Paddle
The value is the network, the data or the infrastructure. Keep paying.
A merchant of record for software: Paddle sells your product on its own account, which means it — not you — is liable for sales tax and VAT everywhere you have customers.
You cannot build a merchant of record. Understand what you would be taking on. WHAT THE FEE ACTUALLY BUYS - Paddle is the seller. Your customer buys from them, so tax registration and filing are their problem - Replace it with Stripe and that liability becomes yours in every jurisdiction where you have customers IF YOU MOVE TO STRIPE ANYWAY STACK - Stripe Checkout and Billing, Stripe Tax, your own webhook handler ENTITLEMENT - Read access from the Stripe subscription status by webhook, never from a local flag set by the browser - One handler, idempotent by event id, that can be replayed safely WHAT YOU NOW OWN - Tax registration thresholds per country, and monitoring when you cross one - Invoice numbering and retention to whatever your jurisdiction requires - Dunning: retries, mails, and the grace period before access is cut GET ADVICE - This is a tax decision before it is an engineering one. Talk to an accountant first Include the webhook handler, the entitlement check and the dunning schedule.
What you lose
- Tax liability moving off your company entirely, which is the product and cannot be built at any price
- VAT, GST and sales-tax registration, collection and filing in dozens of jurisdictions
- Invoicing, refunds, chargebacks and dunning already handled
If you would rather not build
- Lemon Squeezy, another merchant of record
- Stripe plus Stripe Tax, if you take the liability
- Gumroad, for very small products
The escape hatch
open source · no votes, no paid placement
Killbill
$0Open-source subscription billing — the invoicing half, not the tax liability.
killbill/killbillfree · open source
Medusa
$0Commerce backend with subscription plugins; you still owe the tax.
medusajs/medusafree · open source
Why this verdict
our own opinion · changed only by a person
16/100
Verdict no at 16. This is not a software problem: the fee buys somebody else carrying your tax liability, and no amount of correct code replaces that.
History
tracked since 10 Aug 2026 · nothing is ever overwritten
Questions about Paddle
answered from the record above
Is Paddle free?
No monthly fee: Paddle takes a percentage of each transaction plus a fixed amount, so there is no headline subscription price.
Can you replace Paddle by building your own?
KEEP IT. The value is the network, the data or the infrastructure. Keep paying. Replacement score 16 out of 100, build time longer than it saves. Read what you lose before you decide.
How much does Paddle cost?
Paddle has no public headline price. The tier we track is the entry plan.
What do you lose by replacing Paddle?
Tax liability moving off your company entirely, which is the product and cannot be built at any price; VAT, GST and sales-tax registration, collection and filing in dozens of jurisdictions; Invoicing, refunds, chargebacks and dunning already handled. If any of those carry weight for you, keep paying.
Is there an open-source alternative to Paddle?
Yes: Killbill, Medusa. The prompt on this page is for when you want it your way instead.
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