Pay what you want pricing: how it works

Pay what you want pricing lets customers choose how much they pay for a product or service, rather than charging everyone a fixed price. You might use it to sell a digital download, offer classes on a sliding scale, or collect contributions for community projects.

The idea isn't new. Honesty boxes at farm gates, pay-as-you-wish museum entry and collection plates have all used the same principle for years. Online, the model gives people more freedom to decide what something is worth to them. That can attract customers who might not pay a fixed price, though it can also mean receiving less than you'd hoped.

This guide explains how pay what you want pricing works, when it makes sense to use it, how to set a minimum and suggested price, and how to add it to your own checkout. If you're looking for the product page, see pay what you want on Checkout Page.

Quick answer: Pay what you want pricing lets customers choose how much to pay, usually above a minimum price you set, with an optional suggested amount. It works best for digital products and donations, where serving an additional customer costs little or nothing. You can offer it through platforms such as Gumroad, Payhip and itch.io, which charge fees on sales, or use your own checkout with a tool like Checkout Page and pay payment-processing fees. The suggested amount often has more influence on what customers pay than the minimum, because it gives them a starting point.

What pay what you want pricing is

Pay what you want pricing lets buyers choose how much to pay for a product or service, rather than charging everyone a fixed price. The seller can set a minimum amount the checkout will accept and display a suggested amount to give buyers a starting point.

A related model is pay what you can, which puts more emphasis on what someone can afford than on what they think a product is worth. Sliding-scale pricing for classes and therapy often follows this principle, offering different prices according to someone's circumstances. Donation pages use a similar approach, although they may have no minimum payment because the contribution itself is the point.

Pay what you want pricing is different from a discount. A discount reduces a price the seller has already set. With pay what you want, the buyer chooses the amount, which can affect both how many people buy and how much they pay. That makes it more suitable for some products and audiences than others.

When it works, and when it doesn't

Research on pay what you want pricing includes a 2009 study involving a restaurant, a cinema and a deli, as well as research on combining the model with a charitable donation. The findings suggest that people will pay voluntarily, but the amounts they pay and the number of purchases they make can vary with the context. Whether pay what you want earns more than a fixed price depends on the product, the audience and the costs involved.

It tends to work well when:

• Each additional sale costs very little to fulfill. PDFs, templates, recordings and other digital products can be good candidates because even a small payment can contribute to revenue without adding much cost.
• Buyers already have a connection with you or your work. Newsletter readers, community members and people who have taken one of your classes may be more willing to pay voluntarily than people encountering your product for the first time.

It can be a poorer fit when:

• Each sale has significant costs. Printing, materials, delivery and staff time can make low payments difficult to sustain.
• Buyers have little reason to trust or support you. People who don't know you may be less willing to pay more than the minimum.
• Price helps signal quality. For products where buyers use price to judge quality, letting them choose the amount may create uncertainty or make the offer seem less valuable.

For example, a digital workbook may be inexpensive to deliver to another customer, while a consultancy day requires substantial time. A printed book also has production and fulfillment costs. In those cases, you need a minimum that covers the relevant costs, which may reduce the advantage of letting buyers choose their price.

Two often-cited examples are Radiohead's In Rainbows album and the Humble Bundle, which allowed customers to choose how much to pay for collections of digital games. Both had substantial audiences or reach, so their results may not translate directly to a new creator or a product without an established following.

In practice, pay what you want can mean accepting a lower average payment in return for reaching more buyers. That trade-off may make sense when you're launching a product, building an audience or testing demand. If you already have a product that sells reliably at a fixed price, charging a set amount may generate more revenue. The best way to decide is to compare the total revenue and costs under each approach, rather than judging success by the number of purchases alone.

Where you can use pay what you want pricing

The main platforms for digital products can take a buyer-chosen price, though they call it different things and set it up differently. Fees vary by platform and plan.

• Gumroad: turn on "Allow customers to pay what they want" on the product.
• Payhip: add a plus sign to the price. A price of 5+ means at least $5, and 0+ means anything, including nothing.
• itch.io: every paid item is pay what you want by default, with the price you set acting as the minimum.
• Bandcamp: calls it name your price.

