Teachable vs Kajabi
Teachable is a course host with a settled checkout, affiliate tooling and tax handling on digital sales, but its lower plans take a percentage of every sale. Kajabi charges a high flat monthly fee, takes no cut, and bundles funnels, email and landing pages. Early sellers lean towards Teachable, established ones towards Kajabi.
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Choose Teachable ifyou want checkout, affiliates and tax on digital goods handled for you, already have your own email and page tools, and your sales are still modest.
Choose Kajabi ifyou already turn over real money, want funnels, email, landing pages and courses on one bill, and would rather pay a large flat fee than a percentage.
Teachable and Kajabi side by side
| Teachable | Kajabi | |
|---|---|---|
| Our online course platform rank | #4 of 14 | #6 of 14 |
| Established in | United States | United States |
| Pricing | Lower plans take a percentage of each sale; higher published plans do not | Per month, published tiers by products and contacts, from $179; a 2% to 0.5% fee on sales through third-party processors |
| Free tier | — | — |
| Open source | — | — |
| Self-hostable | — | — |
| Built for | A seller who wants tax and affiliates handled without building them | An established seller consolidating funnels, email and courses in one place |
| Not for | A high-volume seller sitting on a percentage plan | A first course with no audience and no revenue yet |
Both are reviewed in full in our online course platform ranking: Teachable and Kajabi.
Where they differ
Teachable 2 · Kajabi 1 · open 1- 01
Percentage of sales or flat fee
Teachable's cheaper plans take a percentage of each sale, and only its higher plans drop it. Kajabi takes nothing at any tier but has the most expensive entry plan in the category. At low revenue the percentage costs less. At serious revenue the cut becomes the largest line on the invoice and the flat fee wins.
Depends on the buyer
- 02
Tax on digital sales
Teachable handles tax on digital sales as part of the product, and that handling is settled, not a promise. Kajabi connects your own Stripe account, so the sale is yours and any cross-border VAT return is yours to file. For a seller with consumers in several countries, Teachable removes more administrative work.
Edge: Teachable
- 03
Marketing built into the platform
Kajabi replaces the email tool, the landing pages, the funnels and the checkout as well as the course host. Teachable's selling tools are narrower: checkout, coupons, affiliates and payouts. Kajabi's email deliverability is nobody's specialism, but as a single system for running campaigns it covers much more ground than Teachable attempts to.
Edge: Kajabi
- 04
Cost of being wrong
A first course with no audience is the case Kajabi fits least, since it is an expensive way to learn a course does not sell. It also concentrates pages, emails, funnels and video, so leaving is a rebuild. Teachable's exposure is smaller and different: moving off a percentage plan means upgrading.
Edge: Teachable
When neither fits
Neither is right when the thing being sold is access to a group of people and the course is secondary. Teachable's community features are weak and Kajabi is built around funnels. Circle offers spaces, live rooms and events, and Skool a single feed for one flat fee.
Teachable or Kajabi: questions
3 answersIs Teachable cheaper than Kajabi?
At low sales, usually yes, because Kajabi has the priciest entry plan in the category. But Teachable's lower plans take a percentage of each sale, and that cut grows with revenue.
Multiply the percentage by your realistic annual sales before deciding which is cheaper for you.
Does Kajabi handle sales tax like Teachable does?
Not in the same way, according to our data. Teachable handles tax on digital sales itself. Kajabi connects your own Stripe account, which makes you the seller, so the rates and the quarterly OSS return for EU consumer sales are your responsibility.
When should a seller move from Teachable to Kajabi?
When revenue is large enough that a flat fee beats a percentage, and when you want email, funnels and landing pages in the same system as the courses.
Note that Teachable's higher plans also remove the cut, so an upgrade there is an alternative to switching.