Donor management is where the giving record lives: the recurring mandate, the pledge, the in-memoriam collection and the legacy that arrives years later.
This guide ranks software on the depth of that record and on the tax mechanics of the country you fundraise in, which is what separates it from a general nonprofit CRM.
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In short
What donor management software does
Donor management software records who gave what and when, collects recurring and one-off gifts, and produces the receipts and tax claims each country's revenue service requires.
In this order: setup effort, what it really costs, how your data comes back out, whether
you can leave, and who each donor management tool is built for. Why those five, and why there is no
score out of ten, is on the how we work page.
Small teams already inside the Blackbaud estate with simple needs
Organisations who expect to leave the vendor cleanly later
Country is where the vendor is headquartered or contracts from, which is a
different question from where your data is hosted. Where the two tell different stories, the
entry says so.
UK donation and events fundraising with Gift Aid handled properly
Ranked #1 of 15 in Best Donor Management Software in 2026.
Published pricingEurope
Enthuse ties the Gift Aid declaration to the gift at the moment it is made and keeps it with the donor, so the claim to HMRC is an export rather than an archaeology project. Event registration, sponsorship pages and regular giving all write to one record.
What it does not do is major-gift management: no meaningful pipeline for six-figure asks, no legacy administration, and no pledge scheduling. UK charities under a certain size will not miss those.
What stands out
Gift Aid
Event fundraising
UK charities
Where it costs you
Not a database for major-gift or legacy work
The tax handling is worthless outside the United Kingdom
Right for
UK charities running events and regular giving with Gift Aid
Wrong for
Organisations fundraising outside the United Kingdom and its tax rules
United KingdomMonthly platform fee plus card processing, published
Donation plugin on your own WordPress, with your own database
Ranked #2 of 15 in Best Donor Management Software in 2026.
Free tierOpen sourceSelf-hostablePublished pricingNorth America
GiveWP, now sold by Liquid Web as Give, puts the donor table in your own database, so the exit test is answered permanently: export the site, keep the data, owe nobody.
The core plugin is free and GPL-licensed; recurring giving and fee recovery need the Pro plan at $399 a year, and funds, tributes, Gift Aid and peer-to-peer need Elite at $599. The hidden cost is maintenance. An unpatched WordPress handling card details is a worse outcome than any subscription you avoided.
What stands out
Self-hosted
Open source core
Annual licence
Where it costs you
Requires a maintained WordPress site and someone to update it
Recurring giving needs the $399 Pro plan; funds and tributes need $599 Elite
Right for
Charities with technical help who want to own the donor database outright
Wrong for
Teams with no WordPress skills or maintenance budget
United StatesFree core plugin; paid plans $199 to $599 a year, published
European fundraising platform operating in several national markets
Ranked #3 of 15 in Best Donor Management Software in 2026.
Pricing on requestEurope
iRaiser is built around European giving rather than adapted to it, with local teams and payment methods per market and SEPA recurring treated as normal rather than exotic. For an international charity running campaigns in three countries, that removes a category of problems.
What you are buying is a fundraising platform with donor records attached; pledge schedules, legacy files and major-gift pipelines are lighter than in Virtuous or a purpose-built database. Read the exit clause: a data handover at the end of the contract is billed, with a minimum of 5,000 euros.
What stands out
Multi-country
SEPA recurring
EU hosting
Where it costs you
Everything is quoted; nothing is self-serve
Donor record is thin on pledges and legacy administration
Right for
Charities fundraising across several European countries under one platform contract
Wrong for
Small organisations wanting to start without a contract
FranceSet-up fee plus monthly subscription, quoted per organisation
Swiss donation infrastructure with hosting inside Switzerland and the EU
Ranked #4 of 15 in Best Donor Management Software in 2026.
Free tierPublished pricingEurope
RaiseNow is donation infrastructure: forms, payment methods that Swiss and German donors actually use, recurring mandates and reconciliation, with data processed mainly in Switzerland or the EU. Institutions with a compliance department pick it for that last point alone.
Growth plans add automatic tax receipts and CRM connectors, but it is explicitly not a donor database, so plan for a second system for segmentation and history, and check how cleanly the transaction data lands in it before you commit.
