Sell services through your own checkout, not a platform's

What Whop is, and who it suits

Whop is a hosted place to take payment for a product, a membership or a service. It runs the checkout, holds your balance and pays you out. Its documentation describes apps you add to a storefront, a marketplace where buyers can find products, and guides for several kinds of seller, including agencies and coaches.

For services, its agency guide describes a simple shape. You create a storefront with case studies and a call booking link. You send clients private checkout links and collect payment. You give them a private space to chat and share project material. That is a real way to run a one-person or small-team service business, and it needs no server and no plugin.

Whop is also the merchant of record. That phrase matters, so it is worth being plain about it. The buyer pays Whop, and Whop is the party responsible to the card networks. Its reserves page says that when a customer disputes a payment, Whop deducts the amount and the card network’s dispute fee from your balance, and that Whop is responsible for those amounts even if you already withdrew your funds.

What it costs, as of 26 October 2026

All figures in this section come from Whop’s own pages, read on 26 October 2026. They can change, so confirm them before you decide.

A domestic card payment costs 2.7% plus $0.30. An international card adds 1.5%, and currency conversion adds 1%. Orchestration (0.8%), billing (0.5%) and tax and remittance (2%) are add-ons you switch on, and they stack on the base rate. A next-day ACH payout costs $2.50. An instant bank deposit costs 4% plus $2.50, and a bank wire costs $23. A dispute costs $15 flat.

The fees page we read lists no separate percentage cut of each sale. Some third-party write-ups describe one for particular app-gated sales. We could not confirm that on Whop’s own pages, so we make no claim about it. If you sell through the marketplace, read the current terms for any further charge.

Reserves and payout timing

A reserve is part of your balance that Whop holds back for a period. Whop’s reserves page says reserved funds are still your money, are never a fee and release automatically. It says Whop may place one when:

• your account is new or has little sales history,
• refunds or disputes are high relative to sales,
• you deliver long after the customer pays, such as pre-orders, bookings or multi-month services.

That last item matters to anyone selling services, because the gap between payment and delivery is the nature of the work. The page gives a rolling example of 10% held for 90 days. A separate page on payment controls also lists a pending delay, which adds days before funds can be paid out.

For a seller with a steady record this may never bite. For a new account taking a large project deposit, it can decide when you can pay your own contractors. That is the trade for Whop carrying the dispute exposure.

What changes when you own the checkout

The money goes from the buyer to your own Stripe or PayPal account. The free plugin’s standalone checkout charges cards through your Stripe keys, with Apple Pay and Google Pay where Stripe offers them, and supports PayPal and offline payment with proof of transfer. WooCommerce is optional, and a Pro feature when you want it as the checkout.

Be clear about what this does and does not remove. It removes the platform’s reserve and the platform’s payout schedule. It does not remove the processor’s. Stripe and PayPal can review an account, delay a payout or hold funds under their own terms, particularly on a new account or after an unusual spike in refunds. Read their terms before you plan around a payout date.

It also hands you the jobs Whop would have done. A chargeback lands on your own Stripe or PayPal account. Tax is one flat rate in the plugin, with per-region handling through WooCommerce. A refund is made by the rail that collected the money, and stays admin-only unless you open it up with a filter.

From payment to delivered work

A checkout link ends at the payment. A services marketplace needs what happens after it, and that is where the plugin spends its effort.

A paid service becomes an order. The buyer fills in the requirements, the vendor delivers files against the package, and the buyer accepts or asks for a revision. There are eleven order statuses, including on hold, late, disputed and cancelled. If the buyer does not respond within the auto-complete window, which defaults to 3 days, the order completes and the vendor is paid. A thread per order keeps messages and files with the job.

Larger work can be split into milestones that unlock one at a time, with the buyer paying each phase. That is in the free plugin, on the built-in checkout and on WooCommerce. When something goes wrong, a dispute collects evidence from both sides and gives you a mediation screen. Buyers also post requests with a budget and deadline, and vendors answer with proposals, which suits custom work that does not fit a fixed package.

None of this is a card dispute service. It is a way for you to settle a disagreement between two people on your site.

Paying vendors, and when

If you run a marketplace, you are probably paying other people. Whop pays you. The plugin is built for the other direction.

