Paddle
Paddle takes a unique approach to subscription billing by acting as a merchant of record, handling not just billing but also payments, tax compliance, and fraud prevention. This all-in-one model removes the complexity of global tax compliance and payment processing, allowing businesses to focus on their product. Paddle is particularly popular with software vendors and SaaS startups selling digital products globally, as it handles VAT, sales tax, and other compliance requirements across 200+ countries. The platform provides a complete checkout experience optimized for conversion, with built-in support for multiple payment methods and currencies. While Paddle's merchant of record model means they handle the customer relationship for transactions, this trade-off delivers significant simplification for teams that want to avoid the operational burden of global compliance.
Freshness & verification
Who is this best for?
This is the fastest way to decide whether Paddle is in the right neighborhood.
- SaaS startups selling digital products globally
- Software vendors wanting to avoid tax compliance complexity
- Indie developers and small teams with limited resources
- Businesses prioritizing speed to market over customization
- Companies selling software licenses and digital downloads
- Teams wanting to outsource payment operations entirely
- Enterprises requiring deep control over billing and payments
- Companies with very high transaction volumes (cost becomes prohibitive)
- Businesses needing complex custom billing logic
- Organizations requiring extensive financial system integrations
- Companies wanting to own the complete customer payment relationship
- Teams needing advanced revenue recognition and reporting
Sources & verification
Pricing and behavioral information comes from public documentation and structured research. When information is incomplete or volatile, we prefer to say so rather than guess.