Teachable pricing 2026: the hidden cost of the 7.5% transaction fee
Teachable's pricing looks competitive at first glance: $39 a month for Starter, rising to $89 and $189. But there is no free plan any more, and Starter charges a 7.5% transaction fee on every sale, and that fee fundamentally changes the math. At $2,000/month in revenue, Starter costs $189 a month all in, being $39 of subscription plus $150 of transaction fees, while Builder costs a flat $89 for the same revenue. That is $100 a month lost to a plan that looked cheaper on the pricing page. Here is the full breakdown so you can see where Teachable's pricing works, where it does not, and the exact revenue at which you should move.
- Plans: Starter at $39/mo, Builder at $89/mo, Growth at $189/mo, plus a Custom tier by sales enquiry. There is no free plan, only a 7-day trial.
- The catch: Starter charges a 7.5% transaction fee on top of Stripe's 2.9% plus $0.30, so per sale you lose about 10.4% plus $0.30.
- Crossover: At about $667/month in revenue, Starter's fee plus subscription equals Builder's flat $89, so above that Builder is cheaper and the fee stops being worth it.
- The common mistake: staying on Starter far past that point. At $2,000/month you pay $189 on Starter against $89 on Builder.
The Teachable plans (verified September 2026)
| Plan | Monthly | Annual (per mo) | Transaction Fee | Courses | Students | Key Features |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Free | Discontinued. Teachable no longer offers a free plan (verified 23 August 2026). A 7-day free trial replaces it. | |||||
| Starter | $39/mo | $29/mo | 7.5% | 5 products | AI course builder, student apps, global payments and taxes, upsells and cart recovery. | |
| Builder | $89/mo | $69/mo | 0% | 10 products | Everything in Starter, plus 0% fees, an affiliate program and real-time support. | |
| Growth | $189/mo | $147/mo | 0% | 50 products | Everything in Builder, plus certificates, branding removal, imported students, custom admin permissions, free subtitles. | |
| Custom | By sales enquiry. Dedicated success manager, bulk sales tooling, flexible seats, sandbox school, SLA support, automated international tax. | |||||
The transaction fee problem: what Teachable Starter actually costs
The 7.5% transaction fee on Teachable Starter sits on top of Stripe's 2.9% + $0.30, so your real cost per sale is about 10.4% + $0.30. On a $97 course that is $10.39, of which $7.28 goes to Teachable and $3.11 to Stripe. The fee is charged on the sale price, not on your profit, so it does not care whether the course took you a weekend or a year.
The number that actually decides your plan is not the fee, it is where the fee overtakes the next subscription. Starter costs $39 plus 7.5%. Builder costs $89 and charges nothing per sale. Those are equal when 7.5% of your revenue equals the $50 difference, which happens at $667 a month. Below that, Starter is genuinely cheaper. Above it, every additional dollar of revenue is money you are handing over for no reason.
| Monthly revenue | Starter total ($39 + 7.5%) | Builder total ($89, 0%) | Cheaper plan |
|---|---|---|---|
| $500/mo | $39 + $37.50 = $76.50 | $89 | Starter, by $12.50 |
| $667/mo | $39 + $50.00 = $89.00 | $89 | identical, this is the crossover |
| $1,000/mo | $39 + $75.00 = $114 | $89 | Builder, by $25/mo |
| $2,000/mo | $39 + $150 = $189 | $89 | Builder, by $100/mo |
| $5,000/mo | $39 + $375 = $414 | $89 | Builder, by $325/mo |
| $20,000/mo | $39 + $1,500 = $1,539 | $89 | Builder, by $1,450/mo |
The crossover point, and it arrives earlier than most people expect: at about $667 a month in revenue, Starter's 7.5% fee plus its $39 subscription reaches $89, which is exactly Builder's flat price. Above that line the fee is pure loss. On annual billing the line moves down rather than up, because Starter falls to $29 and Builder to about $69, putting the crossover near $533 a month. Either way it is a few hundred dollars of monthly revenue, not a few thousand, and it is the single most expensive thing to get wrong on this platform.
At the Growth tier ($189/month), Teachable competes differently. Zero transaction fees, certificates, and an affiliate program make Growth a functional platform. But at $189/month, compare it against Kajabi, which includes email marketing, sales funnels, community, and a website builder that Teachable does not bundle. Full analysis in our head-to-head comparison. Also compare Thinkific pricing and Podia's plans. Use our Course ROI Showdown calculator to model your true net revenue across platforms.
