Compare › Sell Digital Products
Circle vs Stripe
| Circle | Stripe | |
|---|---|---|
| What it says it does | Build a home for your community, events, and courses — all under your own brand. | Stripe is a payments platform for accepting cards, wallets and bank payments online, with Payment Links, Checkout, subscriptions, invoicing and tax tools that need little or no code. |
| Pricing | Professional $89/mo (2% transaction fee); Business $199/mo (1% fee); Scale $419/mo; Circle Plus custom; prices billed annually; 14-day free trial, no card required (official) | No setup or monthly fees; 2.9% + 30 cents per successful domestic card transaction; +0.5% for manually entered cards, +1.5% for international cards, +1% if currency conversion is needed; ACH Direct Debit 0.8% capped at $5; $15 per dispute; Payment Links included (US pricing) (official) |
| Website | https://circle.so/ | https://stripe.com/ |
Which to use
Circle wins when you want a polished, branded home for a paid community with courses and events. Stripe wins when you want pay-per-sale card processing with Payment Links, subscriptions and invoices and no monthly fee.
- Choose Circle if you want a branded community with courses, events and paid memberships in one place.
- Choose Stripe if you want to take card payments for products, services or subscriptions without a monthly fee.
This is an editorial fit note from each vendor's public site and docs, not a sponsored ranking and not a price quote. Descriptions in the table come from those sites. Confirm current prices there. How we review tools.
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