If you’re looking to sell digital products online, chances are you’ve done a fair share of shopping for the perfect all-in-one creator store and have heard of Pillar.
Pillar is a relatively new platform on the market that caters to creators interested in earning an income from digital products and services, as well as brand sponsorships. However, while Pillar allows you to set up a link-in-bio store easily to start selling to your audience, the platform isn’t free.
In this article, we deep dive into 10 Pillar alternatives, including what makes them similar and what sets them apart, to help you decide on the best creator store for you.
Build your link-in-bio creator store with The Leap today. It’s free!Pillar alternatives at a glance
| Best overall | The Leap Designed to help creators kickstart their monetization journey, The Leap lets you create, market, and sell digital products all from one place, for free! |
| Best for digital and physical product sales | Shopify With a robust toolkit of features, Shopify has what you need to sell digital products alongside physical merch (if you don’t mind the cost). |
| Best for versatile selling | Payhip For creators who are looking to scale, and appreciate flexible pricing plans and transaction fee structures. |
Best Pillar alternatives
While Pillar is a solid platform for selling digital products, other alternatives offer more advanced features or take a smaller cut of your sales. Read on as we break down the 10 best Pillar alternatives.
Pillar alternatives comparison
| Platform | Pricing and key features |
| Pillar | Price: $29/month (5% transaction fee) – $70/month (0% transaction fee) Digital product builder: ❌ Online store: ✅ Generative AI: ❌ Email marketing: ✅ |
| The Leap | Price: Free! Digital product builder: ✅ Types of digital products you can build: Mini-courses, guides, tutorials, challenges Online store: ✅ Generative AI: ✅ Email marketing: ✅ |
| Stan | Price: $29-$99/month Digital product builder: ✅ Types of digital products you can build: Online courses only Online store: ✅ Generative AI: ❌ Email marketing: ✅ |
| Shopify | Price: $29-$298/month Digital product builder: ❌ Online store: ✅ Generative AI: ✅ Email marketing: ✅ |
| Payhip | Price: Free (5% transaction fee) – $99/month (0% transaction fee) Digital product builder: ✅ Types of digital products you can build: Online courses only Online store: ✅ Generative AI: ❌ Email marketing: ✅ |
| Snipfeed | Price: $20-$59/month Digital product builder: ✅ (via integration) Types of digital products you can build: Online courses only Online store: ✅ Generative AI: ✅ Email marketing: ✅ |
| Sellfy | Price: $22-$119/month Digital product builder: ❌ Online store: ✅ Generative AI: ❌ Email marketing: ✅ |
| Gumroad | Price: Free (10% transaction fee) Digital product builder: ❌ Online store: ✅ Generative AI: ❌ Email marketing:✅ |
| Pensight | Price: $29-$99/month (0% transaction fee) Digital product builder: ✅ Types of digital products you can build: Online courses only Online store: ✅ Generative AI: ❌ Email marketing: ✅ |
| Beacons | Price: $0-$90/month (9% transaction fee on lower tiered plans) Digital product builder: ✅ Types of digital products you can build: Online courses only Online store: ✅ Generative AI: ✅ Email marketing: ✅ |
| SendOwl | Price: $9-$39/month (various transaction fees) Digital product builder:❌ Online store: ✅ Generative AI: ❌ Email marketing: ✅ |
1. The Leap
🏆 Best overall: Looking for the ultimate creator store to build, sell, and market your digital products all from one place — and for free? Then you’ll want to get in on The Leap.
This all-in-one platform functions as a link-in-bio storefront, an AI-powered digital product builder, and an email list builder. Essentially, The Leap helps creators transform their knowledge into digital products and their followers into paying customers, quickly and easily.
The Leap’s AI-powered digital product builder enables creators to create a range of bingeable bite-sized learning products, including mini-courses, tutorials, guides, and challenges. Plus, The Leap’s product builder is powered by generative AI, meaning it creates products for you, saving you time and effort. It also empowers creators to turn their products into lead magnets, which helps them grow their email list and own their audience.
What’s more, The Leap offers users built-in email marketing automation features for nurturing leads, in addition to audience analytics and flexible payment options.