Who should still choose Teachable
Teachable makes sense in exactly two situations
Situation 1: You're already on Teachable with an established student base. Migration costs are real, rebuilding courses, email sequences, and checkout pages takes 2-4 weeks and risks revenue disruption. If you're profitable on Teachable and your time is better spent creating content than migrating, staying put is pragmatic. Just make sure you're on Pro if revenue exceeds $2,000/month.
Situation 2: You need Teachable's specific integrations. Teachable has the largest third-party ecosystem in the course platform market, more templates, more tutorials, more Zapier integrations, more developer resources than Thinkific or Kajabi. If your tech stack depends on a specific Teachable integration that doesn't exist elsewhere, that's a valid lock-in reason.
For new creators in 2026: Starter at $39 a month is a reasonable place to begin, but only if you expect to stay under roughly $667 a month in sales for a while. Above that, the 7.5% fee makes it the most expensive way to use Teachable, and the honest move is to budget for Builder at $89 from the start rather than discover the crossover after a launch. Start there, and move to Kajabi when you need the full marketing stack.
Teachable Builder and Growth
Builder $89/mo ($69/mo annual) · Growth $189/mo ($147/mo annual) · 0% transaction fees on both · Affiliate program · Certificates on Growth
The plans worth considering once you are selling. Builder removes the transaction fee for $89, which is the upgrade almost everyone on Starter should be making sooner than they do. Growth adds certificates and branding removal at $189. Best for anyone selling more than about $667 a month.
View Teachable plans →Course income is self-employment revenue, your Teachable subscription, transaction fees, and marketing tools are all deductible as business expenses. CeoCult's self-employed tax deductions guide covers the full list for course creators, including the 1099 vs W-2 tax impact calculator useful when modeling your effective take-home at different revenue levels.
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Frequently asked
Why does Teachable charge transaction fees on Basic?
Teachable uses the freemium-to-premium model: offer lower subscription prices on entry plans, then monetize through transaction fees until creators upgrade to Pro. It's a deliberate pricing strategy that works in Teachable's favor, many creators don't calculate their total cost (subscription + fees) until they've been on the platform for months. By then, migration costs create lock-in. This is why we always recommend comparing TOTAL cost (subscription + fees + external tools needed) rather than subscription price alone.
Is Teachable's free plan worth using?
Only for absolute minimal testing. The free plan limits you to 1 course, 10 students, and no longer exists: Teachable discontinued its free plan and now offers a 7-day free trial instead (verified 23 August 2026). For free validation, Thinkific's free plan is better: 1 course, unlimited students, 0% transaction fees. Both are testing-only plans, but Thinkific's is genuinely free while Teachable's takes a significant cut of every sale.
When should I upgrade from Teachable Starter to Builder?
When your monthly revenue consistently exceeds about $667. At that point the 7.5% transaction fee ($50) plus the Starter subscription ($39) equals $89, which is exactly what Builder costs with no fee at all. Every dollar above that line is money you are losing by staying put. Do not wait, because the fee scales with revenue and the subscription does not. At $5,000 a month, staying on Starter costs $325 a month more than Builder.
Federal data behind this page
What a programme costs, what its graduates earn, and what aid is available are published by federal statistical agencies rather than by any provider's marketing page, and the sources below are the primary ones. They are linked so a reader can check a figure here directly.
- FinanzaX course-platform pricing table is an independently maintained comparison that re-checks each platform's published pricing every quarter and states the date it was last verified. We use it as a second reading against the vendor pages, and its August 2026 figures are what prompted the September re-check of this page.
- Teachable's own pricing page is the primary source for every plan price and transaction fee stated here. verified 2026-09-17
- College Scorecard publishes the federal cost, completion and post-enrolment earnings data used to compare programmes.
- National Center for Education Statistics is the federal statistical agency for education and the source most published figures trace back to.
- IPEDS holds the institution-level survey data behind enrolment, price and completion comparisons.
- Federal Student Aid states what aid exists, who qualifies, and what repayment actually obligates a borrower to.
- CFPB paying for college documents how education financing works and where its common traps are.
- US Department of Education sets the policy framework the accreditation and aid systems operate under.
- Department of Education laws and policy carries the rules that decide whether a provider or credential is recognised.
This page compares programmes on published data. Outcomes vary by student, and a reader's own aid package and circumstances decide what a programme actually costs them.