Alternatively, you can set the price on your own checkout, with a minimum and a suggested amount of your own. With Checkout Page you can also:

• change the label above the box to Pay what you can, Name your price or Donation amount
• offer a pay what you want option next to a fixed price on the same page
• run pay what you want on a subscription, where the buyer picks the amount once and pays it every period

How tax works with pay what you want pricing

Tax is another thing to factor in when choosing where to offer pay what you want pricing. Depending on the platform, it may handle VAT or sales tax for you, or you may need to take care of it yourself.

• Gumroad: acts as the merchant of record for sales through its platform.
• Payhip: handles EU and UK VAT on digital products, and collects and pays US and Canadian sales tax as a marketplace facilitator.
• itch.io: in its "Collected by itch.io" payout mode, it collects and pays EU VAT for you.

If you sell through your own checkout, you generally remain responsible for your tax obligations as the seller. Checkout Page can calculate and add tax at checkout through Stripe Tax, but you’re still responsible for registering, filing returns and paying the tax due where required. Our guide to what a merchant of record is explains how this differs from using a platform that takes on those responsibilities.

Here's how the four options compare.

Fees checked on each platform's own pages: Gumroad and Payhip pricing on 14 October 2026, with their pay what you want help articles on 20 October; itch.io's pricing docs and revenue share post on 20 October. Processing fees are extra unless stated; itch.io's processing fees weren't stated on the pages checked.

Buyers already browsing a marketplace? Listing there can help them find you, especially on itch.io for games and Gumroad for creator products.

Have a newsletter, a site or a community of your own? Your own checkout gives you more control over the page and the price, and the buyer's email address comes to you. You'll still pay processing fees, plus a monthly plan once your sales pass the free tier. Some sellers use both: a marketplace for discovery and their own checkout for the people who find them directly.

How to set a minimum and a suggested price

Start with the suggested price. It's the amount buyers see first, so it can influence what they choose to pay. A good starting point is the fixed price you'd normally charge, or slightly less if you want to make the offer more accessible.

Next, set a minimum. Card processing fees often include a fixed charge as well as a percentage, which makes very small payments less worthwhile. Calculate your minimum using your actual fees and costs rather than assuming a few dollars will always be enough.

A zero minimum makes sense for donations or free resources with an optional tip. For products you need to earn money from, a minimum can help keep the model sustainable.

You can also offer a fixed-price option for buyers who prefer a clear price. Make sure the two options are easy to understand and don't leave buyers unsure which to choose.

After a few weeks, review the average payment, number of purchases and total revenue. If most buyers pay the minimum, test a different suggested price or raise the minimum. If the results are poor, compare them with what you'd earn using a fixed price.

How to set up pay what you want pricing

The steps below are demonstrated using Checkout Page and would be much the same on other tools: create the product, choose pay what you want, set the minimum and suggested amount, decide what happens after payment, test it, share it.

Step 1: create a checkout page for the product

In your dashboard, create a new checkout page for the thing you're selling. Give it a title and a description that says who it's for and what they'll get, and add an image or two. If it's a digital download, upload the file under Details → File downloads so it's delivered automatically after payment.

Say plainly on the page that the price is up to the buyer, and why. A sentence like "Pay what you want, from $3. Suggested price $12." tells people the floor, gives them a reference point and makes the choice feel normal rather than awkward.

Step 2: choose pay what you want as the pricing type

Under Pricing, select Pay what you want instead of a fixed amount. The price field becomes an amount the buyer fills in, and two optional fields appear: Minimum price and Suggested price. Pick the currency the buyer will see.

Step 3: set up what happens after payment

Write the confirmation message and the confirmation email so the buyer knows what they've got and where to find it. For a download, the file appears on the confirmation screen and in the email, and the buyer can come back for it later through their customer portal. A short thank you in your own words is worth adding, because the buyer has just chosen to pay you.

Step 4: run a test payment

Switch the page to test mode and buy your own product with a test card, trying three amounts:

• the suggested amount
• less than the minimum, to see the message a buyer gets
• a larger amount

Check the confirmation screen and email, download the file, and switch test mode off when you're happy. While it's on, the page accepts test cards rather than real payments.

