Recurly Vs Stripe:

Which Billing Software is Right for Your Business?

Billing systems need to handle more than just subscription billing. Whether it’s managing usage-based billing, dynamic pricing, or multiple payment methods - businesses need to look for solutions that simplify their billing process and focus on product development.

So which is the right tool?

Recurly and Stripe both have been in the billing arena for quite sometime. Though well-known their focus and capabilities differ. While Recurly specializes in subscription management, Stripe primarily handles payment processing.

Let’s compare their strengths, weaknesses, and see how they stack up against each other and also are there any alternatives to look for in the market.

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Comparing Recurly and Stripe for Usage-Based Billing

Recurly and Stripe target different pricing needs and also different groups of companies. While Stripe is great for B2C and to get started and going for B2B it lacks nuances which Recurly provides. Recurly is a software designed for B2B companies but it does fall short when catering to different pricing models other than subscriptions.

So let’s take a detailed look at these platforms and how they work!

Recurly

Strengths

Subscription Billing: Recurly excels in managing recurring payments, invoicing, and dunning management workflows, making it suitable for businesses with standard subscription models.
Ease to Use: The user-friendly interface ensures that even non-technical teams can manage billing workflows without external support.
Dunning Management: Automated tools help reduce churn by recovering failed payments and sending proactive reminders to subscribers.
Churn Reduction Tools: Includes automated dunning management to reduce involuntary churn by retrying failed payments and notifying customers, helping to maintain revenue streams.
Payment Gateways: Recurly integrates with multiple payment methods, including credit cards and digital wallets, for smooth transactions.

Common Problems with Recurly

Limited Real-Time Metering: Recurly lacks real-time usage-based billing capabilities. Businesses requiring precise tracking of customer usage find this a critical gap.
Lack of Entitlement Management: Does not support feature-based access control or dynamic entitlements, limiting the ability to manage customer access based on subscription plans or usage thresholds.
Global Limitations: Recurly’s multi-currency and localization capabilities are limited
Pricing Flexibility: While Recurly supports basic pricing like tiered models, it does not allow for complex pricing rules such as volume-based discounts, thresholds, or hybrid plans.

Stripe

Strengths

Payment Processing: Handles multi-currency payments and integrates with multiple payment gateways, including Google Pay and Apple Pay.
Developer-Friendly APIs: Designed for developers to build and customize payment and billing workflows.
Global Reach: Supports international payments, making it ideal for businesses with global customer bases.

Weaknesses

Basic Subscription and Usage billing: Limited capabilities for managing recurring payments, usage-billing, hybrid pricing or tiered subscription models.
Lack of Advanced Billing Features: While Stripe supports usage-based pricing, it doesn’t provide advanced metering, entitlements, or pricing models for complex business needs.
Complex Customization: Non-technical teams may struggle with configuring workflows or integrating Stripe for advanced use cases.
Hidden Costs: Choosing Stripe means getting locked into the Stripe ecosystem. Every Stripe product comes at an add-on price, subscriptions, payment processing, invoicing, billing, which will slowly start adding up more as you scale. This also means you’ll end up paying more for limited spread of integrations and features as your business grows.
Ecosystem lockin: Preferring Stripe means you only have to use their in-house product like Stripe payments and also the integrations they offer. The downside is that Stripe payments are available only in some countries which makes it difficult for you to expand your business beyond certain countries.

This is a classic example of how a billing platform can cripple your scope for expansion because now you need to build a product that fits in with your billing platform, not the other way around.

Recurly Vs Stripe: A Feature Wise Comparison

Features

Recurly

Stripe

Togai by Zuora

Usage-Based Billing

Basic support; lacks real-time metering and advanced usage-based billing capabilities. Primarily for SaaS companies that handle basic subscription billing.

Basic usage billing. Cannot track real-time usage data.

Offers real-time tracking for usage-based billing, allowing businesses to bill customers accurately based on actual usage

Pricing

$249/month after the first 3 months or free trial. Pricing varies; requires additional costs for advanced features or integrations.

Starts at 0.5%, goes up to 0.8% of revenue on top of Stripe Payments that starts at 2.9% + $0.30 for successful card transactions.

Usage fee that ensures you’ve access to all the features in the platform without paying ++

Pricing Models

Supports flat-rate and tiered pricing. Lacks flexibility for advanced pricing configurations.

