Ko-fi vs Buy me a coffee - Which one is better?

Are you trying to decide which online donations platform to use?
I will compare Ko-fi vs “buy me a coffee” in just three minutes!
So you can start receiving donations to fuel your passion, today!

00:00 Video in summary

00:19 Features
So both of these services come with an option for one-time donations.
And it’s super easy to donate with both, supporters don’t even need an account to leave few bucks for a coffee.

On top of that, both offer a membership option. Memberships just mean you get recurring donations from your supporters. Usually, creators offer unique content for the members. So pretty much what people do on Patreon.

However, Ko-fi membership only comes with the paid plan. And Buy me a coffee offers it for free but they take a five percent fee from every donation.

Both offer a way to sell digital products & services. In addition, with Ko-fi you can also sell physical stuff. In my opinion, the shop functionality is better organized on Ko-fi.
As you can see on your screen.

What I like about Buy Me A Coffee, is that you can adjust “the coffee part”. So instead of a coffee, you can get creative and use tea, or banana...

And then you can also Generate it as a button.
With ko-fi you can only change the word “Coffee” to something else.. But that’s it.

01:33 Usability
They are both super easy to use and setting up a profile is quick and painless. If you have a Paypal account you can start receiving donations in minutes.
Personally, I like the Ko-fi layout slightly better, but this is really my personal preference.

01:55 Fees
Now let’s talk about the biggest difference between the two… and it is how they charge fees.
So Ko-fi is totally free when using for one-time donations and they charge 5% for product sales and memberships.
If you upgrade to the Ko-fi Gold plan, then you pay a flat fee of six dollars per month,
And you don’t pay any other fees.

In contrast, buy me a coffee charges five percent for every donation or sale, but they don’t have monthly fees.

So which one is cheaper?
Well with quick math if you get donations or sell products for more than a hundred and twenty dollars a month. Then Ko-fi will be cheaper because you can switch to the flat fee.
For one-time donations, Ko-fi is cheaper.

02:44 Which is better Kofi or Buy me a coffee?

So which one do I think is better. Honestly, they are both really great services to get donations from supporters. And they both have pros and cons.

Personally, I needed a platform for one-time donations, and I like the logo of Ko-fi, look at it, just gives me a warm fuzzy feeling.

*Some of the above links might be affiliate links.

[footballinvestorsclub]

I knew nothing about Ko-Fi until i watched your videos, this one and the longer walkthrough one. You explain things so well, very easy to follow along and understand and also very honest and authentic. Thanks you, I appreciate you taking the time to make these.

[SupremeGecko]

Been using BMC for about 8 months. BMC just decided to discontinue using PayPal. This could be a dealbreaker for me.

[acarlalala]

The thing is that buy me a coffee has now removed paypal in their system.

Thank you for this video! It's brief and concise!

[hauntswargaming]

Great video man! I found about about ko-fi a few weeks ago and am trying to decide which platform to go with. I'm leaning towards Ko-Fi for sure. That flat fee is really nice 🙂

[TargetedCreole]

I'm trying out Ko-fi. I'm glad that it's more secure than BMAC, & that I'm able to block trolls & control who's allowed to comment. BMAC didn't have a BLOCK feature.

BMAC did NOTHING about the online bullying, harassment, stalking & threats, but they were MORE THAN GLAD to quickly delete my account when I requested them to, & see me leave. They didn't care. I was left traumatized. I hope Ko-fi is a better experience.

[kreathrivelifestyle]

Thanks for sharing! :) Just learned about ko-fi this month. :) So excited to use ko-fi!

[spendingtimetogether]

Thanks for your video. We were shortlisting options and are considering these 2, glad to know that Ko-Fi is better, which we were leaning towards anyway...not to mention all the positive comments about it here in your comment section (and the negative ones about BMAC!).👍

[Autumnleaff]

hello, personally i have a bad experience with '' buy me a coffee'' I opened my page but it has been under review for days now; I stopped counting ... when they said it was only supposed to last 24 hours... they are not serious in my opinion... i'm going to try ko-fi it looks better to me ... we'll see . Thnks for the video !!!

[DKJohnDigital]

Thanks man, this video was really helpful. Subscribed :)

[kino]

i don't think either options are good
i've heard horror stories about ko-fi having bad security: recently, an illustrator named duchess celestia lost her account due to a hacker, with no email confirmations on any changes done to her ko-fi account (the hacker changed the paypal info without ko-fi sending alert emails). i recommend looking up her YT channel and read her latest community posts on the situation. she ended up losing 750+ dollars from this ordeal. 2FA would make things safer, but sending email confirmations should be standard. it's like signing up on a website and the site lets anyone log in to your account.
i'd hope BMAC have better security than them.

[GrowWithWill]

Great clear breakdown! Didn't know about Ko-fi.

[BbrosAuto]

Great comparison video. Thank you. I just found out about Ko-Fi and I think we're gonna try it out for our channel.

[Alleyoop-Fanfiction]

I’ve never heard of Ko-Fi before, thanks for explaining! I just opened a BMaC that I hope actually starts to get attention next month in July.

[ordinarykid.]

Brother, I've got a doubt about the ssl certification.
I installed my let's encrypt ssl certificate fine and it's showing the padlock on other devices but when I open the https version of my site in my device it says insecure connection...
It also says (Note: You don't have a dedicated IP address. Browsers that were released before 2013 may not support SNI. Because of this, users may see false security warnings when they visit your SSL-secured websites.)
.
So the thing is my website open on every device and every network but doesn't open on my own devices and overall wifi connection.

[mortgagefinancing]

Hi great video ! I have question. Can people steel your videos on this platform ?

[omegamac]

When you use PayPal on ko-fi what is the Print packing slip fee and how do I get rid of it? Or can i remove that at all?

[AashishKishnani]

Hey Hi! That was a Great punch (I'm surely it's friendly 😉)
wanted to ask, What do you think, is it still solid option than other options?

[blaumoond]

Would it be okay to use both? iv seen other do something similar with pattreon and ko-fi?

[holidaytang]

ko-fi doesn't have a phone app and buy-me-a-coffee does, I think

[LawWonderTV]

I never even heard of ko-fi. I tried Buy Me A Coffee, but it does not support PayPal or Cash App. And I've deleted my Patreon account for reasons of it being too complicated to upload exclusive videos.