Subscription Billing
Subscription billing platforms handle recurring charges, plans, invoicing, dunning, and tax, either as a layer on a payment processor or as a merchant of record that takes on tax and compliance liability.
Billing is go-to-market infrastructure because pricing changes are growth experiments, and a system that cannot express a new plan blocks one. The decisive choice is architectural: a merchant of record absorbs global sales tax and VAT registration in exchange for a higher percentage, while a billing layer on your own processor costs less and leaves the compliance work with you. Both are defensible; the mistake is not knowing which one you bought.
Creem
Best ValueThe cheapest published merchant of record rate in software, from a two-year-old Estonian startup
Dodo Payments
A merchant of record built for India and emerging markets, aimed at AI companies
Lemon Squeezy
The friendliest merchant of record in software, now living inside Stripe
Paddle
Category LeaderThe merchant of record that sells your software so you never file a VAT return
Polar
MomentumOpen-source merchant of record built for developers who bill by the token
Chargebee
The billing layer that runs on your processor, at 0.8 percent instead of 5
Outseta
Billing, auth, CRM, email, and help desk in one bootstrapped bundle from $37 a month
Recurly
Churn recovery and payments orchestration for subscription businesses with real volume
GoCardless
Pull money from bank accounts instead of cards, at roughly a quarter of the cost
Gumroad
Ten percent flat, no monthly fee, and Gumroad files the tax
Mollie
European payments with the local methods that actually convert, and a subscriptions API bolted on
MoonClerk
Recurring payments without a developer, for a flat monthly fee on top of your own Stripe account
Stripe Billing
The default subscription engine, priced as a percentage of everything you bill
Zoho Billing
A full subscription platform for a flat monthly fee, with no percentage of your revenue
Metronome
InnovationUsage-based billing at AI scale, now owned by Stripe
Stigg
The entitlements and credits layer that sits on top of the billing system you already have
Schematic
Pricing and entitlements as configuration, with the React components already built
Profiles are listed in editorial order. Placement cannot be purchased; see our methodology.