The best part about The Leap? It’s free to use!
Key features
- Mobile-optimized link-in-bio creator store
- AI-powered digital product builder for mini-courses, tutorials, guides, and challenges
- Email list builder
- Pre-made email templates for setting up automated email flows and sending email broadcasts easily
- Book My Time native calendar booking feature for coaching and consulting services
- Audience analytics
- No listing fee or platform transaction fees
- Flexible payment options like Buy Now, Pay Later, discount/coupon codes, and one-click payments
- AI assistant to generate sales page descriptions and content for digital products
- It’s free!
Pricing
Free! Try The Leap today to start creating and selling digital products.
Build, market, and sell digital products all in one spot with The Leap!
2. Stan
🏆 Best for advanced marketing features: Stan Store has grown in popularity as a creator store in the last few years. “Why?” you ask. Because it boasts many features that help creators start selling and marketing their digital products.
In addition to its online store feature, the platform provides a host of marketing features. For example, its basic Creator plan enables users to build out their email list with opt-in forms, while its Creator Pro plan provides users with email marketing capabilities, as well as pixel tracking to retarget followers.
Key features
- Mobile-optimized online storefront
- Customizable themes
- Online course builder
- Email marketing
- Pixel tracking
Pricing
Stan’s Creator plan is $29/month, and its Creator Pro plan will run you $99/month.
3. Shopify
🏆 Best for digital and physical product sales: You might have already heard that Shopify is super popular for selling stuff online — and that includes digital products. In addition to physical merch, this Pillar alternative allows creators to sell virtually any kind of digital product. However, it may not feel as intuitive to use as other Pillar alternatives on the market.
To start selling digital products, you’ll need to download and use Shopify’s free Digital Downloads app. From there, upload your product and disable shipping, then Shopify will deliver your digital product directly to your customers. If you’d like to sell memberships and subscriptions, you’ll also need to integrate another third-party app through the Shopify app store.
Key features
- Online storefront
- Email marketing (at additional cost depending on the number of emails sent)
- Email list builder
- Advanced audience analytics
Pricing
Shopify recommends its Basic plan (starting at $29/month) for solo entrepreneurs, its Shopify plan (starting $79/month) for small teams, and its Advanced plan (starting at $298/month) if you really want to scale your business.
Keep in mind that Shopify charges transaction fees when you sell using third-party payment gateways (2% for Basic plan, 1% for Shopify plan, and 0.5% for Advanced plan). However, it waives these fees if you sell using the Shopify Payments app.
4. Payhip
🏆 Best for versatile selling: Payhip is a platform that allows you to sell digital products and memberships. Its key features include customizable landing pages, automatic delivery, as well as integration with various payment gateways. If you’re looking for a quick and easy way to create an online storefront for selling your digital products, Payhip could be a good option.
In addition to its online store builder, Payhip features an online course builder, which creators can use to create lessons and monetize their knowledge through paid subscriptions and drip content. It’s important to note that while Payhip does allow you to create online courses, it can’t produce other digital products like tutorials or guidebooks.
Key features
- Online storefront and shopping cart
- Online course builder
- Sell memberships and subscriptions
- Built-in marketing tools
- Get paid via PayPal and Stripe
Pricing
Payhip offers three plans, each provides the same features but charges a different percentage of transaction fees. Its Free plan charges a 5% transaction fee. Its Plus plan is $29/month (plus a 2% transaction fee), and the Pro plan is $99/month with a 0% transaction fee.
5. Snipfeed
🏆 Best for email and SMS marketing: Snipfeed is all about helping creators monetize their social audience in one click through on-demand content, direct interactions, and selling digital products.
While the platform focuses on monetization through digital services and products, it doesn’t have a built-in digital product builder for creating said products. What it does have is an online course builder integration, marketing tools, and a tip feature, among other features. That means while you can upload pretty much any digital product under the sun onto Snipfeed and create online courses, don’t expect the ability to build other products on the platform directly.
