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Merchant of record fee calculator: Paddle, Lemon Squeezy, FastSpring and Gumroad for your monthly sales

You sell digital products to buyers in more than one country, and you want the fee in dollars. Enter the month's revenue and the order count. The table applies Paddle's and Lemon Squeezy's published checkout rate, Gumroad's direct or Discover cut, and a FastSpring percentage you paste from your own quote.

By Marcus Reyes, Editor. Published 24 October 2026.

Summarize with:

Treat every total as an estimate. It follows each company's published fee rules and leaves out sales tax, payout charges, affiliate commissions and cart-recovery add-ons. Three things move a total: Lemon Squeezy's international, PayPal and subscription extras, whether the Gumroad sale is direct or from Discover, and the FastSpring quote you paste in.

See your monthly fee. The guide to merchant of record platforms for digital products says which of the four fits software, a course or a download. If you also pay a monthly plan for a funnel checkout, use the checkout cost calculator. Our comparison of merchant of record vs payment processor sets out what changes when the platform is the seller.

Estimate the fee for your monthly sales

Typing a price here sets revenue to price times orders. Typing revenue updates the price.

Gumroad sale type
Lemon Squeezy add-ons
FastSpring quote

Enter revenue and orders, then press Calculate my fees. The table sorts the four by the estimated fee.

How the estimate is built

Paddle's pricing page shows 5% plus 50¢ per checkout transaction and no monthly fee. Lemon Squeezy publishes that same rate for ecommerce, and it does not charge a monthly fee either. For both, card processing is included in that rate, so the table stops there.

Two fee shapes side by side: one solid yellow bar, and a yellow bar with a shorter grey bar under it
One bar is a single fee. The two bars are a platform fee and a card fee, charged separately.

Lemon Squeezy's fees documentation adds 1.5% when the buyer is outside the US, 1.5% for PayPal, and 0.5% on a subscription. The boxes apply those to revenue only. The same page says the platform fee is calculated on the total order value when the order is placed. This calculator asks for revenue before sales tax, so a VAT amount inside a real order is not in the total. Cart-recovery and affiliate-order add-ons stay out as well.

Gumroad charges 10% plus $0.50 on a direct sale through a profile or a direct link, and 30% when a new customer buys through Discover. Its fees article says the direct rate does not include credit card processing at 2.9% plus $0.30, so direct rows add that line. Discover sales are a flat 30% in this table.

The same article says that after $20,000 of paid direct sales in a calendar month, each new direct sale that month is 5% plus $0.50. The checkbox prices everything you typed at 5%. Tick it only if that figure represents sales made after the $20,000 mark. Sales from earlier in the month stay at 10%, and the 10% rate returns on the first day of the next month.

FastSpring describes its pricing as one flat rate covering payments, tax compliance, subscriptions and checkout, and it does not publish the percentage. Leave the quote fields blank and the table asks you to enter one. A percentage with the fixed field empty is treated as zero dollars per order.

Paddle's pricing page says to contact them for a custom rate if you sell products under $10, and again if your volume is high. Neither case has a formula, so the table keeps the published rate until Paddle gives you a different number. For the way these rates were checked, read how we research fees.

What $50,000 and 500 orders cost

A calculator beside four vertical bars of different heights, the shortest bar yellow, with a small stack of coins under that bar
Four fee totals at the same revenue. The short bar is the lower merchant-of-record line.

Take an average order of $100, Gumroad set to direct, a US card, and no subscription. Paddle's percentage comes to $2,500 and the per-order charges come to $250, so the line is $2,750, or 5.5% of revenue. Lemon Squeezy matches that $2,750 while its three extras are off.

Switch all three extras on and Lemon Squeezy comes to $4,500, which is 9% of the same revenue. Those add-ons are the extra $1,750.

Gumroad direct at the higher platform rate is a $5,250 platform cut plus $1,600 of card processing, $6,850 in all, or 13.7% of revenue. That is about two and a half times the Paddle figure on these inputs, before anyone touches Discover. The 5% checkbox on the whole month produces $4,350, and that overstates the discount, because earlier sales in the month stay on the higher direct rate. Discover sales come to $15,000.

My take: at a $100 average order I would price Paddle and Lemon Squeezy first, then turn on the extras that match how your buyers pay. I would keep Gumroad when buyers find the product on Discover, and while the catalog is still small enough that the direct cut is acceptable.

Paddle vs Lemon Squeezy fees

The headline rates match. Lemon Squeezy costs more once its three extras are on. Paddle's other difference is a custom rate for products under $10 and for high volume. Sellers who charge buyers outside the US describe Lemon Squeezy as the costlier of the pair once that international extra applies.

The full comparison is Paddle vs Lemon Squeezy. Every tier is in the Paddle pricing breakdown and the Lemon Squeezy pricing breakdown.

When Gumroad is still the right pick

There is no monthly fee. Discover is a marketplace, so a new buyer can find the product without you sending the traffic, and those sales are the flat marketplace cut. After a heavy month of direct sales, later direct sales in that same month use the lower platform rate.

Gumroad's pricing page says that since 1 January 2025 it handles your tax obligations. A creator keeps the account while that percentage is still something they can live with. At the revenue in the example, the direct fee plus card processing is why Gumroad costs more. Gumroad's pricing breakdown walks through each of those rates.

FastSpring needs your quote

Paste the percentage your contact quoted, and any fixed amount per order. That quote is one fee for the whole service, the flat rate described above. Leave the fields empty until you have a quote. The table will not guess a percentage.

Read the FastSpring pricing page for what the company has published.

Your next step

See your monthly fee with your own revenue, then open the checkout and funnel ranking if the offer needs a checkout you host yourself.

Frequently asked questions

Does the Paddle fee apply to sales tax?
Type the sales total with tax taken out. The estimate multiplies that figure by the checkout rate on Paddle's pricing page, and that page does not add a tax surcharge on top of the formula used here.
Is Lemon Squeezy more expensive than Paddle?
A US card payment that is not a subscription lands on the same total. International cards, PayPal and subscriptions each add a percentage, and those are the three boxes on the form.
Does Gumroad include the card charge?
Direct sales add card processing as their own line. Discover is a single percentage, and the table does not pile a card charge on top of it.
What does FastSpring charge?
The number in your quote. No percentage is printed on the site we read, so the two FastSpring fields stay empty until you paste that quote.

Sources

Changelog

  • 24 October 2026. First version, using each vendor's published fee rules. FastSpring uses the percentage you type in.

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Last checked 2026-10-24

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