Stan Store alternatives: prices, fees and which one fits

What makes this useful: Introduces a job-based decision framework that separates audience routing, checkout, product delivery, customer ownership and attribution rather than declaring a universal winner.

The right Stan Store alternative depends on what you're replacing. Stan is a paid creator storefront with no fee per sale, so the alternatives fall into three groups: tools that are free to start but take a share of each sale (Gumroad, Beacons, Payhip, EarnThread's free plan), all-in-one course platforms that cost more each month (Kajabi), and plain link-in-bio pages for creators who don't sell anything yet.

The short version:

• Selling one or two downloads and not sure they'll sell? Start with a free plan that takes a percentage, and move to a paid plan once the percentage costs more than the subscription.
• Already making steady sales? A flat monthly plan with a low or zero sales fee usually works out cheaper.
• Running courses with community and automation at scale? A dedicated course platform is worth its higher price.

All prices below come from each company's own pricing or help pages, checked on 4 October 2026. They change, so check the current page before you switch.

Stan Store alternatives at a glance

Card processing (Stripe or PayPal) applies on every platform. Sources for each line are in the sections below.

What Stan costs

Stan's own pricing guide lists two plans: Creator at $29 a month or $300 a year, and Creator Pro at $99 a month or $948 a year (opens in a new tab). Stan doesn't charge transaction fees on either plan (opens in a new tab); you pay the standard Stripe or PayPal processing fee. There's a 14-day free trial, not a free plan (opens in a new tab).

Creator Pro adds the selling tools: Stan's help centre lists discount codes, payment plans, upsells and order bumps, funnels, affiliate tools, email marketing and ad-pixel tracking (opens in a new tab). If you'd need those, compare alternatives against $99 a month, not $29.

Gumroad: no monthly fee, a bigger cut per sale

Gumroad charges no subscription. Its pricing page says it takes 10% + $0.50 on sales through your profile or direct links (opens in a new tab), and 30% when new customers find and buy from you through its Discover marketplace (opens in a new tab).

That makes Gumroad a good place to test whether a product sells at all. It gets expensive as sales grow: the percentage keeps rising with your revenue, while a flat subscription doesn't. It's also checkout-first rather than a storefront for your social traffic, so you may still want a link-in-bio page in front of it. Not sure what to test? See what small creators sell, and to whom.

Beacons: link in bio first, with a store

Beacons has four plans: Free, Creator at $10 a month, Creator Plus at $30 and Creator Max at $90 (opens in a new tab). Its store charges a 9% transaction fee on the Free and Creator plans and 0% on Creator Plus and Creator Max (opens in a new tab), and Beacons notes that Stripe and PayPal have their own associated fees (opens in a new tab) on top.

Beacons suits creators whose page is mainly links, a media kit and brand deals, with a few products alongside. If selling is the main job, compare its $30 plan (no sales fee) with Stan's $29 Creator plan. If brand deals are your main income, see brand deal rates and pitches for small accounts.

Payhip and Kajabi: the budget option and the premium one

Payhip has a free plan with a 5% transaction fee, Plus at $29 a month with 2%, and Pro at $99 a month with no transaction fee (opens in a new tab). Payhip says PayPal and Stripe still charge their standard rates on all plans (opens in a new tab). It's a simple way to sell downloads, courses and memberships without a big monthly bill.

Kajabi is at the other end: Basic at $179 a month, Growth at $249 and Pro at $499 (opens in a new tab), with lower prices billed yearly. Kajabi says it doesn't take a revenue share (opens in a new tab). It's built for established course businesses that want courses, community, email and automation in one place. For a first product, it's usually more than you need.

EarnThread: storefront, email list and attribution

EarnThread has three plans: Launch free with a 5% platform fee, Growth at $19 a month with 1%, and Scale at $49 a month with 0%. Payments go into your own Stripe account, so card processing is Stripe's standard fee.

Where it differs is the thread from post to purchase: a tracked link from a social post, a storefront, a lead magnet or offer, checkout, and a customer record with the consent each subscriber gave, so you can see which posts actually led to sales. That doesn't make it the right choice for everyone. A creator who only needs to sell one file may prefer a simple checkout, and a large course operator may want Kajabi's learning tools. EarnThread is built for creators who want to own their audience and know where their revenue comes from.

What each costs at $1,000 a month in sales

Percentages are easy to misjudge, so here's a worked example. Say you sell 40 products at $25, $1,000 a month in total, through your own link. This is our arithmetic from the prices above; it leaves out card processing, which applies everywhere:

At this level, flat plans with a low or zero sales fee win. At $100 a month in sales the order flips and the free plans are cheapest. Work out your own break-even: divide the monthly price by the percentage you'd save.

Do you need a store, or is a link-in-bio page enough?

If you don't sell anything yet, a link-in-bio page is enough: it sends followers to your content, your newsletter signup and the occasional affiliate link. You need a creator store when you start selling your own products or bookings, because then you want the checkout, the customer list and the sales data in one place rather than spread across tools.

A useful test: if you're already sending followers from your link page to a separate checkout, and a separate email tool, and you can't tell which post led to which sale, that's the point where a store pays for itself. Before you build a store, a free lead magnet is often the better first step; How to create a lead magnet that builds an owned audience covers it.

Seven questions to ask before you switch

Feature lists all look alike. These questions separate the platforms that fit from the ones that don't:

1. 01
   Can I sell the offer type I need today?

   Downloads, courses, coaching calls, memberships.

2. 02
   Where do payments land?

   In your own Stripe account, or the platform's first? How Stripe Connect works for creators explains why it matters.

3. 03
   What does it cost at my expected sales

   , counting the subscription, the sales fee and card processing?

4. 04
   Can I export my customers, their consent, my products and my orders

   if I leave?

5. 05
   Can I see which post or campaign led to a sale?

6. 06
   What does a buyer get straight after paying?

   The download, the booking link, the course access.

7. 07
   How hard is it to move later?

   Ask about migration help and whether your links will still work.

A fair comparison can point you to a competitor when it fits your business better. Pick the platform that suits the next 12 months of your business, not the one with the longest feature list.

Start free on EarnThread and publish your first offer or lead magnet to see how it fits.

Frequently asked questions

Is there a free alternative to Stan Store?

Yes. Gumroad, Beacons, Payhip and EarnThread all have ways to start without a monthly fee, in exchange for a percentage of each sale. Stan itself has a 14-day trial but no free plan.

Is Stan Store cheaper than Gumroad?

It depends on your sales. Gumroad has no monthly fee but takes 10% + $0.50 per sale; Stan costs $29 a month with no sales fee. At $1,000 a month in sales, Stan's plan costs less; at small volumes Gumroad does.

Stan Store or Kajabi?

Stan suits creators selling downloads, coaching and simple courses from one storefront. Kajabi starts at $179 a month and suits established course businesses that need community, email and automation together.