Step 5: share the checkout

Publish the page and share it where the people who already know you are:

• your newsletter
• the post where you announced the product
• your link in bio
• embedded on your own site, or as a QR code for anything printed or shown on a screen

Because pay what you want relies on goodwill, add a sentence explaining why you're pricing it this way.

What pay what you want pricing costs

Whichever route you choose, there are two kinds of cost: a cut of each payment to the platform, and card processing. Because the buyer decides the amount, a fixed part of the fee, such as the 30 cents on a card payment, takes a bigger share of small payments than of large ones.

Marketplaces take their percentage off whatever the buyer chooses to pay, and some add a fixed amount per sale.

Selling from your own checkout, you pay Stripe's processing fees, which on a US account are 2.9% + 30¢ per successful card payment (rates vary by country and payment method), and your checkout tool a monthly plan. A pay what you want subscription adds Stripe's 0.7% Billing fee on each recurring payment.

Here's how one buyer paying the suggested $12 for a digital product works out on each route, before any monthly plan cost.

Rates checked 14 to 20 October 2026. Your own checkout is Stripe processing only; Payhip is its 5% free-plan fee plus Stripe processing; Gumroad is 10% + 50¢; itch.io is its default 10%, processing not stated. Card processing is Stripe's US rate and varies by country and card type.

The fixed part of the fee makes the most difference on small payments. On a $3 minimum payment, the same fees come to $0.39 on your own checkout and $0.80 on Gumroad.

The plan cost depends on the checkout tool. Checkout Page is free up to $3K in monthly sales. Paid plans are a monthly price based on your sales volume. Stripe's processing fees apply. On the free plan, your pages pause once you pass $3K in a 30-day period and reopen when the period resets or you upgrade.

The gap between routes is about a dollar per sale at this price, so it matters more as volume grows. At 100 sales a month at $12, the difference between your own checkout and Gumroad is about $105 a month. The Stripe fee calculator will work out your own numbers at whatever amounts your buyers tend to pay.

Sell more than one thing

Pay what you want is often a first product rather than a whole business. People who pay for a $12 icon set may go on to buy your next product at a fixed price, and the email addresses you collect let you promote your work to them.

The same checkout account can sell a PDF guide or a Notion template at a fixed price, a membership that delivers something new each month, or a workshop ticket, each as its own checkout page with the same customer list. If what you're really taking is gifts rather than payments, our guide to accepting donations with Stripe covers the parts that are different for a nonprofit or a community group.

If you'd like to try it, you can set up a pay what you want checkout on the free plan and upgrade once your sales pass $3K a month.

Pay what you want pricing FAQ

Does pay what you want pricing work?

It can, depending on the product and audience. Research suggests people will pay voluntarily, though how much they pay and how many buy varies with the setting. It tends to suit digital products, where extra sales cost little, sold to people who know your work. For products with costs on every sale, a fixed price is usually safer.

What is an example of pay what you want pricing?

Radiohead's 2007 album In Rainbows, sold online for whatever fans chose, is the best-known example, and the Humble Bundle built a business on buyer-chosen prices for games and books. Day to day, it's common for PDFs, templates, music and software on sites such as Gumroad, itch.io and Bandcamp, and for sliding-scale classes and community donations.

How do I set a minimum price for pay what you want?

Choose pay what you want as the pricing type and enter a minimum alongside it. On Payhip you add a plus sign, so 5+ means at least $5. On Checkout Page the minimum is an optional field next to the suggested price. Base it on your card fees and any delivery costs, or leave it at zero for a gift.

Can I use pay what you want pricing on Shopify?

Not with Shopify alone, since it doesn't offer this as a pricing option. Sellers add a pay what you want app from its app store, which may have its own monthly fee, or link to a hosted checkout page. For a digital download, linking to a hosted checkout is usually simpler and keeps the buyer's details with you.

Is pay what you want the same as a donation?

They use the same mechanism, an amount the buyer chooses, but the framing differs. A pay what you want product usually has a minimum and a suggested price, because the buyer gets something in return. A donation page usually has no minimum. On Checkout Page the setup is the same; you change the label and drop the minimum.