Making the work
Growing an audience
Running the business
Both cover digital products & storefronts. Here is what separates them on price, billing, what you can take with you, and coverage.
A hosted store priced against how much you sell
Courses, downloads and email in one place
BigCommerce | Podia | |
|---|---|---|
| Starting price (they differ) | From $29 | From $42 |
| Pricing model | Free trial, then paid | Free trial, then paid |
| Free tier | No | No |
| Billing | Not stated | Monthly or annual |
| Free trial | Not stated | 30 days |
| API | Yes | Not stated |
| Data export | Not stated | Not stated |
| Their cut | Not stated | 5% of what you earn |
| Runs on | Web | Web |
| Covers | Digital Products & Storefronts, Monetization & Payments |
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.
A hosted store priced against how much you sell
BigCommerce is a hosted storefront whose tiers are drawn around sales volume rather than around features, so the question at signup is what a shop turns over rather than which capabilities it needs. Crossing a tier's ceiling moves the account up on its own, which is worth knowing before the first busy quarter. The platform adds no transaction fee of its own on top of the payment provider's. Anybody below the first threshold is paying for headroom they will not use for a while.
Our note
The automatic upgrade is the thing to plan for, because a good quarter moves you a tier without anybody approving it and the jump from $29 to $79 arrives at $30,000 of sales. Compare with Shopify on the card rate rather than the subscription, since that is where the two platforms actually differ.
Only on this side
Courses, downloads and email in one place
Podia sells courses, digital downloads, coaching and memberships from one storefront, with an email tool attached so the list and the products live together. Nothing in it is the best version of itself, and that is the trade being offered: one subscription instead of four. The entry plan charges 5 percent of sales, which the two plans above it drop.
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.
| Courses & Coaching, Digital Products & Storefronts |
| 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 |
|---|
Our note
The 5 percent on the entry plan is the number to run first. Past about $850 of monthly sales the fee costs more than the $42 jump to Shaker, and that jump also removes the email subscriber cap.
Only on this side