Gumroad vs Whop: what you keep, who handles tax, and which fits what you sell

Editorially reviewed by Carlos Gil. Fees and policies checked on Gumroad's and Whop's official pricing pages and help docs on 2026-10-08; platform, processing, payout and tax fees re-checked on 2026-10-31. No affiliate links on this page. How we review · How we make money.

Short answer: Whop keeps far less of each sale. Its base card fee is 2.7% + $0.30 with no monthly plan, against Gumroad's 10% + $0.50 plus 2.9% + $0.30 card processing. On a $29 product that's roughly $1.08 to Whop versus $4.54 to Gumroad. What the gap buys you on Gumroad is tax: Gumroad is the merchant of record on every sale and handles sales tax and VAT worldwide. On Whop, tax on your direct sales is your job unless you switch on one of its 2% tax options, and Whop only remits for you in the US, EU and UK.

The real question is what you sell and how much admin you'll take on. Gumroad fits a file you sell to your own audience with zero setup. Whop fits a membership, a paid Discord or a course with a community, at volume where 10% hurts. Full reviews: Gumroad review and Whop review.

Fees and what you keep

Gumroad charges 10% + $0.50 per sale through your profile or direct links, per its pricing page. Its help center adds the part most comparisons miss: that fee does not include card processing (2.9% + $0.30) or PayPal fees. Sales that come through Gumroad's Discover marketplace pay a flat 30%, which does include processing. Once your paid sales in a calendar month pass $20,000, new direct sales that month drop to 5% + $0.50, resetting on the 1st. No monthly plan exists.

Whop has no subscription plans. Its fee docs list 2.7% + $0.30 per successful domestic card transaction, plus 1.5% for international cards and 1% when currency conversion applies. ACH debits are 1.5% capped at $5. Then come the extras, each listed per event: optional "revenue optimization" add-ons (orchestration 0.8%, billing automation 0.5%, tax and remittance 2% when enabled and tax is collected), payout fees (next-day ACH is $2.50 per payout), $15 per dispute, and small per-transaction fraud fees ($0.03 for 3D Secure, $0.07 for Radar). Whop's own table tops out at 6% + $0.30 per domestic card sale with every add-on on.

Example 1: 100 sales of a $29 digital product ($2,900 gross)

Assumptions: all buyers in the US paying by card, prices exclude tax (any tax is added at checkout and paid by the buyer), every sale comes from your own link, no affiliates, no refunds or disputes, Gumroad's monthly sales stay under $20,000, Whop pays out once by next-day ACH.

Whop's fee page also lists Radar at $0.07 and 3D Secure at $0.03 per transaction but leaves both out of its own per-sale cost table; if both apply to every charge, add $10 to each Whop column. Whop's 2% tax fee only applies to transactions where tax is actually collected, and many US states don't tax digital downloads, so the third column is a ceiling.

Example 2: $5,000 a month in memberships

Assumptions: 250 members at $20/month, US cards, prices exclude tax, all direct sign-ups, no affiliates, no failed payments or churn during the month, Whop pays out weekly by next-day ACH (four payouts).

That's a $625 monthly gap in Whop's favor on the base rate, about $7,500 a year. With both add-ons on, it's $500 a month. If Whop's Radar and 3D Secure fees apply to every charge, add $25 to each Whop column. At this size, the gap pays for a bookkeeper several times over.

Want the same math across 18 creator platforms at $1k, $5k and $20k a month? See the Creator Platform Fee Index.

Product types

Gumroad sells digital downloads, ebooks, courses, memberships and software (with license keys), plus bundles, versions, pay-what-you-want pricing, installment plans, tipping and upsells, per its help center.

Whop sells "products" with one-time, subscription or free pricing, then attaches apps that members get access to: Courses, Chat, Forums, Events, Content pages, Files and Calendar Bookings, per its docs. You can sell a PDF on Whop through the Files app, but the platform is built around access to a space, not delivery of a file. It also offers waitlists, free trials and customer financing (15% per financed transaction through partners like Klarna).

Memberships and communities

Both do recurring billing. Gumroad memberships bill monthly, quarterly, every six months or yearly, support tiers and seats, and can be fixed-length. Gumroad Community adds a free chat space per product.

Whop is the deeper option here. A single product can bundle a course, a forum, chat, events and booked calls. Its user dashboard shows each member's status (renewing, paused, churned, paid once), and you can pause payments, add free days or generate a transfer link per membership. If the community is the product, Whop gives you more to work with.

Discord integration

Both connect to Discord. Gumroad's integration adds buyers to your server through a "Join Discord" button and, for memberships, removes them when the membership ends by default. Gumroad's help center says its bot can't auto-assign roles; it points you to Zapier for that.