Key features
- Online store
- Create online courses via Canva integration
- Use ChatGPT to generate text descriptions
- Incorporate tipping feature
- Automated email workflows
- 0% transaction fees
Pricing
Snipfeed’s Pro plan is $20/month, and its Pro Plus plan is $59/month. Snipfeed charges 0% transaction fees across all of its plans.
6. Sellfy
🏆 Best for unique marketing tools: Sellfy is a lightweight platform geared towards selling digital products. Its user-friendly online store builder helps you get your store up and running in just a few minutes. Once it’s online, you can upload as many digital products as you want, and even sell subscriptions and on-demand video.
However, it’s important to note that Sellfy places a cap on just how much income you can earn per pricing tier. For example, if you plan on making more than $10,000/year, you’ll have to upgrade from Sellfy’s basic plan to a higher tier.
Sellfy also doesn’t offer a digital product builder. However, it does have an array of marketing tools geared towards conversion. For example, its Basic plan offers email marketing and coupons, while more advanced plans offer product upselling and cart abandonment automation.
Key features
- Online storefront
- Digital product hosting services
- Email collection
- Marketing tools like coupon codes, upselling, and cart abandonment
- Audience and sales analytics
- No listing or transaction fees
Pricing
Rather than charging users a transaction fee per sale, Sellfy offers three tiers of plans — Starter, Business, and Premium — which can be subscribed to on a monthly or yearly basis. The platform’s Starter plan begins at $22/month, its Business plan starts at $59/month, and its Premium plan starts at $119/month.
7. Gumroad
🏆 Best for artists and musicians: Gumroad has become a go-to for many creators selling digital products to their audiences.
Gumroad allows users to create a digital storefront from which they can sell pretty much any digital product imaginable. We’re talking from ebooks to templates, online courses to printable art, and beyond. If you’re looking to sell subscriptions and memberships, Gumroad also has you covered.
Gumroad also makes it easy to sell your products through different channels (like your website, blog, newsletters, and more) through its embeddable checkout buttons and widgets. The platform arrives with email marketing functionality, so you can build your email list and email workflows to increase sales.
Key features
- Online storefront
- Payment processing via Stripe and PayPal
- Embeddable checkout buttons
- Sell memberships and subscriptions
- Email marketing and email list builder
- Audience analytics
Pricing
Free with a 10% transaction fee per sale.
8. Pensight
🏆 Best for video call and scheduling features: Relatively new to the market, Pensight is a creator store platform that offers an intuitive interface for building your online storefront. It boasts several features for selling digital products and services like online courses, one-on-one coaching sessions, and subscriptions, to name a few.
Creators can use Pensight to sell digital products and services, manage email marketing, and track important analytics about their audience and digital product sales. This platform has several unique features like video call and scheduling tools, as well as the ability to generate automated customer testimonials.
Key features
- Online storefront and link-in-bio landing page
- Sell digital products and services
- Build and sell online courses
- Track audience analytics
- 0% transaction fees across all plans
Pricing
Pensight’s Pro plan is $29/month and its Biz plan is $99/month. Pensight charges 0% transaction fees on all of its plans.
9. Beacons
🏆 Best for media kit management: Since its launch in 2020, Beacons has gained popularity as a link-in-bio tool and creator monetization platform. This platform arrives with several features for monetizing your audience, like the ability to build and sell online courses. It also allows you to sell digital services like one-on-one coaching sessions, track audience analytics, and even a media kit for managing brand sponsorships.
You can customize your page design with creative link content blocks, including collapsible tabs, carousels, text descriptions, and more. Beacons also offers affiliate marketing tools and email marketing features to help creators generate more leads.
Key features
- Online storefront and link-in-bio landing page
- Sell digital products, one-on-one calls, and more
- Build and sell online courses
- Flexible payment options in multiple currencies
- Track audience analytics
- Use AI to generate product descriptions, images, and newsletters
- Create a media kit for managing brand sponsorships
Pricing
Beacons has a free plan with limited features and 9% transaction fees. Its Creator Pro plan costs $10 per month plus 9% transaction fees. Beacon’s Store Pro and Business Pro plans have 0% transaction fees, and cost $30 and $90/month respectively.