What stands out
Swiss hosting
Payment methods
DACH focus
Where it costs you
No stewardship, segmentation or campaign history worth the name
A percentage platform fee on every gift, on top of payment provider fees
Right for
Swiss and German organisations who need payment collection done correctly
Wrong for
Charities looking for one system to replace their database
SwitzerlandFree plan with a 1.3% to 2.5% platform fee; Growth plans from CHF 225 a month plus 0.5% to 4.4%, published
German donation forms with Zuwendungsbestätigung generation built in
Ranked #5 of 15 in Best Donor Management Software in 2026.
Published pricingEurope
twingle covers the German donation form and the paperwork after it, including the Zuwendungsbestätigung in the wording the tax office expects, individually or as an annual statement.
Getting that document wrong is not a cosmetic error: donors lose their deduction and they notice. The trade is scope. There is no campaign history, no segmentation and no major-gift handling, so twingle is a component in a stack rather than the stack.
What stands out
German receipts
Donation forms
SEPA
Where it costs you
No donor database of substance behind the forms
German market only in practice
Right for
German nonprofits who need correct donation receipts issued without extra effort
Wrong for
Organisations needing donor history and segmentation in one place
GermanyNo monthly fee; 2.5% to 5% per donation by annual volume, payment costs included, published
Free payment and donation collection for French associations
Ranked #6 of 15 in Best Donor Management Software in 2026.
Free tierPublished pricingEurope
HelloAsso charges the association nothing and asks the donor for a voluntary contribution instead, which has made it the default for French clubs, associations and small charities.
Memberships, ticketing and donations all produce records, and the reçu fiscal is generated. Two limits matter: the model only works for French-registered structures, and once your donor base is large the reporting and segmentation will send you looking for a real database.
What stands out
No cost
French associations
Reçu fiscal
Where it costs you
Only for organisations registered in France
Reporting is basic beyond a few thousand donors
Right for
French associations who want online collection at no cost to themselves
Wrong for
Charities outside France, or large and complex fundraising operations
FranceFree to the organisation; funded by voluntary donor contributions
Online fundraising, advocacy and email platform for campaigning charities
Ranked #7 of 15 in Best Donor Management Software in 2026.
Pricing on requestEurope
Engaging Networks combines donation pages, recurring giving, petitions, email-to-target campaigns and email marketing on one supporter record, which is the right shape for an organisation where signing a petition is the first step towards a regular gift.
It is privately owned, with offices in the UK, the US and Canada. What it is not is the database of record: pledge schedules, legacy administration and full gift history sit better in a CRM it syncs with, and pricing is quoted.
What stands out
Advocacy included
Privately owned
Needs a CRM
Where it costs you
Not a full donor database, so most customers run a CRM alongside it
Quoted pricing, and it assumes a digital team to run it
Right for
Campaigning charities that fundraise and run advocacy from one supporter list
Wrong for
Small charities needing one donor database with receipting built in
Donation forms that go live in an afternoon on any website
Ranked #8 of 15 in Best Donor Management Software in 2026.
Published pricingNorth America
Donorbox is the shortest route to working donation forms and recurring gifts on an existing website, with donor records and reasonable defaults. Crowdfunding, peer-to-peer and event ticketing are on the Standard plan, while the prompt that turns one-off donors into recurring ones is listed under Pro.
The cost model is the thing to model honestly: a percentage of every donation, on top of card fees, forever. Past a certain annual total it is considerably more expensive than Enthuse or GiveWP would be.
What stands out
Quick setup
Recurring giving
Percentage fee
Where it costs you
A percentage of every gift, permanently
Receipting and compliance are built around American rules
Right for
Small organisations who need online recurring giving working this week
Wrong for
Large donation volumes where a percentage fee compounds
United StatesStandard: no monthly fee, 2.95% platform fee per donation; Pro $150 per month, published
Donor database for small nonprofits, priced by contact count
Ranked #9 of 15 in Best Donor Management Software in 2026.
Published pricingNorth America
Keela is a Canadian donor database aimed at nonprofits with a small development team, now part of the Velora suite alongside Raisely and Aplos. Contact records, donation forms, email, tax receipts and reporting are included in every plan, prices are published by contact band, and wealth screening and texting are extras.
Support beyond email is a paid tier. The hosting decides the audience: data stays in the United States, Canada or Australia, so European tax relief and data residency sit outside its design.
