Growing an audience
Running the business
Both cover tips & donations. Here is what separates them on price, billing, what you can take with you, and coverage.
| Buy Me a Coffee | Givebutter | |
|---|---|---|
| Starting price | Free | From $29 |
| Pricing model | Free | Free plan, paid tiers |
| Free tier | Yes | Yes |
| Billing | Usage-based | Monthly or annual |
| Free trial | Not stated | 30 days |
| API | Not stated | Not stated |
| Data export | Not stated | Not stated |
| Their cut | 5% of what you earn | None |
| Runs on | Not stated | Web |
| Covers | Tips & Donations, Digital Products & Storefronts, Memberships & Subscriptions, Monetization & Payments | Tips & Donations, Crowdfunding |
| 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 |
One page for tips, memberships and sales
Buy Me a Coffee is the shortest path between a reader wanting to pay you and money arriving in your bank account. A page, a button, and no plan to choose. Memberships and a shop for one-off things sit on the same page, and the 5 percent it takes is cheap until you are earning enough that a percentage stops being cheap.
Our note
The right first step and rarely the last one. Once memberships pass a few hundred a month, run the 5 percent against what a fixed monthly plan elsewhere would cost, because that is when the simplicity starts having a price.
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Fundraising that runs on optional tips
Givebutter charges nothing for donation pages, events and its fundraising CRM, and funds itself from a tip donors can choose to add at checkout. Turning tips off swaps them for a platform fee, which is the honest version of free. The paid tier is a marketing add-on rather than the fundraising itself, and most organisations never need it.
Our note
The 0 percent platform fee holds only while donor tips are switched on, and a fee applies if they are turned off. The cost moves from the organisation to the donor rather than disappearing, which is the trade to weigh against Donorbox.
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.
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