Software Alternatives, Accelerators & Startups

Stripe VS Chargebee

Compare Stripe VS Chargebee and see what are their differences

Stripe logo Stripe

Online payment processing for internet businesses. Stripe is a suite of payment APIs that powers commerce for online businesses of all sizes. Use Stripe’s payment platform to accept and process payments online for easy-to-use commerce solutions.

Chargebee logo Chargebee

Chargebee lets you manage subscriptions and payments at scale, handle custom recurring billing scenarios, reduce subscription churn and simplify accounting.
  • Stripe Landing page
    Landing page //
    2024-04-30
  • Chargebee Landing page
    Landing page //
    2023-08-22

Bill with clarity Send beautiful invoices that capture everything - accurate proration, the right taxes, relevant notes for line items - with complete compliance adherence.

Manage subscriptions together Let different teams access information based on user roles, so that they can: Extend trials. Edit plans. Issue refund receipts. And perform other essential tasks with a few clicks.

Measure what matters Access accurate subscription metrics (MRR, LTV, ARPU, Churn...) to see how your business is doing, and to ask the right questions.

Recover lost revenue Fight involuntary churn with a smart dunning process that works with automated reminders, and configurable retry rules (Credit card failed? Try PayPal).

Close books faster Draw revenue recognition reports based on your business requirements. And with our Xero and QuickBooks Online integrations, reconciliation is a click of a button.

Stripe features and specs

  • Comprehensive API
    Stripe offers a robust and well-documented API that allows businesses to customize their payment processing to suit their specific needs.
  • Global Reach
    Stripe supports payment processing in multiple countries and currencies, making it ideal for businesses with international clientele.
  • Advanced Security
    Stripe provides advanced security features, such as PCI DSS compliance and fraud prevention tools, ensuring that both businesses and customers are protected.
  • Scalability
    Stripe is suitable for businesses of all sizes, from startups to large enterprises, offering solutions that scale with the business's growth.
  • Rich Feature Set
    In addition to payment processing, Stripe offers a wide range of features including subscription billing, invoicing, and marketplace payments.
  • Integration with Popular Platforms
    Stripe easily integrates with popular e-commerce platforms like Shopify, WooCommerce, and Magento, simplifying the setup process.

Possible disadvantages of Stripe

  • Costly for High-Volume Businesses
    Stripe's transaction fees can become expensive for high-volume businesses, especially when compared to other payment processors that offer volume-based discounts.
  • Complex Setup
    For businesses without a dedicated developer or technical team, setting up Stripe’s API and customizing it can be complex and time-consuming.
  • Limited Customer Support
    Some users have reported that Stripe's customer support can be slow to respond and may not always provide satisfactory solutions to issues.
  • Account Stability
    There have been instances where Stripe has abruptly terminated accounts or held funds, causing disruptions to businesses.
  • Subject to Chargebacks
    Like other payment processors, Stripe is not immune to chargebacks, which can be a significant issue for certain types of businesses.

Chargebee features and specs

  • Comprehensive Subscription Management
    Chargebee offers a wide range of features for managing subscriptions, including billing cycles, trials, discounts, and renewal configurations. This flexibility enables businesses to optimize their subscription models and reduce churn.
  • Automated Billing
    Chargebee automates the invoicing and payment collection process, reducing the manual effort required and minimizing the chance for errors. This allows businesses to focus more on growth strategies rather than administrative tasks.
  • Multiple Payment Gateway Support
    Chargebee supports integration with various payment gateways like Stripe, PayPal, and Braintree, giving businesses the flexibility to choose their preferred payment processing services.
  • Analytics and Reporting
    Chargebee provides comprehensive analytics and reporting tools that offer valuable insights into subscription metrics, such as MRR (Monthly Recurring Revenue), churn rate, and customer lifetime value. This helps businesses make data-driven decisions.
  • Compliance and Security
    Chargebee is compliant with PCI-DSS standards and offers robust security measures to protect customer data. This ensures that businesses can meet regulatory requirements and gain customer trust.
  • Customizable and Scalable
    The platform is highly customizable to suit the unique needs of different businesses, and it scales well as the business grows. This ensures that companies of all sizes can effectively use Chargebee.

Possible disadvantages of Chargebee

  • Complexity
    Chargebee's extensive feature set can be overwhelming for new users, particularly those without a technical background. A steep learning curve may be encountered when setting up the system for the first time.
  • Cost
    Chargebee can be expensive, especially for startups and small businesses. The platform has different pricing tiers, and as the business scales, costs may increase significantly.
  • Limited Native Integrations
    While Chargebee does support various integrations, it lacks native integrations with some popular tools, which might necessitate additional effort or the use of third-party services to achieve full functionality.
  • Customer Support
    Some users have reported that the customer support can be slow to respond and not always effective in resolving issues promptly, which can be frustrating in time-sensitive situations.
  • Customization Constraints
    Although Chargebee is highly customizable, certain advanced customizations may require technical expertise or developer assistance, which might not be readily available for all businesses.

