first time since the App Store opened in 2008, Apple said it would allow developers from different companies to bundle their subscriptions together and sell them as a single discounted package. Under the new system, a...