Making the work
Growing an audience
Running the business
BackerKit bundles the campaign with the pledge manager, so address collection and add-on sales happen without exporting backers anywhere, and it leans hard toward tabletop games and other physical products with shipping to work out. Crowdfundr runs a leaner funding page for a creator who already has an audience, offers its platform fee to supporters as a choice rather than deducting it outright, and drops the all-or-nothing rule entirely. Both charge 5 percent on what is raised. One needs shipping and add-on tooling built in. The other is just a page to collect pledges from people who already know you.
Crowdfunding with the pledge manager attached
Crowdfunding built to leave creators the money
BackerKit | Crowdfundr | |
|---|---|---|
| Starting price | Free | Free |
| Pricing model | Free | Free |
| Free tier | Yes | Yes |
| Billing | Usage-based | Usage-based |
| Free trial | Not stated | Not stated |
| API | Not stated | Not stated |
| Data export |
Crowdfunding with the pledge manager attached
BackerKit started as the thing campaigns moved to after Kickstarter closed, to collect addresses and sell add-ons, and now runs the campaign itself as well. Keeping both halves in one place removes the export and re-import that loses backers. It leans heavily toward tabletop games, which shows in the templates and in who is browsing.
Our note
The reason to launch here rather than on Kickstarter is the second half of the job. If the project is a straightforward one-reward campaign with no add-ons and no shipping tiers, Kickstarter's larger browsing audience is worth more than the pledge manager.
Crowdfunding built to leave creators the money
Crowdfundr runs reward and donation campaigns with the platform fee presented as optional to the supporter rather than deducted from the creator, and the company publishes what that works out to in practice. Campaigns are free to start and there is no all-or-nothing rule forcing a goal. The comparison table on its own pricing page names Kickstarter and BackerKit and states their fees beside its own. Discovery is thin, so bring your own audience.
Pick BackerKit for a tabletop game, comic or physical product with add-ons and shipping tiers to sort out once the campaign funds. It takes 5 percent of what is raised, plus standard payment processing, and only if the project hits its goal. What that fee buys on top of a plain campaign is the pledge manager built in, so backer addresses and add-on orders never get exported anywhere.
Pick Crowdfundr when you already have an audience and just need a page to collect pledges, without an all-or-nothing rule forcing you to hit a target before keeping anything. The 5 percent platform fee matches BackerKit's, but Crowdfundr offers it to supporters as a choice at checkout, and the company states 95 percent cover it themselves. Discovery is thin on Crowdfundr, so this only works if you are bringing your own audience rather than hoping the platform finds one for you.
Ratings are the average of reviews readers left. The facts are stated by each tool’s own listing and are not verified by CloutStack. How we make money.
| Not stated |
| Their cut | 5% of what you earn | 5% of what you earn |
|---|
| Runs on | Web | Web |
|---|
| Covers | Crowdfunding, Monetization & Payments | Crowdfunding, Monetization & Payments |
|---|
| Works with | Nothing in particular | Nothing in particular |
|---|
| Founded | Not listed | Not listed |
|---|
| Reader rating | No reviews yet | No reviews yet |
|---|
| Live deals | None right now | None right now |
|---|
Shaded rows are where the two answers disagree and both listings have answered. A row where one side has not stated a fact is left plain, because silence is not a difference.
Our note
Compare this against Kickstarter on the assumption that nobody covers your fees, and then treat anything supporters do cover as upside. The absence of an all-or-nothing rule is the bigger practical difference for a creator funding a project that can ship at a smaller scale.