Whop includes Discord as an app inside a membership: buyers link their Discord account to Whop, authorize the Whop Bot, and claim access from the whop. Whop's help docs cover the buyer side; we couldn't find a seller-side doc confirming how roles are assigned and removed, so check that in a test whop before you migrate a paid server.

Discovery and marketplace

Gumroad Discover recommends products to buyers. Eligibility takes a $100 balance from genuine sales plus a risk review that Gumroad says averages three weeks. Discover sales cost 30%, and products listed there are automatically opted into Gumroad Affiliates, where anyone can promote you for a fixed 10%.

Whop's marketplace is also called Discover. Whop's fee page lists no separate marketplace fee, and on Discover sales Whop handles sales tax as the marketplace facilitator in the jurisdictions where it's registered. The cost to watch is affiliates: Whop says it uses global affiliates by default to promote listed products across its marketplace, at a default 30% commission. You can change that rate. Our read: neither marketplace should be your plan. Treat it as a bonus on top of your own audience.

Checkout and tax

This is Gumroad's strongest card. Since January 1, 2025, Gumroad is the merchant of record and says it handles sales tax collection and remittance worldwide where it has obligations. You don't register, file or remit for Gumroad sales.

Whop gives you three choices for direct sales, per its tax doc:

• Whop collects tax, I remit (Whop's recommended option): Whop calculates and collects; the tax lands in your payout and you register, remit and file. 2% per transaction.
• Whop collects and remits: Whop files for you, but only in the US, EU and UK. 2% per transaction.
• I'll handle tax myself: no Whop tax fee, and every jurisdiction is on you.

Whop's doc is blunt that choosing a managed option doesn't, by itself, remove your own tax obligations. For a seller with buyers in Canada, Australia or India, Gumroad is meaningfully less work.

Payouts

Gumroad pays out daily (US only, after four prior payouts), weekly, monthly or quarterly, with a $100 minimum on scheduled payouts and a 7-day hold on the weekly, monthly and quarterly schedules. US creators can take instant payouts up to $10,000 for a 3% fee after 60 days of processing. Bank deposit or PayPal, depending on your country; Gumroad's help center lists a 2% fee on PayPal payouts.

Whop offers instant, daily or weekly schedules (depending on your account), a $10 minimum withdrawal where applicable, and charges per payout: $2.50 for next-day ACH, 4% + $2.50 for instant bank deposit, $23 for a wire, with crypto and Venmo options.

Customer data and portability

You can leave either one with your customer list. Gumroad exports a sales CSV with a full fee breakdown per sale and a separate CSV of email subscribers. It doesn't import customers or subscribers, so moving in from elsewhere means asking people to re-subscribe. Whop's Users and Memberships tables export name, email, membership status, location and total spend, and Whop connects to Zapier, HubSpot, QuickBooks and Xero.

What neither documents is moving active card-on-file subscriptions to another platform. Gumroad no longer lets new sellers connect their own Stripe account (outside Brazil), so on both platforms, in practice, a membership migration likely means members re-entering payment details. Plan for churn if you ever switch.

Affiliate program for your product

Gumroad: add your own affiliates at 1% to 75% with a 30-day cookie, or join Gumroad Affiliates (fixed 10%, 7-day cookie). Gumroad's fees on affiliate sales are split between you and the affiliate in proportion to the commission.

Whop: a global affiliate rate (default 30%, adjustable), a separate rate for your existing members, custom per-person deals (percent or fixed, first payment or recurring), and revenue share. Affiliates get paid after a 30-day wait. Whop's program is more flexible for recurring products; Gumroad's is simpler.

Gumroad vs Whop at a glance

Read more: Gumroad review · Whop review

Which should you choose?

Choose Gumroad if:

• You sell files (templates, presets, ebooks) mostly to your own audience, a few sales a month, and want to be live in an hour.
• You have international buyers and don't want to touch sales tax or VAT at all.
• You'd pay roughly 12 extra cents on the dollar to never file a tax return for these sales.

Choose Whop if:

• You sell recurring access: a paid Discord, a community, a course with chat and calls.
• You're past a few thousand dollars a month, where the gap in Example 2 is real money.
• You have an accountant or a tax setup already, or your buyers are mostly in the US, EU and UK.

Consider neither if:

• You want tax handled at a lower fee than Gumroad: Lemon Squeezy is a merchant of record at 5% + 50¢, though Stripe now owns it and is building a migration path to Stripe Managed Payments.
• You sell from Instagram or TikTok and want a storefront in your bio: Stan is $29/month with no transaction fees (processing still applies, and Stan is not a merchant of record). See our best link-in-bio tools for creators.
• You're leaving Gumroad for fees alone: start with our Gumroad alternatives, which prices nine options on the same 100-sale Example.

What would change this: if Whop expands its collect-and-remit coverage beyond the US, EU and UK, the tax argument for Gumroad narrows. If Gumroad cuts its base rate or makes the $20k discount easier to reach, the fee argument for Whop narrows.