Basic pricing options

105+ pricing configurations, including usage-based, hybrid, tiered, and custom pricing rules.

Invoicing

Built in feature for invoicing

Can use Stripe invoicing but it comes as an additional cost

Custom invoicing templates with build it yourself format. Multi-currency support.

Customization

Basic customization; limited flexibility in adjusting billing workflows and pricing options.

Limited customization according to customer needs

Customizable billing logic using JavaScript-powered rules, enabling limitless customization.

Entitlement Management

Not supported

Feature-level access control based for add-ons, subscription plans or usage metrics.

Customer Portal

Allows customers to manage subscriptions and payments

Customers can view and manage their price plans, check usage and cost metrics in real time, and access billing details.

Wallet and Credits

No native wallets, third party integrations available

Togai has native wallets and credit features so that the post-invoicing processing and receivables can be managed in a single platform. Togai’s wallets help you net-off remaining balance in your invoice and also in issuing advances.

Payments and Integrations

10+ payment methods. Limited multi-currency options.

In the Stripe ecosystem, you can only use Stripe’s payment processor. This means Stripe may not be available across different countries and also products - thus deterring the capability to expand.

Togai provides 50+ workflows across multiple external apps to automate any complex billing workflow, with support to create your own private flows using our No-code flow builder.

Togai’s integration spread extends up to 30+ across data sources, CRM, ERP, cloud marketplaces and payment processors

Scalability

Limited usage billing support

Cannot process large events

Can process billions of events per day with a guaranteed 99.9% platform uptime.

Why is Togai the Better Alternative to Recurly and Stripe?

Recurly and Stripe address specific aspects of billing—subscription management and payment processing. However, for businesses with advanced needs like usage-based billing, real-time metering, and flexible pricing rules, these tools require manual workarounds or additional integrations.

Togai is built for businesses looking to simplify and scale their billing systems.

Key Capabilities:

Real-Time Metering: Capture and track usage in real-time for accurate billing.

Flexible Pricing Configurations: Support for 105+ pricing models, including tiered, hybrid, and volume-based plans.

Subscription Management: Manage subscription plans, add-ons, and recurring invoices with ease.

Entitlement Management: Control access to features and services based on usage or pricing thresholds.

Churn Reduction: Monitor real-time usage metrics to reduce churn and improve retention.

Global Payments: Integrates with multiple payment platforms and payment processors for businesses operating across geographies.

Developer-Friendly APIs: Build and automate billing workflows to fit your business needs.

Why Togai is the Best Choice

Stripe and Recurly work well for businesses with basic billing requirements. However, if your company is scaling and needs advanced tools for usage-based billing, real-time insights, and configurable pricing, Togai offers a more flexible solution.

Insights showing total revenue, customers and usage meters.

We saw the platform's value in the first 30 days

Gulshan Dhanani

Head of Revenue Strategy and Operations, Yellow.ai

Togai allowed us to monetize our service more efficiently, simplifying complex billing issues with ease.

Paul J Thompson

Founder, Hello Scribe

Togai was a gateway to scalable growth and intricate pricing strategies.

Satyam Nathani

Co-Founder and CTO, OTPless

Cut our launch time from months to days.

Nikhil Nandagopal

Founder, Appsmith

We found Togai to be very flexible - to be able to capture all our events, create any pricing, and scale for any form of complexity. We saw the platform's value in the first 30 days itself and what cemented our trust in Togai was getting clear ROI right from day 1.

Gulshan Dhanani, Head of Revenue Strategy and Operations

Read Case study

We encountered a specific challenge with our billing process. We aimed to adjust our pricing to reflect the actual costs of running the service and needed a mechanism to selectively grant access to customers. After evaluating several options, many fell short in offering both gating and a credit-based wallet system. Then we came across Togai. Togai's entitlement features effectively met our needs, enabling us to establish monthly recurring entitlements with precision. It was versatile enough to cater to various customer segments, including those on yearly and monthly payment plans. The pay-as-you-go model at Helloscribe was particularly well-served by Togai's entitlement options. Integrating with Togai allowed us to monetize our service more efficiently, simplifying complex billing issues with ease.

Paul J. Thompson, Founder

Togai was more than a billing solution; it was a gateway to scalable growth and intricate pricing strategies. Their adept handling of our complex billing needs, from nuanced metering to flexible pricing models, not only streamlined our operations but also empowered our expansion into new markets.