What is Paddle used for?

Paddle is a merchant-of-record payments platform for SaaS and app companies, handling billing, subscriptions, global tax and compliance. It is a good fit for SaaS companies selling worldwide, mobile app studios with web payments and software sellers outsourcing tax compliance.

How much does Paddle cost?

Paddle is a paid product with no free plan. No monthly fee. Paddle charges 5% + 50¢ per checkout transaction as merchant of record, with custom pricing for high-volume or more complex needs.

Is Paddle open source?

No. Paddle is proprietary (closed-source) software and can't be self-hosted. Open-source alternatives to Paddle include Polar.

What are some alternatives to Paddle?

Paddle competes with Lemon Squeezy, FastSpring and Stripe. For open-source options, see Enlisted's ranked list of open-source Paddle alternatives.

Paddle: features, pricing and alternatives

About Paddle

Paddle is a hosted billing and payments platform for SaaS, mobile apps, software and digital products. It acts as the merchant of record, which means Paddle sells to the end customer on the seller's behalf and takes on sales tax, VAT and related compliance work rather than leaving it with the software company.

Its product set includes localized checkout, flexible multi-product subscriptions, payment tools, recurring B2B invoicing, fraud protection, real-time payment and revenue analytics, and automated churn reduction for failed payments and cancellations. The vendor also offers in-app purchase support for apps and a free subscription metrics dashboard.

For developers, Paddle provides documentation, a sandbox, an API reference, changelog and an MCP-based docs tool for AI assistants. Paddle is proprietary software sold as a service, with details on its pricing page. It suits SaaS and app businesses that want to sell globally without registering for taxes in every market.

Key features

Merchant-of-record handling of tax and compliance
Localized, high-performance checkout
Multi-product subscription management
Recurring invoicing for B2B billing
Fraud prevention and protection
Revenue and subscription analytics
Developer sandbox and API reference

Good fit for

→SaaS companies selling worldwide
→Mobile app studios with web payments
→Software sellers outsourcing tax compliance

Tags: merchant-of-record; billing; subscriptions; saas; tax-compliance; checkout; payments

Paddle: questions and answers

What is Paddle used for?: Paddle is a merchant-of-record payments platform for SaaS and app companies, handling billing, subscriptions, global tax and compliance. It is a good fit for SaaS companies selling worldwide, mobile app studios with web payments and software sellers outsourcing tax compliance.
How much does Paddle cost?: Paddle is a paid product with no free plan. No monthly fee. Paddle charges 5% + 50¢ per checkout transaction as merchant of record, with custom pricing for high-volume or more complex needs.
Is Paddle open source?: No. Paddle is proprietary (closed-source) software and can't be self-hosted. Open-source alternatives to Paddle include Polar.
What are some alternatives to Paddle?: Paddle competes with Lemon Squeezy, FastSpring and Stripe. For open-source options, see Enlisted's ranked list of open-source Paddle alternatives.