You set a global commission from 0 to 50 percent and can override it for a single vendor. Pro adds tiered rules by category, volume or seller level. Vendors see cleared, pending and lifetime earnings on a dashboard. A clearance period holds earnings after an order completes. It ships at 0 days, so earnings clear as soon as the order does, and you can raise it to give yourself room for disputes. The default minimum withdrawal is $25.

In the free plugin, vendors request a withdrawal, you approve it and you send the money by bank transfer or PayPal. You can export what is owed as a CSV. That is manual, and honest about it. Pro automates it with Stripe Connect, which splits each payment to the vendor’s own Stripe account, and with PayPal Payouts for batches. An owner can always pay every vendor with no integration at all.

One point to weigh: without Connect, the money sits in your processor account until you pay it out. You are holding other people’s earnings. Keep your books clean and pay on a schedule you publish.

What WP Sell Services does not do here

We checked for the parts of the Whop pattern that we could not find, so you hear them first.

• There is no calendar or call booking.
• There is no buy now pay later financing for buyers.
• There is no marketplace that sends you buyers. Every visitor comes from your own marketing.
• Recurring or subscription billing for a service is not available. The code is switched off because renewals do not charge yet, so do not buy Pro for it.
• Tipping needs Pro. Without it buyers see no tip option.
• EDD and FluentCart checkout are beta and off by default, and SureCart is not supported.
• There is no importer from Whop.

If you sell a call and a retainer to a few clients, the first and fourth of these decide the matter.

Running costs and what they buy

On Whop, the cost sits in its fees and reserves, and it buys you a platform that runs itself. On your own site, the cost sits in running a website: hosting, a domain, updates, processor fees and your time on support, moderation and payouts.

At a small scale that is you. At a larger scale it is a hire. Someone has to approve vendors, answer disputes and keep the withdrawal queue moving. The plugin removes the percentage cut. It does not remove the work.

Pro is a paid licence; see the pricing page. The core, including the Stripe and PayPal checkout, orders, milestones, disputes and manual payouts, is free.

Trust and vetting

On a marketplace, the buyer trusts you before they trust a vendor. The plugin gives you levers for that: a vendor approval step, optional moderation of listings and reviews, star ratings on completed orders, seller levels earned from real order history, public vendor profiles with a portfolio and response time, and a dispute process.

Whop gives buyers its own name behind the payment. A new site has to earn that. Publish your refund policy and your payout schedule, and enforce them.

Data and ownership

Every buyer and vendor is a WordPress user on your site. Orders, messages, reviews and the earnings ledger sit in your database and are reachable by REST API and WP-CLI. Standard WordPress privacy tools export and erase a member’s marketplace data, and erasure is refused while an order is in flight or a payout is mid-transfer. On a hosted platform that history sits with the platform until you export it.

Moving over from Whop

There is no importer. Moving over is a rebuild: vendors recreate their profile and services through the wizard, or a developer scripts it. Check Whop’s terms before asking customers to move, because the platform governs that and not us.

A short launch checklist:

1. Install WP Sell Services on a staging site and run the setup wizard.
2. Add your Stripe keys in test mode and place a test order.
3. Set your commission, clearance period and minimum withdrawal.
4. Walk one order from payment through delivery to review.
5. Run a milestone project and pay each phase.
6. Open and resolve a dispute, then approve a withdrawal.
7. Write your refund policy and payout schedule.
8. Switch Stripe to live mode and take one real payment.

Other alternatives worth a look

• Fiverr wins for ready-made fixed-price services with a large built-in audience.
• Upwork wins for talent supply and hiring volume.
• Sharetribe wins when you want a hosted marketplace builder and no server to look after.
• Dokan is a WordPress multi-vendor plugin we compare separately.

Who should stay with Whop

Stay if you want to start this week, sell a few high-touch services through checkout links and prefer that someone else carries tax and chargebacks. Stay if booking calls and offering financing are central to how you sell. Stay if you do not want to run a website.

Move to your own site if you want the payment in your own account, a real order workflow for delivered work, and control over commission, clearance and payouts. Remember that Stripe and PayPal keep their own rules either way.

For courses instead of services, see Learnomy’s Whop page. For a paid community, see BuddyNext’s Whop page. More detail is in features, free versus Pro and compare.