Thinkific vs Teachable: The Fee Math Decides
Thinkific and Teachable are the closest twins in the course platform market — similar builders, similar checkout, similar promises. Which is exactly why choosing between them on features is a coin flip that misses the point. The real separation is in the numbers each one hopes you won’t run: Teachable’s 7.5% transaction fee on its entry plan, and Thinkific’s trial that quietly runs on a $109 plan rather than the $54 one you probably budgeted for.
We’ve been inside Thinkific — our trial findings and screenshots are below. Teachable we cover from its published pricing and policies, checked against its own pages rather than other comparisons. Prices change; confirm before you commit.
Some links in this article are affiliate links — see our affiliate disclosure. It doesn’t change what we recommend.
New to selling courses? How to sell an online course runs the steps in order — choosing between these two comes later than you’d think.
The short version
- Pick Thinkific if you’re building a durable catalog: unlimited published courses and a 10,000-student allowance on every plan, flat 2.9% payments, 30-day trial. It rewards scale from day one.
- Pick Teachable if you’re small, international, or app-dependent: the $39 entry undercuts everyone but fees bite (details below), the student mobile app comes on every plan, and its built-in sales tax/VAT handling is unmatched here.
- The trap in each: Teachable’s Starter fee makes success expensive; Thinkific’s generosity starts one plan higher than its price anchor suggests.
Pricing head to head
| Thinkific | Teachable | |
|---|---|---|
| Entry (monthly / annual-equiv.) | Basic $54 / $40 | Starter $39 / $29 |
| Mid | Start $109 / $82 | Builder $89 / $69 |
| Upper | Grow $219 / $164 | Growth $189 / $139 |
| Free trial | 30 days — runs on the $109 Start plan, card required | 7 days (+ 30-day money-back guarantee) |
| Transaction fee | 0% via Thinkific Payments (2.9% processing) | 7.5% on Starter → 0% on Builder+ |
| Free plan | No | No |
The fee math, because it decides more than features
Take $1,000/month in course sales on each entry plan. On Thinkific Basic you pay $54 plus ~2.9% processing — roughly $83 all-in. On Teachable Starter you pay $39 plus 7.5% platform fee ($75) plus ~2.9% processing — roughly $143 all-in. The “cheaper” plan costs $60 more the moment you’re actually selling.
Which is why the honest Teachable recommendation is almost always Builder ($89, 0% platform fee) once revenue is real — and at that point Thinkific Basic at $54 is cheaper again for a pure course business. Teachable’s entry price is a door, not a home.
Teachable’s counterweight is real, though: student limits lift entirely once you pass $10k/year in sales on the platform, and its global tax handling (US sales tax, VAT, GST calculated and handled for you) replaces genuine accounting pain if you sell internationally. Thinkific has no equivalent — you own your tax life.
What we found inside Thinkific
Two findings from our own trial that belong in this decision.
The trial terms surprise. It’s genuinely 30 days — four times Teachable’s window — but it runs on the Start plan at $109/month, not the $54 Basic the pricing page anchors on, with a card on file. Our billing screen showed the next charge plainly:
Evaluate freely, but diary the date, and budget against the plan you’ll actually keep. (Cancelling was gentler than most: a 30-extra-days retention offer, then a downgrade that keeps your content rather than deleting it.)
The AI course builder earns its place. From a short description, Thinkific generated a full curriculum skeleton — sections and lessons ready to edit rather than a blank page:
That’s a real head start for a first course, and it pairs with the structural generosity: unlimited published courses everywhere, so experiments cost nothing extra.
Limits: where each platform pinches
Thinkific meters bandwidth and features. 100 GB/month of video bandwidth on Basic (200 on Start, 400 on Grow), and the commerce features most creators eventually want — memberships, bundles, private courses, certificates — sit on Start ($109), not Basic. Ten thousand students and unlimited courses from the cheapest plan is the headline; the feature ladder is the fine print.
Teachable meters products and people. Five products and 100 active students on Starter, one admin seat until Growth — tight caps that vanish at $10k/year in sales. Its bandwidth, by contrast, isn’t the constraint Thinkific’s is. The included student mobile app on every plan is the feature Thinkific can’t match at these prices — Thinkific’s branded app is a separate $199/mo conversation.
Who should pick which
Pick Thinkific if:
- You’ll publish multiple courses and want zero marginal cost per experiment
- Predictable flat fees matter — 2.9% and done, no platform cut
- You’re bandwidth-light (talking-head video, documents) and feature-patient until Start
- You want the longest real evaluation window (30 days, ~60 with the retention offer — on the right plan, with a reminder set)
Pick Teachable if:
- You’re testing one course at hobby scale and want the lowest entry price — knowing the fee math flips once you’re selling
- You sell internationally and want tax handled for you
- The student mobile app matters to your learners
- You expect to clear $10k/year, after which the caps stop being caps
Either way: if the learning experience itself is your differentiator — assessments, interactive video, premium feel — neither twin is the specialist; that’s LearnWorlds territory, mapped in our five-platform comparison.
Frequently asked questions
Is Teachable’s 7-day trial enough to decide? Barely — plan the week before you start it. Build one module, connect a test checkout, buy your own course. Thinkific’s 30 days is the more honest evaluation window, with the caveat about which plan it runs on.
Can I start on Teachable Starter and upgrade later? Yes, and many should — but run the fee math monthly. At even a few hundred dollars in sales, Builder’s $89 with 0% fees beats Starter’s $39 + 7.5%. The upgrade point arrives earlier than intuition suggests.
Which migrates away more cleanly? Both export content and student CSVs; neither ports checkout or automations anywhere. Our migration checklist applies to both directions — the short version: export first, run parallel for a cycle, redirect your URLs.
What about Kajabi? A different question — it bundles your whole marketing stack at a very different price. That three-way decision is covered in Kajabi vs Thinkific and Kajabi alternatives.
Bottom line
Feature-by-feature these platforms tie more often than they differ. Decide on the money mechanics instead: Teachable’s entry fee punishes the success you’re hoping for, and Thinkific’s trial bills against a pricier plan than its anchor — so the right choice is the trap you can live with. Selling steadily from day one, or building a multi-course catalog: Thinkific. Testing small, selling globally, or leaning on a student app: Teachable — with a calendar reminder to leave Starter early. Both trials are free to run; run the one whose trap you’ve priced.