Pricing verified August 23, 2026 · next review
Stop guessing which course platform to pay for.
Four questions. One straight answer, with the drawbacks listed next to the strengths — and a calculator that shows what each option actually costs at your sales volume, fees included. Teachable, Thinkific, Podia and Systeme.io, compared on numbers we checked ourselves.
Affiliate disclosure. If you sign up to Systeme.io through a link on this page, we may earn a commission at no extra cost to you. We are not in the affiliate programs of Teachable, Thinkific or Podia, so we earn nothing when we recommend them — which happens often. Read the full disclosure.
The quiz
Where is your course business right now?
Why this matters
The difference a comparison makes
The cost of picking wrong is not the monthly fee. It is the percentage cut you did not notice, the migration you have to do a year later, and the separate email tool you did not budget for.
Choosing without comparing
- You pick the platform with the best-known name and find the 7.5% cut after your first launch.
- You budget the subscription and forget the separate email tool the platform quietly needs.
- You pay for exam and certificate features you will never switch on.
- You migrate everything a year in, once the real cost shows up.
Choosing with this tool
- Every platform fee is on the table before you enter a card, not after.
- The calculator uses your own price and volume, so the number is yours, not an example.
- You see what the recommended option is bad at, in the same breath as what it is good at.
- You start on the plan that fits the stage you are actually at.
Side by side
Already know roughly what you want? Compare directly.
Pick two or three and see them head to head — the shape chart first, then every number that actually differs.
Your numbers, not an example
What each platform really costs you
Put in what you charge and how much you sell. This works out the subscription, the platform's cut and card processing for every option, then ranks them by what you actually pay.
By situation
Best course platform for a specific job
The generic answer is rarely the useful one. These are the cases where one platform clearly wins, and why.
Best for a $0 budget
Systeme.io. It is the last of the four with a free plan that does not expire, and it includes email and funnels. The catch: the course player looks plainer than the others, and there is no student app.
Best for memberships with a community
Podia. Community is on every plan with no add-on, and it is the easiest of the four to run. The catch: Mover takes 5% of every sale, and its email caps at 100 subscribers, so you will likely pay for email elsewhere.
Best for accredited or compliance training
Thinkific. Real exams, enforced lesson completion and formal certificates, with unlimited courses from the base plan. The catch: it is the priciest way in at $40/month, and its built-in email is weak.
Best student experience on a phone
Teachable. A native student app on every plan, including the cheapest. The catch: that cheapest plan takes 7.5% of every sale and caps you at 100 active students.
Best if you already pay for email
Thinkific. If your list already lives in ConvertKit or Mailchimp, Thinkific's weak email stops mattering and you are left with the strongest course engine and no platform cut.
Best for selling one course before scaling
Systeme.io free, then Thinkific. Validate on the free plan, move once the revenue justifies $40/month. Migrating a single course is a weekend; migrating forty is not.
Methodology
How this tool decides
Every price, cap and fee on this page was read directly off each platform's own pricing page on . Nothing here is estimated or carried over from an older article. Where a platform does not publish a figure — Podia's month-to-month prices, for instance — we say it is not published rather than guessing.
The quiz scoring
Each of the four answers adds fixed points to one or more platforms. The highest total wins. There is no commission weighting anywhere in that rule set. When two platforms tie, we break it in this order: first, whichever one actually fits the budget you told us; then whichever scored higher on the two needs questions rather than the two money questions; then the cheaper one.
The radar scores
The six scores out of ten are our editorial judgement, not a measurement. They are anchored to the published facts listed on this page — entry price and fees for entry price, assessment and certification features for course features, and so on — but two reasonable people could score them a point apart. Treat the shape as a summary, and the table as the source of truth.
The cost calculator
For each platform we price every published plan at your volume, then show the cheapest one. Card processing of 2.9% + $0.30 per sale is included for all four, because you pay it everywhere — it is not a platform charge and no platform avoids it. Plans whose published subscriber caps fall below your number are excluded, and we say when that happens. Figures are estimates based on published prices, not a guarantee of savings or earnings.
What we do not do
We do not invent testimonials, success stories or user counts. We do not show these companies' logos, because we have no partnership with them and will not imply one. And we do not hide which links pay us — every affiliate link on this site says so, right next to the button.
Change log
What has changed, and when we checked
Pricing pages change quietly. Every time we re-verify, the result goes here — including the times a platform got worse.
Next scheduled review: . If you spot something out of date before we do, tell us at hello@finanzaxhq.com.
Questions
Frequently asked
Which course platform is cheapest to start with?
Systeme.io, because it is the only one of the four with a permanent free plan — 2,000 contacts, one course and three funnels, with no time limit and no credit card. Podia and Thinkific offer 30-day trials and Teachable offers 7 days, but all three need a paid plan after that.
Cheapest paid entry points, billed annually: Systeme.io $17/mo, Teachable $29/mo, Thinkific $40/mo, Podia $42/mo.
Do these platforms take a cut of my sales?
Some do, on their entry plans. Teachable Starter takes 7.5% of every sale and Podia Mover takes 5%, both on top of card processing. Systeme.io charges 0% on every plan including the free one, and Thinkific charges 0% when you collect through Thinkific Payments.
Separately, all four pass on standard card processing of roughly 2.9% + $0.30 per transaction. Nobody avoids that one, so we include it for every platform in the calculator rather than letting one option look artificially cheap.
Does Teachable still have a free plan?
No. Teachable removed it in June 2025 and replaced it with the Starter, Builder and Growth ladder plus a 7-day trial. Thinkific's free tier has likewise become a 30-day trial rather than a permanent plan. As of August 2026, Systeme.io is the only one of the four with a free plan that does not expire.
Which one is best for exams and certificates?
Thinkific, comfortably. Real exams, enforced lesson completion and formal certificates, plus unlimited courses from the base plan. Teachable is the next best with quizzes, compliance tracking and certificates. Podia and Systeme.io have only basic assessment features — if certification is the point of your course, neither is the right tool.
How do you make money, and does it change the recommendation?
We earn an affiliate commission if you sign up to Systeme.io through our link. We currently earn nothing at all from Teachable, Thinkific or Podia, and we say so next to every one of those links.
The quiz scores your answers against a fixed rule set published in the methodology, with no commission weighting in it. It recommends Thinkific on more answer paths than any other platform, and Thinkific pays us nothing.
Why don't you show the platforms' logos?
Because we have no partnership with them, and showing a company's branding implies one. Naming a company in an honest comparison is fine; borrowing its visual identity is not. Every graphic on this site is drawn by us.
How often is this updated?
We re-verify every price against the official pages quarterly, and sooner when we catch a change. Every check is logged in the change log, including the date. If the log has gone stale, that is a signal you should double-check the price yourself before you buy — we would rather tell you that than have you assume.