Patreon alternatives
At 100 members paying $10 a month, Patreon costs $100 a month. 1 community platform costs less, from $50 (Skool). The closest match, Circle, covers 77% of what Patreon does. Each one shows how much of it it covers, capability by capability, next to the price.
What Patreon does
Core: Paid memberships & subscriptions.
Important: Discussion community (partly), Member mobile apps, Email marketing broadcasts (partly), Paid Discord/Slack access (partly), Shop, tips and products.
Also has: Real-time chat (partly), Members-only site content (partly), Events and live rooms (partly), Custom domain and branding (partly), Creator discovery marketplace, Member directory and profiles (partly), Public SEO forum (partly), SSO and embedding (partly), Integrations and API (partly).
Alternatives to Patreon at 100 members paying $10 a month, best match first
- Circle: $119/mo +2% of member payments; monthly price as of 2025 (Professional). It covers 77% of Patreon; missing or partial: Paid Discord/Slack access, Shop, tips and products, Creator discovery marketplace. Free plan: none.
- Discord: $100/mo 10% of paid subs, plus processing (Server Subscriptions (free server + 10% revenue share)). It covers 64% of Patreon; missing or partial: Paid memberships & subscriptions (partly), Email marketing broadcasts, Shop, tips and products, Members-only site content, Custom domain and branding. Free plan: Free servers with unlimited members, channels, roles and full message history.
- Skool: $50/mo Hobby: +10% of member payments (Hobby). It covers 57% of Patreon; missing or partial: Paid memberships & subscriptions (partly), Paid Discord/Slack access, Shop, tips and products, Members-only site content, Custom domain and branding. Free plan: none.
Prices at every size
- Patreon: 100 members paying $10 a month $100/mo, 1,000 members paying $10 a month $1,000/mo, 1,000 free members free (10% platform fee + processing)
- Circle: 100 members paying $10 a month $119/mo, 1,000 members paying $10 a month $299/mo, 1,000 free members $99/mo (+2% of member payments; monthly price as of 2025)
- Discord: 100 members paying $10 a month $100/mo, 1,000 members paying $10 a month $1,000/mo, 1,000 free members free (10% of paid subs, plus processing)
- Skool: 100 members paying $10 a month $50/mo, 1,000 members paying $10 a month $99/mo, 1,000 free members $9/mo (Hobby: +10% of member payments)
Monthly USD on monthly billing (annual-only plans divided by 12) to run a community of a given size, including the platform's own fees on member payments but not standard card processing; WordPress plugins are priced on their licence without hosting, and forum software sold both ways on the vendor's hosted plan. The headline is 100 members paying $10 a month; we also compare 1,000 paying members ($10,000 a month, 2 admins) and a free community of 1,000 members.
Built a cheaper community platform?
List it on PriceHiked for free as an alternative to Patreon: Add your product. It's ranked by price at the same size; sponsored listings are labeled and never change the order.
Everything about Patreon's own prices and price hikes: Patreon.