What stands out
Contact bands
Published price
North America
Where it costs you
Data hosted only in the United States, Canada or Australia
Price bands rise with contact count, including lapsed donors you keep
Right for
Small North American nonprofits replacing spreadsheets with a proper donor database
Wrong for
European charities or anyone needing Gift Aid or SEPA
CanadaPer month by contact band, published; annual discount
Deep giving record with automation aimed at mid-level donors
Ranked #10 of 15 in Best Donor Management Software in 2026.
Pricing on requestNorth America
Virtuous holds the giving record properly: pledges with schedules, soft credits, tribute and memorial gifts, recurring plans with card recovery, and automation triggered by giving behaviour. For an organisation whose data has outgrown a donation platform, that depth is the reason to move.
The obstacles for European buyers are consistent, though: Gift Aid, Zuwendungsbestätigung and ANBI periodic gifts are not native, and implementation is a paid project with an annual contract behind it.
What stands out
Pledges
Recurring depth
Marketing automation
Where it costs you
Quoted pricing, with tiers that step up as fundraising revenue grows
Every default assumes American tax and mail practice
Right for
Growing charities who need real pledge and recurring gift depth
Wrong for
European charities needing local tax relief handled natively
United StatesQuoted per organisation, tiered by annual fundraising revenue
Free fundraising platform funded by optional tips from donors
Ranked #11 of 15 in Best Donor Management Software in 2026.
Free tierPublished pricingNorth America
Givebutter gives away donation pages, peer-to-peer fundraising, events, auctions and a donor record, and funds itself by asking your donors to tip. For a US nonprofit with nothing, the alternative is usually a spreadsheet, so this wins easily.
Three caveats: the tip request is a claim on the same goodwill you were about to ask for again, turning it off costs a 3% platform fee plus card processing, and custom reports sit in Givebutter Plus from $29 a month, so the free reporting will not satisfy a board that wants cohort retention analysis.
What stands out
No licence fee
Events and pages
US only
Where it costs you
United States organisations only
The tip prompt spends donor goodwill on the platform
Right for
Small US nonprofits with no budget at all for fundraising software
Wrong for
Any organisation that is registered outside the United States
United StatesFree with donor tips enabled; 3% platform fee plus card fees with tips off; Plus from $29 per month, published
Free fundraising and donor platform funded by a per-gift fee
Ranked #12 of 15 in Best Donor Management Software in 2026.
Free tierPublished pricingNorth America
Funraise's model is the reverse of a licence: the free plan costs nothing up front, takes 5% of each gift, and prompts donors to cover that fee, which the vendor says about 90% do.
It covers forms, recurring gifts, events and a donor CRM, and data import is open to every account; peer-to-peer, text-to-give and wealth screening sit in the quoted premium plans. The free plan is for organisations raising under a million dollars a year; beyond that, or to cut the fee, you move to premium.
What stands out
Free plan
Percentage fee
US nonprofits
Where it costs you
The platform fee on the free plan grows in step with your fundraising
Premium plans that lower the fee are quoted rather than published
Right for
US nonprofits raising under a million dollars a year online
Wrong for
European charities or organisations wanting a flat, predictable software cost
United StatesFree plan with a 5% platform fee per gift; premium plans quoted
Zero-fee fundraising for North American nonprofits, donors cover costs
Ranked #13 of 15 in Best Donor Management Software in 2026.
Free tierPublished pricingNorth America
Zeffy absorbs the card processing as well as its own costs, funded by a contribution prompt shown to donors, so the organisation keeps the full gift. Forms, ticketing, memberships and compliant Canadian and US receipts are included.
The question to sit with is whether you are comfortable that a prompt on your donation page is asking for money that is not yours, at the moment your donor is already giving.
What stands out
Zero fees
Canada and US
Tax receipts
Where it costs you
Nothing for European charities; North America only
Revenue depends entirely on donors choosing to contribute
Right for
Canadian and American nonprofits who want genuinely zero platform cost
Wrong for
European organisations, or those uneasy with checkout prompts
CanadaFree to the organisation; funded by optional donor contributions
Dutch peer-to-peer and online collecting, now sold under the iRaiser name
Ranked #14 of 15 in Best Donor Management Software in 2026.
Pricing on requestEurope
Kentaa, now iRaiser in the Netherlands, is what Dutch fundraisers reach for when supporters raise money on their behalf: personal pages, team actions, sponsored events, online collecting with Digicollect, iDEAL and SEPA. Donations flow into donor records you can work with.
