If you can’t decide between Thinkific and Gumroad, you are in the right place. Thinkific and Gumroad are two popular tools available, but their intended audiences are quite different. Compare them side by side:
Key Takeaways
- Thinkific is an online course platform that creates and sells online courses. It offers course creation, quizzes, assignments, and multimedia content features. Thinkific is suitable for educators and businesses offering comprehensive online courses with interactive elements. However, it may not provide the same flexibility for selling physical products as Gumroad.
- Gumroad is an e-commerce platform that focuses on helping creators sell their work directly to their audience. It offers features for selling digital products, physical goods, and subscriptions. Gumroad’s community-building features enable creators to connect with fans and engage with their audience. Gumroad is suitable for creators looking to build a fan base and monetize their content, and it is well-suited for selling digital and physical products. While both platforms offer e-commerce capabilities, Thinkific specializes in online course creation, while Gumroad is better suited for creators seeking a platform for selling various products to their audience.
Main Differences Between Thinkific and Gumroad
Thinkific and Gumroad target different aspects of online business. Thinkific focuses on course creation and delivery, while Gumroad specializes in selling digital products. Users should decide based on their primary business model and offerings.
Pricing of Thinkific and Gumroad
Here are the pricing plans of Thinkific and Gumroad:
Thinkific
Here is an overview of the pricing plans for Thinkific:
- Free Plan: $0 per month.
– Includes basic features such as unlimited courses, quizzes, and surveys. - Basic Plan: $49 per month (or $39 per month when billed annually).
– Includes all features of the Free plan, plus additional features such as drip content, custom domain, and affiliate reporting. - Pro Plan: $99 per month (or $79 per month when billed annually).
– Includes all features of the Basic plan, plus additional features such as certificates, course compliance, and priority support. - Premier Plan: $499 monthly (or $399 per month when billed annually).
– Includes all features of the Pro plan, plus additional features such as an onboarding package, dedicated account manager, and custom URL.
Thinkific offers a free plan with limited features and a 30-day money-back guarantee for paid plans.
Gumroad
Gumroad’s pricing is simple and straightforward. There are no monthly fees, and they only take a small percentage of every sale made by the user. The percentage they take varies depending on the lifetime earnings of the user. Here are the fees:
- Getting Started: 8.5% + 30 cents per transaction. This plan is free to sign up and set up shop, and Gumroad only takes money when a sale is made. It includes a Gumroad storefront with unlimited products, analytics, and customer management tools. However, it has a limited number of posts and workflows and can only offer standard-definition streaming of videos.
- Pro: $10 per month or $108 when billed annually, plus the credit card fees. This plan covers up to 1,000 customers and includes everything in the Getting Started plan, plus more advanced features.
- Enterprise: $39 per month. This plan includes everything in the Pro plan, plus additional features for larger businesses.
Note that Gumroad also offers a free plan with limited features, and there are other Gumroad alternatives available with different pricing plans and features.
My experience with Thinkific and Gumroad
After using and testing Thinkific and Gumroad, this is what I liked and didn’t like about both platforms:
Thinkific
Thinkific offers a robust platform for creating and selling online courses. What I liked in particular is the flexibility in course creation – you can choose to drip-feed content, create multimedia lessons, and even build membership sites. The customization options for the course player and site design are also impressive. It allows you to maintain a consistent brand image. However, like other comprehensive course platforms, Thinkific’s pricing can be a bit higher, especially if you’re starting. Make sure to evaluate the features you truly need before committing. Keep in mind that as your course offerings and students grow, the subscription costs can increase, so be prepared for potential scalability expenses.
Gumroad
Gumroad provides a simple platform for selling digital products directly to your audience. The ease of setting up your store and managing your products is a highlight. It’s ideal for creators who want a straightforward way to start selling online. Furthermore, the low transaction fees mean you keep a higher portion of your sales. This is crucial for maximizing your profits. However, Gumroad’s features are primarily focused on digital product sales. If you’re looking for a more comprehensive e-commerce solution, you might need to explore other platforms. Just remember that while Gumroad is user-friendly, it might not offer the same range of features as more complex e-commerce systems.
Our Winner: Gumroad
After analyzing both Thinkific and Gumroad, we concluded that the best choice overall is Gumroad.
This doesn’t necessarily mean that the other choice is particularly bad. Some cases could even be the other way around, depending on your specific needs.
