Growing an audience
Running the business
Both cover monetization & payments. Here is what separates them on price, billing, what you can take with you, and coverage.
| beehiiv | Ko-fi | |
|---|---|---|
| Starting price | From $49 | From $12 |
| Pricing model | Free plan, paid tiers | Free plan, paid tiers |
| Free tier | Yes | Yes |
| Billing | Monthly or annual | Monthly or annual |
| Free trial | None | Not stated |
| API | Yes | Not stated |
| Data export | Everything, in an open format | Not stated |
| Their cut | None | Not stated |
| Runs on | Not stated | Not stated |
| Covers | Newsletter & Email, Monetization & Payments | Monetization & Payments, Memberships & Subscriptions, Tips & Donations |
| Works with | Substack | YouTube, Twitch |
| Founded | Not listed | Not listed |
| Reader rating | No reviews yet | No reviews yet |
| Live deals | None right now | None right now |
Newsletters with paid subscriptions and referrals
beehiiv handles sending, paid subscriptions, a referral program and a basic website, which covers most of what someone writing a weekly letter actually needs. It was built by people who ran Morning Brew, and it shows in the growth tooling. Automation is thinner than a dedicated email platform.
Our note
If you are starting a newsletter you intend to charge for, start here. The free tier goes further than it looks, the growth tools are the reason people stay, and the export is clean if you decide to leave.
Only on this side
Tips, memberships and a shop with no platform cut
Ko-fi takes nothing from tips on the free plan, which no other platform of its size does. Memberships, commissions and digital downloads all work from the same page. It is lighter than Patreon in every direction, which is often the point.
Our note
The best free option for somebody who mostly gets tipped, and worth weighing against Patreon the moment memberships become the larger half of the income. Do the Gold arithmetic yourself rather than taking the upgrade prompt's word for it.
Only on this side
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.