10. SendOwl
🏆 Best for secure sales: SendOwl allows you to sell digital products, subscriptions, memberships, drip files, audio files, videos, podcasts, and more. It also comes with some unique features like PDF stamping, 2-factor authentication, download limits, and software license keys for extra security.
SendOwl supports multiple currencies and payment methods, and offers a tip jar and pay-what-you-want pricing feature. Its built-in marketing tools are plentiful, including abandoned cart analytics and automated email follow-ups.
Overall, SendOwl is ideal for small to medium-sized digital businesses that need an all-in-one solution for selling digital products, managing affiliates, and automating product delivery.
Key features
- Online storefront
- Embeddable checkout buttons
- Customizable checkout pages and built-in affiliate marketing system
- Audience analytics
- Flexible payment options including discounts and upsells
Pricing
Starter plan at $9/month (plus 5% transaction fee) for 10GB storage; Growth plan at $15/month (plus $0.33 per transaction) for 100GB storage; or Pro plan at $39/month (plus $0.17 per transaction) for 200GB storage.
What to look for in a Pillar alternative
When it comes to finding the perfect Pillar alternative for you, there are a few key features you’ll want to consider, including:
- Low (or zero) transaction fees
- Ability to sell and build digital products from one place
- Flexible payment options
Low (or zero) transaction fees
Whether or not you pay transaction fees is most likely going to have the biggest impact on your digital product business. Pillar charges 5% transaction fees on top of its $29/month subscription for its Creator plan. However, the platform will wipe those fees if you pay annually ($228/year). It also offers zero transaction fees for its Entrepreneur plan ($79/month).
Certain platforms like Payhip offer 0% transaction fees, however, you still have to pay a monthly subscription. Other platforms like Beacons offer 0% transaction fees only on their paid plans.
As it stands, the only all-in-one creator store on the market that charges a 0% transaction fee and is 100% free is The Leap.
Build your link-in-bio creator store with The Leap today. It’s free!Ability to sell and build digital products from one place
Another important factor when considering a Pillar alternative is whether or not you can sell and create digital products on the same platform.
For example, Pillar allows you to sell digital products, but it doesn’t allow you to create them. Certain creator store platforms like Payhip, Pensight, and Beacons only allow you to build online courses.
The only online storefront on this list that allows you to create and sell a variety of digital products — like mini-courses, tutorials, guides, and more — is The Leap. Plus, The Leap’s digital product builder is AI-powered, meaning it helps you build digital products in just minutes.
Create and sell digital products in minutes using The Leap!
Flexible payment options
When shopping for an ideal Pillar alternative, flexible payment options may not be on your radar at first, but they can be a big game changer.
Why? Offering your audience flexible payment options like Buy Now, Pay Later plans, discount or coupon codes, and one-click payments via digital wallets can make the difference between a prospect and an actual customer.
Boost your digital product sales with The Leap’s flexible selling and payment options.Build and sell digital products with The Leap
If you’re looking for a free platform to create and sell your digital products, Pillar might not be your best bet. It turns out there are tons of alternatives with similar, more robust features on the market. And if you have your heart set on the perfect all-in-one creator store, you’ll want to check out The Leap.
The Leap provides you with everything you need to start selling your digital products, so you can start earning money, today.
In addition to being a link-in-bio storefront, The Leap provides you with an AI-powered digital product builder that can generate engaging mini-courses, guides, and more for you in seconds, saving you time and effort. It also comes with built-in email marketing automation tools, including pre-made templates for automated email flows and email broadcasts, that help you nurture leads effortlessly.
Sign up free for The Leap today to start creating and selling digital products.
Build, market, and sell digital products all in one spot with The Leap!
Follow The Leap on TikTok, Instagram, and YouTube for more creator platform reviews. We also make a newsletter.
Further reading
- 13 Best Examples of Digital Products Created on The Leap
- 15 Best Platforms To Sell Digital Products Online
- 9 Best Tools To Create Digital Products To Sell
- 10 Best Creator Store Platforms for Monetizing Your Knowledge
- Pillar Pricing 2024 Review: Is the Creator Store Worth It?
- The Leap vs. Pillar: Which Creator Store Platform Is Better?
- The Leap Alternatives