Ask directly about periodic gift agreements, the five-year notarised or private deed arrangement that makes Dutch giving fully deductible, because that mechanism has no equivalent elsewhere and support for it varies by tooling.
What stands out
Peer-to-peer
iDEAL and SEPA
Dutch market
Where it costs you
Campaign platform first, donor database second
Barely relevant outside the Netherlands and Belgium
Right for
Dutch charities running personal and team fundraising campaigns with supporters
Wrong for
Charities needing a full donor database as the core
FranceSet-up fee plus monthly subscription, quoted per organisation
Entry-level Blackbaud database for small fundraising teams on a budget
Ranked #15 of 15 in Best Donor Management Software in 2026.
Pricing on requestNorth America
Blackbaud eTapestry has kept small fundraising teams going for two decades and still holds the fields they need. It is also positioned as the first rung of a ladder, and the upgrade conversation to bigger Blackbaud products arrives as your records grow, because pricing is banded by record count.
Test the export before you commit anything: getting a complete, structured copy of your own giving history out is harder here than at most alternatives.
What stands out
Long history
Record bands
Blackbaud estate
Where it costs you
The interface has aged badly
Full export is a support conversation, not a button
Right for
Small teams already inside the Blackbaud estate with simple needs
Wrong for
Organisations who expect to leave the vendor cleanly later
United StatesQuoted per organisation, banded by record count
Donor management software records who gave what and when, collects recurring and one-off gifts, and produces the receipts and tax claims each country's revenue service requires. The differences that matter are rarely in the feature list, so this is
the order we would work through them.
01
Decide whether you need a published price
10 of the 15 tools here publish what they cost; the other 5 quote per organisation. The ones you can compare without a sales call: Enthuse, Give (GiveWP), RaiseNow, twingle, HelloAsso, Donorbox, Keela, Givebutter, Funraise, Zeffy.
02
Decide how much the jurisdiction matters
These 15 vendors are established in 6 countries across 2 regions (North America 8, Europe 7). That decides whose disclosure law applies to what the vendor holds, wherever the servers are.
03
Consider whether you want the source
1 of these are open source: Give (GiveWP). Hosting one yourself trades a subscription for maintenance.
Where donor management stops and nonprofit CRM starts
The two categories overlap and the difference is depth in one direction. A nonprofit CRM holds every relationship the organisation has: volunteers, members, campaigners, service users, trustees. Donor management holds the giving record and goes deeper into it, which means pledge schedules that run for years, soft credits when a gift arrives through a trust, tribute and in-memoriam giving, legacy files that sit dormant until they do not, and the tax paperwork behind each.
Virtuous and Blackbaud eTapestry are databases of that kind. Enthuse, HelloAsso and twingle are collection tools with donor records attached, which is a different purchase at a different price. Decide which of the two problems you have before you compare features, because a tool built for one is a poor substitute for the other.
Count how many of your relationships are not donors. If most, buy a CRM instead.
Write down your three most complex giving arrangements and ask each vendor to model them.
Ask whether the vendor considers legacy administration in scope, and get the answer in writing.
Tax relief is not a feature, it is the reason the country's charities buy locally
Every European market has its own mechanism and none of them travel. UK charities need the Gift Aid declaration captured, stored with an audit trail and claimed from HMRC, which Enthuse does at the point of donation. German organisations must issue a Zuwendungsbestätigung in the official wording, which twingle produces and most imported products do not.
Dutch donors get full deductibility only through a periodic gift agreement over five years to an ANBI, an arrangement users of iRaiser (formerly Kentaa) should confirm support for explicitly. France has the reçu fiscal, handled by HelloAsso and iRaiser. An American product will rarely handle these natively, GiveWP's Gift Aid option aside, however good its donor record is, and a workaround built in custom fields is a liability at audit.
Name your country's relief mechanism and ask for a live demonstration of it.
Ask who is responsible if a receipt is issued in the wrong format.
Check that the audit trail survives a donor changing address or bank details.
Recurring giving is the product, and it fails quietly
Regular gifts are the only fundraising income you can plan with, and the software decides how much of it survives. Direct debit under SEPA behaves differently from a card: mandates have references and pre-notification rules, failures come back days later, and a card expires without telling anyone.
Ask what happens on a failed payment, because silent attrition of a recurring file is the most expensive thing that goes wrong in this category. RaiseNow and iRaiser handle SEPA as a first-class mechanism; products designed for American card giving often treat direct debit as an afterthought. Then ask the awkward question: if you leave, do the mandates move with you, or must every regular donor be asked to sign again?
