Payhip Review 2026: Why I Stopped Using It (And Why You Should Too)

Hey guys, welcome back to another product review. In the past, I wrote quite a few reviews of various digital products and services that I’ve either used or currently using in my business. I’ve decided to bring this back to the personal blog because, for the most part, I have many years of experience using some of these products and services.

Let’s talk about Payhip. Now, this isn’t my first review of Payhip, I actually wrote an in-depth review back in 2018 on my old digital marketing blog (magnet4blogging), which I took offline last year. It was just time to move on from that blog.

Anyhow, to cut a long-winded story short. I began using Payhip back in 2015, when blogging was the only thing that I was doing. Back then, Payhip was a force to be reckoned with, but it’s been over ten years since I sold my first eBook on Payhip, and of course, I no longer use Payhip for one main reason, which I’ll share with you later.

That said, my reason should not be the same reason for you to quit using Payhip, because your situation may be very different from mine. Let’s get into it.

What is Payhip, and why should you give a 💩 about it in 2026?

Payhip is an ecommerce platform that was launched back in 2011 by the Farah brothers. As I mentioned, it wasn’t until around 2015 that I started to use Payhip myself.

Originally, Payhip was setup to help creators sell digital products and downloads. Over time and with growth, the platform added new features that allowed users to sell courses, coaching, memberships, and various other digital downloads. It is considered the almost perfect, and certainly most affordable solution for all kinds of content creators selling online.

I’ll talk more about what features are included in Payhip later and whether I think they’re useful in 2026 or not.

Who is Payhip for?

So just to clarify, Payhip is an ecommerce solution for anyone wanting to get their digital products out there, selling, and making money.

Payhip caters for all kinds of entrepreneurs, so whether you’re an author, musician, blogger, designer, educator, freelancer, digital marketer, software creator – if you have something to sell online, Payhip is for you.

What makes Payhip the perfect starting point

Setting up a website on your own can be a logistical and costly nightmare, especially if you’ve never done it before, or don’t have time or technical know-how to do it yourself.

That’s OK. Not everyone is interested in learning web design. There’s a lot of boring 💩 that comes with website building. That’s one of the reasons Payhip is perfect for anyone starting on their journey, without needing to learn how to build your own platform to sell online.

Of course, there are many benefits of building your own eCommerce store, and again, I’ll outline some of these benefits in the post later.

So I mentioned Payhip is a good ‘starting point’. In my opinion, that’s what Payhip is useful for. You can use it as a launchpad platform to start selling online. Especially if you are new to the world of digital entrepreneurship.

What also makes Payhip a great platform to consider using is it’s features –

1. Store builder (fully customizable)
2. Payment gateway integrations (Stripe and PayPal)
3. VAT and taxes collected and paid for (EU, UK, US, and Canada)
4. Marketing tools (including email and referral)
5. Marketplace (new)

Now, some of these features may sound basic, and for the most part, they are. But what more could you possibly need to start selling online? Why do you need to be overwhelmed by complexity?

By the way, I need to mention that Payhip isn’t exclusively used to sell digital products. You can also sell physical products as well, such as arts and crafts, branded merchandise, etc.

Features (A deeper dive)

Let’s dive deeper into Payhip’s features.

1. Store Builder

The store builder lets you create your own exclusive and branded online store. If you have more than one product to sell, this is ideal. Your store is fully customizable using visual design options (no coding required). You can embed videos, add your own logo, color schemes and more.

You can also connect your own domain name to your store, which can really help to personalise your brand.

2. Payment gateways

At the time of writing this review of Payhip, you can only connect your PayPal account or Stripe to get paid for selling products. Now, there is, of course, a fee for selling through the Payhip platform, and any additional charges that PayPal and stripe may have.

The fees generally depend on the membership plan you have with Payhip.

1. Free Forever Plan (5% fee + PayPal and Stripe fees)
2. Plus Plan (2% fee + PayPal and Stripe fees)
3. Pro Plan (zero fees + PayPal and Stripe fees)

We’ll talk more about pricing and affordability later on in this post.

3. VAT and taxes

One of the biggest benefits of using Payhip is that the platform takes care of VAT, (EU, US/Canada taxes). EU VAT, for example, is collected and paid on your behalf, so no need to set up a one-Stop Shop or make payments to individual EU countries.

