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WP Simple Pay vs. GiveWP vs. WPForms (Compared)

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Written By: author image Natalie Jones

Are you looking to accept donation payments for your non-profit or charity organization, yet finding it challenging to determine the ideal fundraising plugin for your WordPress site?

Several plugins for collecting donation payments exist; however, not all of them are necessarily tailored to your specific fundraising needs.

In this article, we’ll take a thorough look at three of the most popular donation plugins and provide a side-by-side comparison of WP Simple Pay vs. GiveWP vs. WPForms to help you narrow down the right one for you.

Table of Contents

WP Simple Pay vs. GiveWP vs. WPForms

WP Simple Pay, GiveWP, and WPForms are popular WordPress plugins that offer unique features and benefits. While each plugin is a good option for raising funds online, you’ll quickly discover what their differences are throughout this article and hopefully be able to choose the best one for your particular organization.

What is WP Simple Pay?

wp simple pay homepage

WP Simple Pay is the #1 Stripe payments plugin for WordPress that allows you to easily accept payments directly on your site without the need for a shopping cart or any additional plugins.

The standalone plugin lets you accept 10+ payment methods, including Cash App Pay, traditional credit and debit cards, Apple Pay / Google Pay / Microsoft Pay, ACH Direct Debit, Alipay, and more.

WP Simple Pay also works with third-party plugins and automation solutions to help you create targeted popup campaigns, social proof notifications, and even donor mailing lists.

With the plugin, you can also:

  • Control the number of transactions a donation payment form accepts with Inventory Limits.
  • Schedule your donation forms during specific times and date ranges to meet your goals.
  • Send your donors personalized email confirmations and purchase confirmation messages when they donate using an individual form.
  • Allow your donors to choose the amount they want to give using Suggested Donation Amounts.
  • Ensure that more of your donated funds go towards your cause by passing the additional 3% Stripe processing fee on to donors.

Remove the additional 3% fee! 

Most Stripe plugins charge an additional 3% fee for EVERY transaction
…not WP Simple Pay Pro!

WP Simple Pay Features

WP Simple Pay offers tons of unique features and benefits designed specifically to help you boost your fundraising efforts.

  • Payment Form Templates: Easily create the perfect donation forms using pre-built templates.
  • Subscriptions: Allow you to automatically collect recurring donation payments weekly, monthly, or yearly.
  • Per-form Messaging: Send your donors customized confirmation emails and messages.
  • Custom Form Fields: Collect additional information from your donors to improve communications.
  • Activity Reports: Keep track of how well your donation payment forms are performing directly from the WordPress admin dashboard.
  • Drag and Drop Form Builder: Create donation payment forms or other types of payment forms for your site without code.

WP Simple Pay Pricing

WP Simple Pay offers four different premium licenses as well as a free version, WP Simple Pay Lite, to help you meet the needs of your cause.

The plugin’s Personal Plan, which costs just $49.50 for the entire year, comes with the essential features you’ll need to start easily collecting donation payments. It allows you to use WP Simple Pay on one site and set up either Off-site Stripe Checkout forms where your donors complete their transactions on a secure page hosted by Stripe or On-site payment forms that let donors check out without ever leaving your site.

You can use the Personal plan to accept multiple payment methods, including credit and debit cards, ACH Direct Debit, Apple Pay / Google Pay / Microsoft Pay, Giropay, Alipay, and more.

Additionally, with the Personal plan, you can add, edit, or remove custom form fields to collect the information you need from your donors using text fields, dropdowns, number fields, checkboxes, and more.

The Plus Plan costs $99.50 per year and expands the number of sites you can use WP Simple Pay on to three sites. It allows you to collect recurring payments that automatically charge your donors on a weekly, monthly, or yearly basis.

The Professional Plan increases the number of sites you can use the plugin on to ten sites, making it an ideal solution for your organization if it runs several fundraising campaigns or separate causes.

It also offers priority customer support via email and adds even more payment method options, including Cash App Pay. You can also use it to collect the correct tax amounts based on the location of your donors and send custom invoice receipts to those who have joined your cause as a subscriber.

Finally, the Elite Plan is the ultimate donation and payments solution option for your fundraising needs and beyond. It includes all of the same features and benefits included in the Professional plan, plus use on an unlimited number of sites and premium support.

If you plan to accept payments for products such as merchandise or events hosted by your organization, going with either the Pro or Elite plan is highly recommended.

WP Simple Pay offers a special 65% discounted license for non-profits.

WP Simple Pay Pros & Cons

WP Simple Pay Pros

  • User-friendly drag and drop payment form builder
  • Standalone plugin
  • Multiple payment methods
  • Integrates with third-party plugins
  • Subscriptions
  • Fee recovery
  • Discount for non-profits
  • Free version
  • All-in-One payment form builder for more than just donations

WP Simple Pay Cons

  • Stripe payment gateway only

What is GiveWP?

GiveWP is one of the most popular donation and fundraising plugins for WordPress with over 100,000 active users.

Similar to WP Simple Pay, it allows you to recover the payment gateway processing fees by requesting your donors to cover it.

One of the best parts about the plugin is that it allows you to accept payments via multiple payment gateways, including Stripe, PayPal, Square, Braintree, and more.

