Crowdfunding fee calculator: what you keep on Kickstarter, Indiegogo and more

How this is calculated

Every platform here prices a pledge as a percentage plus a flat amount. Over a campaign, that's the percentage of the total plus the flat amount once per backer, whatever each pledge is. So the calculator needs the total and how many backers paid it, or the average pledge, from which it works out the backers.

• Fees are the total times the percentage, plus the number of backers times the flat amount.
• You keep the total less the fees.
• The effective rate is the fees as a share of the total.

So the share a platform takes depends only on the average pledge: its percentage, plus its flat amount divided by the average pledge. A flat amount weighs heavily on a small pledge and barely on a large one. We charge a flat fee on every pledge and a small percentage. On small pledges we cost more than a platform that charges mostly a percentage, and on large ones less. Each row gives the average pledge where the two cross, worked out from both published rates.

Our fee is 1.5% of each pledge plus $0.99, read from the contract's own constants. The smallest pledge the contract accepts is $10. A campaign with a lower average can't run here, and the calculator says so instead of showing a figure. The percentage fee on a pledge follows the plan of the account making it. It's taken when the pledge is made, so it isn't returned if the campaign misses its goal. Paid plans aren't on sale today, so the published fee is the free plan's fee.

Every other rate is the one on the comparison page: the platform's published price as a percentage and a flat amount, platform fee and payment processing added together, because what you compare is what arrives. Where a platform charges the backer part of its fee on top of the pledge, that part counts too, and its row says so. Each row shows the platform's own words for its price, its source and the date.

Backers who add money by card pay our fee of 0.25% plus a flat $0.99 before any pledge exists. You add money by card on our payment partner's own page, with Apple Pay, Google Pay or a card. It lands first in a deposit wallet for your account, and we move it to your own wallet within minutes, minus our fee of 0.25% plus a flat $0.99, and the network fee. The partner shows its own fee on its page. It's their cost, not a fee on the campaign, and a backer who sends stablecoin directly pays none of it. So the calculator shows it on its own line: our fee on what each backer would add by card, in one go, to cover exactly their pledge, added up. The partner's own fee doesn't change what reaches the campaign either.

What it doesn't know

• A missed goal. The figures assume the campaign reaches its goal. What happens when a campaign misses explains how. On most other platforms a missed goal costs no one anything. Here it does, as the rule on fees above and this one say: If the goal isn't met by the deadline, you take your pledge back from escrow with one tap, and nobody has to approve it. What comes back is the amount held for you: your pledge minus the fees taken when you backed (the platform fee, the flat fee, any tip and any share reward the campaign pays).
• Tips and share rewards. A backer can add a tip, and you can pay whoever brought the backer a share reward of up to 18.5% of the pledge. Both come out of the pledge, and neither is in these figures.
• Other prices on the same platform. Another plan, another country's flat amount, a charge per payout or bank transfer and currency conversion are in each platform's own terms, not here. Its row quotes its price in its own words, so you can read any charge the figures leave out.
• Where you can use each platform. Not every platform takes creators from every country. Availability by country shows each one's rules for yours.
• Your own costs. What you keep still has to pay for making the rewards and shipping them. The goal planner works out a goal that covers it all.
• Currency. Every other platform's row counts in its own currency, one for one, like the comparison page. The CoFunders row is in your currency: we read your total in it and convert our flat fee, the only part of our price set in USDC, at today's rate.
• Tax. These figures leave out VAT and income tax. Running a campaign explains what usually applies.
• Tomorrow's prices. Every rate is as read on the date in its row, and a platform can change its price without notice. Check the source before you decide.
• Rounding. The contract rounds each percentage fee down to a millionth of a unit. The calculator doesn't round, so on chain you keep at most a millionth of a unit more per pledge than shown here.

Questions

How do you calculate crowdfunding fees?

Multiply what you raise by the platform's percentage, then add its flat amount once for every backer. What's left is what you keep. On CoFunders that's 1.5% of the total plus $0.99 per backer, and the calculator does the same for every platform above at once.

How much does Kickstarter take?

Its platform fee plus payment processing: a percentage of what you raise and a small amount per pledge, taken only if the project reaches its goal. Enter your figures above and Kickstarter's row quotes its price in its own words, with the date we read it, and what that leaves you.

Are Kickstarter's fees lower than Indiegogo's?

Slightly, on their published prices. Both add payment processing to a platform fee, but Indiegogo's flat amount per pledge is a little higher, and it charges for each bank transfer outside the United States. Enter your own figures and their two rows show the difference for your campaign.

Is CoFunders cheaper than Kickstarter?

On large pledges it is. On small ones it isn't. A flat fee weighs most on a small pledge, so each row gives the average pledge above which CoFunders costs less, worked out from both published rates.