Ask for the recurring failure and retry logic in writing, per payment method.
Confirm whether SEPA mandates are portable to another provider.
Check that a donor can change amount or date without cancelling and restarting.
Percentage fees, record bands and the bill five years out
Donor software is priced in three shapes and they diverge sharply over time. A percentage of every gift, as Donorbox, Funraise, twingle and RaiseNow charge and as the free platforms recover through donor tips, is painless at first and grows exactly as fast as your fundraising does. Record-count bands, used by Blackbaud eTapestry and Keela, punish you for keeping history, which is the one thing a fundraising database exists to do.
A flat licence, or GiveWP's self-hosted plugin, holds still while you grow. Model each against your five-year income plan, not this year's, and price the deletion policy too, because deciding to purge lapsed donors to stay in a cheaper band is a decision the pricing model made for you.
Project the fee against your fundraising target in year five, not year one.
Ask what happens to the price when your record count crosses the next band.
Get the cost of a full structured export written into the contract now.
What goes wrong most often when buying donor management software
Buying a donation platform when the problem is a database. Forms collect money; they do not remember who gave, why they stopped, or what was promised.
Accepting an American product's promise to handle local tax relief through custom fields. At audit that is not a receipt, it is a note.
Migrating without the recurring mandates. If donors must re-sign, expect to lose a meaningful share of your most reliable income.
Treating the free platforms as free. Someone pays, and the donor tip prompt draws on the same goodwill your next appeal needs.
07
Frequently asked questions
8 answers
What is the best donor management in 2026?
Enthuse leads our ranking of 15. Collects the Gift Aid declaration at the point of giving, stores it against the donor and produces the claim, which is the part UK charities most often bodge in spreadsheets.
Donation pages, events and regular giving all feed one donor record. It is not a full database for major-gift or legacy work, and outside the UK the tax handling has nothing to offer.
Which donor management tools publish their pricing?
10 of the 15, with the pricing model each one publishes:
Enthuse: Monthly platform fee plus card processing, published.
Give (GiveWP): Free core plugin; paid plans $199 to $599 a year, published.
RaiseNow: Free plan with a 1.3% to 2.5% platform fee; Growth plans from CHF 225 a month plus 0.5% to 4.4%, published.
twingle: No monthly fee; 2.5% to 5% per donation by annual volume, payment costs included, published.
HelloAsso: Free to the organisation; funded by voluntary donor contributions.
Donorbox: Standard: no monthly fee, 2.95% platform fee per donation; Pro $150 per month, published.
Keela: Per month by contact band, published; annual discount.
Givebutter: Free with donor tips enabled; 3% platform fee plus card fees with tips off; Plus from $29 per month, published.
Funraise: Free plan with a 5% platform fee per gift; premium plans quoted.
Zeffy: Free to the organisation; funded by optional donor contributions.
The other 5 quote per organisation.
Is there a free donor management tool?
Give (GiveWP), RaiseNow, HelloAsso, Givebutter, Funraise, Zeffy offer a free tier or a free self-hosted edition.
Where are these donor management vendors established?
In 6 countries across 2 regions: North America 8, Europe 7.
Enthuse: United Kingdom.
Give (GiveWP): United States.
iRaiser: France.
RaiseNow: Switzerland.
twingle: Germany.
HelloAsso: France.
Engaging Networks: United Kingdom.
Donorbox: United States.
Keela: Canada.
Virtuous: United States.
Givebutter: United States.
Funraise: United States.
Zeffy: Canada.
iRaiser (formerly Kentaa): France.
Blackbaud eTapestry: United States.
Which donor management tools are open source?
Give (GiveWP).
Which donor management tools can you host yourself?
Give (GiveWP). The other 14 are hosted by the vendor only.
What should you use instead of Enthuse?
Give (GiveWP) and iRaiser are the next two on this page. Give (GiveWP) is for Charities with technical help who want to own the donor database outright; iRaiser is for Charities fundraising across several European countries under one platform contract.
Who should not buy Enthuse?
Organisations fundraising outside the United Kingdom and its tax rules. Not a database for major-gift or legacy work.
If your donor management product belongs among these 15, tell us what it does and who it is for. Inclusion is an editorial call; what a listing is and is not is set out under software advice.