4. Marketing tools

Payhip offers simple marketing tools, however, you also have access to coupons, email marketing, referrals, blogging tools, cross-selling, upsells, and an affiliate dashboard. These feature can be found on some of Payhip’s competitor platforms but at additional fees. The fact that these are included in every plan is a pretty sweet deal.

5. Marketplace

Another noteable feature of Payhip is it’s new dedicated marketplace! Something a lot of people have been asking for. The marketplace is packed with products from creators selling on Payhip. I believe this marketplace is only going to grow over time.

6. Test of time

One thing many Payhip reviews overlook is that Payhip is a battle-tested platform that has stood the test of time. Few platforms can say they’re still owned, run, and actively managed by their original founders and team.

Unfortunately, by 2026, many competing platforms have either shut down entirely or been acquired by larger companies. Payhip, on the other hand, has been serving creators for more than 15 years, and there’s every reason to believe it will continue to be a reliable platform for years to come.

If you’re looking for a platform you’ll be able to depend on for the long term, that’s definitely something worth taking into consideration.

My story: selling on Payhip

As I stated at the start, I started using Payhip back in 2015. Back then blogging was mainly the thing I was doing, before web design and creating and selling courses and memberships was really my thing.

I created a really simple blog planner resource guide which I had some success with selling through Payhip. I managed to make just over $1.4k from sales, and when you think about it, the ROI on a PDF guide is pretty crazy considering it only takes time to create it once!

Before discovering Payhip, I was using other platforms such as Fiverr and Gumroad. But Payhip is by far the best. That’s my opinion.

Why I stopped using Payhip (and why you should too)

So if Payhip has so many great things going, and so much to offer creative entrepreneurs, why on earth did I stop using it?

Simple, I can build and manage my own selling platform now. When I started using Payhip in 2015, I couldn’t, or at least not with a great deal of confidence.

These days however, WordPress is my natural go-to platform for building an ecommerce site for selling digital products. You’ll know this if you’ve visited my WordPress training and membership platform over at Van Marciano Pro.

You can also quit using Payhip if you want to learn how to do the same, I actually teach this process on Van Marciano Pro.

However, you should definitely stick to using, or consider using Payhip if –

1. You don’t have the time to learn to build your own ecommerce portal
2. You don’t have the initial money to invest in building your own website (Hosting, domain name, theme, plus all the marketing tools and plugins required)
3. You don’t want to have the responsibility of collecting and paying tax and VAT

Payhip, for the most part, has everything you need to get started.

Payhip pricing

Payhip is one of the more affordable options available, even in 2026.

They have a free plan, which many of it’s competitors do not (alternative platform Sellfy no longer has a free plan). Their fees are relatively low, and it’s pretty easy to get set up and start selling quickly.

OK, let’s look at pricing –

Free plan – $0 per month
5% fee plus Stripe and PayPal fees. Access to all features, unlimited products and revenue!

Plus plan – $29 per month
2% fee plus Stripe and PayPal fees. Access to all features, unlimited products and revenue!

Pro plan – $99 per month
0% fee plus Stripe and PayPal fees. Access to all features, unlimited products and revenue!

Is Payhip worth it in 2026?

Don’t get me wrong, there are some things certainly lacking in Payhip.

Technology as moved on, but Payhip still seem to lag behind a little bit. For starters, the analytics is thin on the ground. It provides very basic analytics data regarding visitors and doesn’t provide any tools for acquiring lost leads, such as cart abandonment.

The UI is a little dated now, and checkout customization also lacking. Additionally, Payhip stores have been known to load slowly sometimes.

Other than that, yes, Payhip is worth using in 2026, if you’re only interested in selling low value products such as eBooks, PDF guides, sound samples libraries, other digital downloads, small courses and limited memberships.

The fact that you have a free plan means you have absolutely nothing to lose. Give Payhip a try today.

What are the alternatives to Payhip?

If after spieling all the positive and some negative things regarding Payhip, you’re still not convinced it’s for you, there are some alternative platforms to consider looking at. Here’s a brief list –

1. Sellfy (Powerful, modern ecommerce platform with a lot more to offer, but no free plan. Can be quite expensive if you’re just starting out)
2. Paddle (Similar to Payhip with better checkout customization options, fraud protection, 5% fee + 50c per sale)

Disclaimer: This post contains affiliate links to Payhip. If you choose to click one of these links and make a purchase, I may earn a small commission at no extra cost to you. Thanks for your support.