Thinkific Payments vs your own Stripe
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Fees change; confirm on the vendor's pricing page before buying.
| Platform / plan | Eligibility | Monthly price | Annual billing / month | Platform fee | Native processing | Own gateway surcharge | Verification / confidence | Sources / notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Thinkific / start | eligible | $109.00 | $82.00 | 0% | 2.9% + fixed fee unknown, assumed $0 | 2% | Last verified: 2026-10-21 partly from secondary source | Vendor pricing Prices and 2.9% Thinkific Payments rate read from pricing page (FAQ: 'in line with other processors like Stripe and Paypal at 2.9%'); page gives no fixed cents (support search snippet says 2.9% + 30c US/CA, not fetched). No platform revenue share. Own-gateway surcharge 2.0% comes from a support.thinkific.com search snippet (article 22383950439575 returned HTTP 403 on fetch) -> secondary; applies to Stripe, PayPal 'in future', waived above $1M sales/calendar year. PayPal not available on Start per pricing table. No free plan; 30-day trial. Own-gateway surcharge (2/1/0.5%) is from an official-domain search snippet; support page returned 403. Verify manually. Secondary fields: own_processor_surcharge_pct, native_processor.fixed_cents |
| Thinkific / grow | eligible | $219.00 | $164.00 | 0% | 2.9% + fixed fee unknown, assumed $0 | 1% | Last verified: 2026-10-21 partly from secondary source | Vendor pricing Same sourcing as Start. Surcharge 1.0% from support.thinkific.com search snippet only (secondary). PayPal accepted on Grow. Own-gateway surcharge (2/1/0.5%) is from an official-domain search snippet; support page returned 403. Verify manually. Secondary fields: own_processor_surcharge_pct, native_processor.fixed_cents |
| Thinkific / expand | eligible | $499.00 | $374.00 | 0% | 2.9% + fixed fee unknown, assumed $0 | 0.5% | Last verified: 2026-10-21 partly from secondary source | Vendor pricing Same sourcing as Start. Surcharge 0.5% from support snippet (secondary). Support table also lists a 'Basic' plan at 5.0% and 'Plus: no fee at this time', but no Basic plan appears on the pricing page; Plus is contact-sales. The '0.7% TP fee' in r14 was not found on any page. Own-gateway surcharge (2/1/0.5%) is from an official-domain search snippet; support page returned 403. Verify manually. Secondary fields: own_processor_surcharge_pct, native_processor.fixed_cents |
Illustrative annual costs
Annual billing, average sale $100. These estimates use the fee data above and do not assess product features or payment-provider eligibility.
$25,000.00 annual revenue · native processing
| Platform / plan | Eligibility | Subscription / year | Platform fee / year | Processing / year | Gateway surcharge / year | Total / year | Effective take | Status / assumptions | Verification / confidence |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. Thinkific / start | eligible | $984.00 | $0.00 | $725.00 | $0.00 | $1,709.00 | 3.636% | eligible; fixed fee unknown, assumed $0 | Last verified: 2026-10-21 partly from secondary source |
$100,000.00 annual revenue · native processing
| Platform / plan | Eligibility | Subscription / year | Platform fee / year | Processing / year | Gateway surcharge / year | Total / year | Effective take | Status / assumptions | Verification / confidence |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. Thinkific / start | eligible | $984.00 | $0.00 | $2,900.00 | $0.00 | $3,884.00 | 0.684% | eligible; fixed fee unknown, assumed $0 | Last verified: 2026-10-21 partly from secondary source |
Own processing assumes 2.9% + $0.30 per sale, plus the plan’s own-gateway surcharge. Vendor-specific exceptions remain in the source notes.
$25,000.00 annual revenue · own processing
| Platform / plan | Eligibility | Subscription / year | Platform fee / year | Processing / year | Gateway surcharge / year | Total / year | Effective take | Status / assumptions | Verification / confidence |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. Thinkific / start | eligible | $984.00 | $0.00 | $800.00 | $500.00 | $2,284.00 | 5.936% | eligible | Last verified: 2026-10-21 partly from secondary source |
$100,000.00 annual revenue · own processing
| Platform / plan | Eligibility | Subscription / year | Platform fee / year | Processing / year | Gateway surcharge / year | Total / year | Effective take | Status / assumptions | Verification / confidence |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. Thinkific / grow | eligible | $1,968.00 | $0.00 | $3,200.00 | $1,000.00 | $6,168.00 | 2.968% | eligible | Last verified: 2026-10-21 partly from secondary source |
More fee references
Pricing by platform
- Thinkific pricing
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- Kajabi pricing
- Podia pricing and fees
- Kit Commerce fees
- LearnWorlds pricing and fees
- Skool pricing and transaction fees
- Stan Store pricing
- Gumroad fees
- Payhip pricing and fees
- Systeme.io pricing
Head-to-head comparisons
- Thinkific vs Teachable cost
- Kajabi vs Thinkific cost
- Kajabi vs Skool cost
- Teachable vs Kajabi cost
- Stan Store vs Kajabi cost
- Gumroad vs Payhip cost
- Thinkific vs LearnWorlds cost
- Podia vs Teachable cost
- Thinkific Payments vs your own Stripe