Stripe Payments Review 2024: Features and Pricing (2024)

Full Review

Stripe Payments is Stripe’s online payment processing solution that accepts dozens of payment methods in a wealth of different currencies, making it a strong fit for online retailers that sell in multiple countries.

Stripe users can accept in-person payments by integrating Stripe Terminal. But if you do most of your business in person, there are better options. For example, other payment processors, such as Square, offer specific restaurant and retail features like end-of-day reports and inventory tracking.

That said, Stripe’s flat-rate pricing is easy to understand and there are no monthly fees. In addition, you can cancel at any time if it isn’t a good fit.

Stripe Payments is best for businesses that:

Deciding factors

Where Stripe Payments stands out

Accepts a variety of payment methods and currencies

Although it’s fairly standard by this point for payment processors to accept all major credit cards in addition to digital wallets and ACH transfers, Stripe really shines here with the breadth of payment types it supports. Stripe enables you to meet your customers’ payment needs by supporting PayPal and Cash App Pay, allowing numerous methods for conducting bank redirects and transfers, and integrating buy now, pay later solutions like Klarna and Afterpay. And because Stripe accepts payments in more than 135 different currencies, your customer base can expand across borders.

Easy to set up

You can begin the process of creating a Stripe account with just your name and email address. You’ll then need to provide some additional personal identification information and details related to your business, customer support and bank account. After completing the onboarding process, you can start customizing your checkout flow and sending payment links and invoices to customers. But you won’t be able to collect your first payout until seven days after you’ve taken your first payment. You may have to wait as long as 14 days, depending on your industry.

Highly customizable

With Stripe’s open APIs and software development kits, businesses can fully customize the payment experience, from a branded payment page that maintains the look and feel of your business website to streamlined invoicing and various uses of payment links. Stripe also provides support documents on its website as well as access to a developer community to help you make the most of these tools.

Where Stripe Payments falls short

Customization options are limited without coding

The customization options that Stripe makes available to merchants are a real asset, but many of those options require some coding comfort and knowledge. A developer is not something every small business has at its disposal, so if you’re hoping to make use of Stripe’s open API and all its capabilities, then you’ll want to be sure you have someone on your team with the necessary expertise.

Tailored to online sales and payments

Stripe Payments is primarily intended for online retailers and marketplaces. It supports selling and accepting payments across multiple online channels, including marketplaces, e-commerce shops and subscription-model businesses. If some of your sales happen in person, you’ll need to make use of Stripe Terminal, an integration that enables you to accept card-present transactions. If you’re a brick-and-mortar retailer that does most or all of your transactions in person, then you’ll likely want to choose a different processor.

Alternatives to Stripe Payments

Why we like it: Generally, Square is for in-person transactions, and Stripe is for online ones. Square offers several POS hardware options, including a free magnetic stripe reader that users can plug into an iOS or Android phone. Square also offers Tap to Pay on iPhone, which lets merchants accept card payments using only a regular iPhone with the Square POS app. Customers hold their cards or their own iPhone wallets near the merchant's phone to pay. Through Square POS, you can manage inventory and offer retail perks like gift cards. You can even build an online store through Square Online.

In addition, with upgraded plans, Square’s services designed specifically for retail and restaurants come with the ability to accept returns and exchanges; the seat management feature, for restaurants, specifies which person at a table ordered which dish.

Why we like it: If you’re overwhelmed by Stripe’s breadth of options and want a more straightforward solution, PayPal may be a good option. PayPal Checkout offers the simple choice of copying and pasting a code into your website to accept payments. But, of course, the more coding skills you have, the more you can customize the checkout flow.

Compare payment processors

To compare payment processing options, check out NerdWallet’s list of payment processing companies that are best for small-business owners. Our recommendations are based on the provider’s pricing and transparency, software and hardware options, system functionality, customer support, software integrations and contract requirements.