Analysis of Stripe

Overall verdict

  • Yes, Stripe is generally considered a good choice for businesses looking for reliable and flexible payment processing solutions. It is praised for its developer-friendly design and its capability to support complex billing models.

Why this product is good

  • Stripe is widely regarded as a good payment processing platform due to its ease of use, robust API, comprehensive documentation, and the ability to handle various payment methods across multiple countries. It also offers advanced security features, fraud prevention tools, and a scalable infrastructure suitable for businesses of all sizes.

Recommended for

  • E-commerce businesses seeking a reliable payment gateway
  • Developers looking for a customizable and programmer-friendly API
  • Startups and SMEs for scalability and ease of integration
  • Global businesses that need multi-currency support and international payment options

Analysis of Chargebee

Overall verdict

  • Chargebee is a solid choice for businesses looking for a reliable, flexible, and feature-rich subscription billing solution. Its ability to cater to different business sizes and industries, combined with strong customer support, makes it a popular option in the market.

Why this product is good

  • Chargebee is considered a good choice by many because it offers comprehensive subscription billing and revenue management features. It supports multiple payment gateways, is scalable for growing businesses, and provides robust analytics and reporting capabilities. Additionally, Chargebee is known for its ease of integration with numerous third-party applications, flexible pricing plans, and a user-friendly interface.

Recommended for

    Chargebee is recommended for SaaS businesses, startups, and enterprises that require sophisticated subscription management and invoicing solutions. It is particularly well-suited for companies needing to manage recurring billing, handle multiple pricing tiers, and gain insights from detailed financial reporting.

Stripe videos

PayPal VS Stripe 2020: Which Online Payment Processor Is Best For Your Business?

More videos:

  • Review - Stripe Review Video
  • Review - BEWARE: CLOSE YOUR STRIPE ACCOUNT!!! *BEFORE THEY DO*

Chargebee videos

Chargebee - Product Overview

More videos:

  • Review - Easily Build & Add Subscription Payments Without Code Using Chargebee
  • Demo - Chargebee Product Demo

Category Popularity

0-100% (relative to Stripe and Chargebee)
Online Payments
100 100%
0% 0
Recurring Subscription Billing
Recurring Billing
64 64%
36% 36
Payment Platform
81 81%
19% 19

User comments

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Reviews

These are some of the external sources and on-site user reviews we've used to compare Stripe and Chargebee

Stripe Reviews

Subscription Billing Solutions Comparison: Stripe vs Recurly vs Chargebee vs Rainex
Stripe is one of the world’s largest payment processing platforms, trusted by their customers for many years. In addition to gateway features, for a fee, Stripe offers billing and subscription management tools for its users. Its intuitive interface and extensive documentation make it a favorite among developers and companies of different sizes.
Source: rainex.io
Top 5 Payoneer Alternatives for Seamless Online Transactions
Key Features: A powerful payment processing platform focused on online businesses, offering features like subscriptions and fraud prevention. Stripe boasts a unified suite of tools and APIs that simplify the entire online payment process for businesses.
Source: www.doola.com
What to Use Instead of PayPal? 10 Best PayPal Alternatives
Conveniently, Stripe automatically deposits your funds into your bank account. Another convenient feature of Stripe is that the checkout process takes place on your website. That reduces customer friction compared to platforms like PayPal, which sends customers to external sites. The platform is also highly customisable.
The 6 best online payment processing services in 2024
Part of the HubSpot Commerce Hub feature set, Payments adds payment processing on top of a mountain of possibilities. It's seamlessly connected to all other parts of this sales software, so you can manage your business relationships, marketing, website, content, and operations from the same place. The actual payment infrastructure belongs to Stripe, with HubSpot charging...
Source: zapier.com
Payment Platforms Comparison: Stripe vs Chargebee vs Paddle vs Recurly
Stripe is a payment processor. Its software and APIs enable businesses to accept payments, send payouts, and manage their businesses online. Stripe offers its customers a full-stack payment process – it serves as both a third-party payment processor and a payment gateway.
Source: rainex.io

