Payment Gateway Comparison: Best Payment Processors for Membership Site

Looking for the best payment processor to integrate into your membership or subscription website? What’s better for a global or local digital-only business?

There are so many little things to remember – especially if you target international audiences, fees for international payments, currency conversion, subscription integration, chargeback fees… Get ready, because we’ll break it all down for you in this payment gateway comparison post.

First of all, which payment gateways will we be looking at, and why have we chosen them?

• Stripe
• PayPal
• Authorize.Net
• 2Checkout (Verifone)
• Paddle

These are the top tools you have surely heard of because they are popular and trusted by consumers of digital subscriptions. More than that, these payment gateways:

• Have wide adoption across countries and user types.
• Provides support for subscriptions and recurring payments.
• Have advanced anti-fraud tools.
• Provide dunning management (failed payment retries).
• Have cool analytics for you.

Thus, we’ll try to structure our payment gateway comparison based on the key criteria, starting from the basics – regions, fees, etc. – all that you need to know!

Moreover, we’ve made sure that you can simply jump from one piece to another and quickly skim through the posts. Time to start!

Regions and Locations

Well, we all know that providers like Stripe and PayPal are trusted in global consumer markets.

But what are some other best payment processor options that you can use in your location?

So, let’s try to find out how the best payment processors compare by location and which ones dominate in different regions.

Payment Gateway Comparison: Commissions

First of all, if you are running a membership site, make sure you are looking at the correct fees page. So, you are treated as the merchant, seller, or business by different gateways.

In some cases, for example, with PayPal, if both customer and your site have PayPal accounts, the customer can pay directly via PayPal balance and avoid card fees.

However, many methods don’t support direct account-to-account (‘wallet’) transfers and customers need to find the best fees for their payment method.

Moreover, for a membership site, take into account the following things related to fees:

• If a customer pays in a different currency than your integrated payment gateway account, that may also increase a commission (e.g. PayPal adds ~3-4% to the exchange rate).
• If you sell memberships to international audiences, consider extra charge (usually 1.5%) for payments from outside your account’s registered country.
• Chargebacks are also expensive for your business. For example, if a customer disputes a payment, that can add up ~$20 per dispute (non-refundable).

Taxes

Some processors like Paddle handle all tax compliance for you, but Stripe and PayPal leave it to you but may ease the process with integrations or tax add-ons.

At the same time, keep in mind that selling products, services, and membership subscriptions can trigger different tax obligations (e.g., VAT for digital services, sales tax for physical goods) and this all should be set up in your payment account.

Refunds

Stripe, Square, Authorize.Net keep all processing refund fees. As for PayPal, you can expect at least the fixed fee ($0.30), sometimes more depending on the region. Paddle keeps its fee (5% + $0.50) but without extra charge. Also not that all 5 charge an additional dispute/chargeback fee (usually $15–25) if customer disputes instead of asking for a refund.

But the refund speed is different:

• Stripe and Square: 3-5 business days.
• PayPal – instant if balance, 3-7 days if card.
• Paddle depends on the payment method (same as Stripe/PayPal).
• Authorize.Net tied to card networks, 5-7 days.
• 2Checkout (Verifone) 3-7 business days for card payments.

Subscriptions and Recurring Payments

Not all membership sites will need to charge recurring payments for subscriptions, of course. Also, a one-time payment is probably the simplest thing to implement.

However, if you deliver your content or services on a regular basis and want to generate recurring revenue, you also need to make sure that the subscriptions offered by the most popular payment gateways work for you.

Also, we’ve included the ease of integration for your business by describing setup requirements.

Do commissions actually differ when your customer is charged one time or a recurring fee? Sometimes! So, here’s a few payment gateway comparison differences below:

• Stripe subscription charges (Stripe Billing) use the same transaction fee as normal payments: ~2.9% + $0.30 in the U.S.  Thus, extra fee is for advanced subscription features (e.g., invoicing, tax, smart retries).
• PayPal subscriptions cost the same as regular payments, so no separate charges.
• Authorize.Net’s fees are identical to one-time transactions, however, there’s a $25/month gateway fee (ongoing cost regardless of usage).
• 2Checkout (Verifone) doesn’t charge extra for recurring premium but fees are generally higher than Stripe/PayPal already.
• In Paddle, there is also no difference between recurring vs. regular fees.
• In Square, ACH debit (U.S.) for recurring payments is cheaper (~1% with $1 minimum).

Checkout Workflow

If you are selling access to content + products or services on the same site, customers should be able to buy a subscription and a product in the same checkout. For example, Stripe supports subscriptions + one-time charges in the same flow but PayPal can redirect to a separate checkout page. So, let’s take a closer look at the payment gateway comparison from the checkout point of view.

Normally, there are two ways – customers pay on your site or on the payment processor’s site (so-called ‘hosted’ page – secured by the payment processor; on the cons side – you can’t customize it).

Furthermore, stripe and Square let customers pay directly on your membership site through embedded forms, with almost no redirects to processors (that may require a bit more of a setup).

PayPal often redirects members to its own website, which is both good and bad (e.g. a more trusted site is great for some people).

Moreover, Paddle and 2Checkout (Verifone) mainly use hosted checkout pages. Also, Authorize.Net is flexible – it can use on-site checkouts or redirect-style hosted payment forms.

Let’s Sum Up – What Payment Processor will Suit Your Membership Site?

When choosing a payment processor for your membership website, multiple things must be kept in mind:

• You need to have a merchant/seller/business account with the chosen payment processor for a membership site.
• Main fees to expect: transaction fees, cross-border fees, currency conversion, and chargebacks.
• Subscriptions are normally processed at the same fee rates as one-time payments.
• If you are selling access to content + products or services on the same website, customers should be able to buy a subscription and a product in the same checkout.
• Subscriptions often work best with bank debits (ACH, SEPA).

If your membership site provides subscriptions + products + services, your chosen payment processor should handle all – mixed checkout, flexible billing, tax differences, and reporting, with the lowest commissions, of course.

To sum up our payment gateway comparison commissions for software and content sellers (digital business), the generalized conclusion is as follows:

• Stripe is cheaper to use on membership sites in the U.S. and Europe for card payments.
• PayPal is cheaper in the U.S. for domestic payments, but more expensive for cross-border transactions.
• Paddle is most affordable for global SaaS if selling to many countries but most likely pricier if most of your customers are U.S.-based.
• Square is great for the U.S., Canada, U.K., Australia but not viable for most of the EU, Asia, and Africa.
• 2Checkout (Verifone) is relatively more expensive no matter in which region you use it.
• Authorize.Net has the best fees for the U.S. and Canada but not as smooth outside North America.

Finally, the easiest way to add a chosen payment processor to your membership site is via developed integration. Also, here at ARMember, we offer all of them – just pick those that work for you:

• Square integration
• Stripe integration
• Authorize.net integration
• PayPal integration
• Paddle integration

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