Unlike with WP Simple Pay, GiveWP supports several addons to expand the capabilities of your donation payment forms, such as peer-to-peer fundraising and email reports.

Keep in mind that WP Simple Pay offers email reports without the need for an additional extension or plugin.

GiveWP Features

To help you get a quick overview of the features offered by GiveWP, let’s take a quick look at some of the most beneficial ones.

  • Multiple Payment Gateways: Accept multiple payment methods.
  • Fee Recovery: Ask your donors to cover the credit card processing fees.
  • Recurring Donations: Accept recurring donations.
  • Form Templates: Create donation payment forms using pre-built templates.
  • Donor Management: Manage your donor database directly from the WordPress admin dashboard.

GiveWP Pricing

GiveWP offers four unique pricing plans: Pro, Plus, Basic, and Free.

With the free version, you can accept payments via the Stripe and PayPal gateways. It also includes donor management and you’re free to use as many forms as you need.

The plugin’s Basic license costs $149 annually and includes all of the same features as the Free plan in addition to basic addons, more payment method options, and use on one site.

GiveWP Plus costs $349 per year and unlocks access to all of the premium addons, plus the ability to accept recurring donations.

The Pro plan is $499 per year and comes with everything offered in the Plus plan with the addition of peer-to-peer fundraising and VIP support.

GiveWP Pros & Cons

GiveWP Pros

  • Multiple payment gateways
  • Fee recovery
  • Tons of addons
  • Recurring donations
  • Free version

GiveWP Cons

  • Higher price point
  • Requires addons

What is WPForms?

WPForms is the best form builder plugin for WordPress well known for its beginner-friendly interface. It is currently being used by over 6,000,000 users to build forms and surveys for all kinds of services, events, products, and more.

While it is a comprehensive solution that goes beyond fundraising and donations, it offers powerful features and benefits that make it a great option for accepting the funds you need for your nonprofit or charity organization.

You can use its user-friendly interface to create customized donation payment forms for your WordPress site and streamline your donor management and marketing efforts by way of its addons.

WPForms Features

Let’s take a look at what makes WPForms an effective donations plugin option.

  • Multiple Payment Gateways: Accept payments via Stripe, PayPal, Authorize.Net, and Square.
  • Third-Party Integrations: Add donors to your email lists and automate tons of other tasks on your WordPress site using seamless integrations with platforms like Zapier.
  • Drag and Drop Form Builder: Easily create forms in minutes without using code.
  • Tons of Addons: Use addons to improve the capabilities of your site and your payment forms.
  • Fancy Form Fields: Customize your forms exactly the way you want by adding, editing, or removing the fields you need.

WPForms Pricing

Like WP Simple Pay, WPForms offers four different premium licenses: Basic, Plus, Pro, Elite.

The plugin’s Basic plan costs $49.50 per year and offers all the essential features you need to create forms for your site, including use on one site, form templates, advanced form fields, and more. Because this plan does not include any payment gateways, you’ll need a higher level license.

Similar to the Basic plan, WPForms Plus allows you to create forms for tons of different registrations, events, and signups; however, it doesn’t offer payment gateways.

To begin accepting donation payments using a WPForm form, you’ll need to purchase the Pro license for just $199.50 per year. It allows you to integrate several different payment gateways on your site, including Stripe, PayPal, and Square. The Pro plan also lets you set up recurring donations.

The plugin’s Elite plan costs $299.50 annually and offers use on an unlimited number of sites, making it a great option if you are an agency or if your organization operates several fundraising causes. Additionally, it adds Authorize.Net as an additional payment gateway.

WPForms Pros & Cons

WPForms Pros

  • Beginner-friendly interface
  • All-in-one form builder
  • Tons of integrations

WPForms Cons

  • Requires Pro license to accept payments
  • Needs addons
  • No subscription payment options

Verdict: Which is Best?

WP Simple Pay offers a simple, yet powerful solution for easily collecting payments on your WordPress site without having to install additional plugins or build a complicated shopping cart or storefront. Its advanced drag and drop payment form builder and pre-built form templates allow you to start collecting donations in minutes. Using the plugin, you can offer your donors their preferred payment methods and even integrate your forms with third-party plugins to create targeted popup campaigns and social proof notifications on your site.

If you’re in need of a straightforward plugin that lets you accept donation payments, WP Simple Pay is the best option for you hands down.

Several nonprofit organizations are currently using the plugin to create customized donation payment forms that offer multiple pricing options and represent their cause with branded checkout pages.

WP Simple Pay’s 65% discount for non-profits combined with its fee recovery capability make it the most cost-effective donations plugin.

WPForms is the right donations plugin for you if you want to accept donation payments on your site and also create forms for additional purposes such as enewsletter signups, event registrations, and surveys.

Although you’ll need to purchase WPForms Pro to actually accept payments, its user-friendly interface, all-in-one form builder, and flexible use cases make it an excellent choice.

That’s it! We hope this article has helped you decide which donations plugin is right for you.

If you liked this article, you might also want to check out our guides on how to accept donation payments online with WordPress and how to increase donation payments with targeted popups.

What are you waiting for? Get started with WP Simple Pay today!

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