Chargebee Reviews

Subscription Billing Solutions Comparison: Stripe vs Recurly vs Chargebee vs Rainex
Chargebee is another major platform for optimizing payment experiences. The company specializes in broad support for subscription monetization strategies, including tiered pricing, metered billing, and addon management. Chargebee’s focus on subscription lifecycle management coupled with robust integration and APIs makes it the preferred choice for companies scaling their...
Source: rainex.io
Payment Platforms Comparison: Stripe vs Chargebee vs Paddle vs Recurly
Chargebee is a cloud based subscription billing and recurring payment software solution. ChargeBee is a multifunctional tool for automating the billing processes of businesses that run subscription services.
Source: rainex.io
Would you use Paddle, Chargebee, Chargify, or just Stripe?
I've worked with both naked Stripe and Chargebee + Stripe before. I can highly recommend Chargebee, especially for young companies. It takes a while to get to 50K revenue with a SaaS project, so you have plenty of time to make a decision about whether you want to keep using Chargebee. We decided to stick with them due to the following reasons:
Looking for a Chargify alternative?
In the jumble of what’s owed and what’s due, a Credit Note is as vital as an Invoice. Chargebee gets that. Hence, you’d never find yourself issuing an invoice when what’s befitting is a Credit Note, or creating credits for a payment you haven’t actually received yet.
7+ Cheap Competitors & Alternatives To Chargify
This subscription billing and recurring payment software is complete in every sense. Chargebee effortlessly manages your subscription, recurring billing, invoicing and much more via its powerful API. It also packs a ton of integrations and add-ons so that you get to access all of your data at a single place i.e. Chargebee dashboard.

Social recommendations and mentions

Based on our record, Stripe seems to be a lot more popular than Chargebee. While we know about 276 links to Stripe, we've tracked only 3 mentions of Chargebee. We are tracking product recommendations and mentions on various public social media platforms and blogs. They can help you identify which product is more popular and what people think of it.

Stripe mentions (276)

  • Integrating Stripe with SvelteKit: Dynamic Pricing and Payment Security
    Integrating Stripe into a SvelteKit application, especially when dealing with dynamic product pricing and robust webhook validation, can be challenging. While building a client's business application using SvelteKit and PostgreSQL (with Drizzle ORM), I encountered the need for a streamlined integration with Stripe. The goal was to use minimal dependencies while supporting features such as dynamic pricing, product... - Source: dev.to / 7 days ago
  • Under the Hood: How Tesla Powers its Android App with React Native
    Notably, Tesla employs Stripe as its payment service, ensuring exceptional stability and security. Stripe is a global payment system capable of reliably handling financial transactions across various countries. - Source: dev.to / 22 days ago
  • Four years of running a SaaS in a competitive market
    Same, from United States and not seeing dollars is a bit funky. I wonder if there are opportunities for more call to actions. e.g. I scrolled the page and the only links to sign up are at the top (I’m on mobile). Compare this to https://stripe.com/ and it’s super obvious how to “Start now” from anywhere on the page. - Source: Hacker News / 29 days ago
  • Is GitHub Sponsors Safe? A Comprehensive Guide
    Open-source development is a cornerstone of modern technology innovation, but sustaining projects financially remains a persistent challenge. GitHub Sponsors, an initiative introduced by GitHub, offers a way for individual developers and organizations to receive funding. Given the emphasis on financial and user security, developers often ask: Is GitHub Sponsors safe? In this post, we explore the safety protocols... - Source: dev.to / about 1 month ago
  • Dunning Emails – Definition, Examples, Best Practices, and Automation Tools
    Many subscription billing or payment platforms include dunning management out-of-the-box. For example, Stripe (a popular payment processor) can be configured to send automatic payment failure emails and retry charges on a schedule. However, Stripe’s native dunning features are somewhat basic and not highly customizable. - Source: dev.to / about 1 month ago
View more

Chargebee mentions (3)

  • Ask HN: SaaS Billing?
    I personally use Stripe, but I think https://chargebee.com supports PayPal. I've heard good things about them. - Source: Hacker News / about 3 years ago
  • I'm opening a SAAS startup, I need advice!
    The system is very complex, I believe that for these construction sites there is no way to do it and it will have a very ugly design. Why did you choose chargebee.com as your payment method? The stripe seemed to me better, or even the iugu. Do you speak from your own experience? Source: about 4 years ago
  • Product Led Growth and the Role of Engineering
    Newer organizations, especially in software, still treat engineering as a cost and allocate resources based on the cost that is saved by deploying this skill across the organization. Thus we see 100s of companies building their own recurring subscription infrastructure when multiple SaaS companies exist to solve this problem. Non-customer facing development improves efficiencies within the organization, but... - Source: dev.to / about 4 years ago

What are some alternatives?

When comparing Stripe and Chargebee, you can also consider the following products

PayPal - PayPal is the faster, safer way to pay online without sharing financial details, send and receive money or accept credit and debit cards as a seller

Recurly - Subscription billing and recurring billing management. Recurly offers enterprise-class subscription billing for thousands of companies worldwide.

PayPal Braintree - An all-in-one solution to accept, process, and split payments in your mobile app or online - from small business to large enterprise.

Chargify - Chargify is the best online billing software for all of your Recurring Billing needs. Learn more about simplifying your Subscription Billing today.

Payoneer - Whether making international payments, receiving funds, managing your digital business, or accessing capital, Payoneer opens your business up to the world.

Zuora - Zuora creates cloud-based software on a subscription basis that enables any company in any industry to successfully launch, manage, and transform into a subscription business.