Easy Digital Downloads vs Lemon Squeezy
We give Easy Digital Downloads a 2.2 GPA and Lemon Squeezy a 2.8, out of 4.0. Lemon Squeezy grades higher on the free plan, features and ease of use. They get the same grade on value for money and platforms.
Price, platforms and features side by side. The table says where each price was read and when.
Easy Digital Downloads
WordPress plugin for selling digital downloads from your own site
Lemon Squeezy
Merchant of record checkout for software, subscriptions and downloads
How we grade them
| 2.2GPAEasy Digital DownloadsFair | 2.8GPALemon SqueezyGood | |
|---|---|---|
| Value for money | CThe free Lite plugin adds a 3% fee to Stripe sales: $30 on $1,000, plus the cost of hosting WordPress, which isn't on record. Extended at $399 a year drops the fee. Software that's free only if you host it yourself counts as a C here. | CNo monthly fee. Each order costs 5% + 50¢, which covers card fees and sales tax, so $1,000 of sales costs $50 plus 50¢ an order. Buyers abroad add 1.5%, PayPal 1.5% and subscriptions 0.5%. That's above this category's dearer quarter, short of its dearest tenth. |
| Free plan and trial | BLite is free on WordPress.org with unlimited products and transactions, so you can run a real store on it. Not an A: it needs a WordPress site on a paid host, and subscriptions and discount codes need a pass. | ASelling is free to start with every ecommerce feature, and you only pay as orders come in. Email marketing is free up to 500 subscribers too, then $10 a month at 1,000. |
| Features | CStore, cart and checkout, then subscriptions, content restriction, license keys, a multi-vendor marketplace and cart recovery on paid passes. A broad kit, but it needs a WordPress site to be useful, and much of it sits on Professional at $599 a year. | BMerchant of record, subscriptions with usage billing, license keys, signed download links, a store on your own domain, affiliates, upsells, cart recovery and email marketing. It covers the whole job. |
| Ease of use | DNo rating on record. You host it yourself: a WordPress site you run, or a WordPress.com business plan, plus yearly licence renewals to keep support and updates. | CNo App Store rating on record. It's a web dashboard where you set up products, checkouts and a store before your first sale, with nothing in the listing to say it's quicker than that. |
| Platforms and integrations | BRuns in the browser inside WordPress, with Stripe, PayPal, Square, Authorize.net, Zapier, Mailchimp and Elementor, and an API on Professional. No phone or desktop app is listed. | BWeb, with Zapier, ConvertKit, Mailchimp, WordPress and Laravel, checkout overlays for any site and a public API. No phone or desktop app is listed. |
| Best for | selling files from your own WordPress site | selling software and subscriptions worldwide |
The GPA is the average of the five grades: an A is 4 points, an F is none. The full reasons are on each tool's page: Easy Digital Downloads and Lemon Squeezy. How we grade
Price against what you get
Easy Digital Downloads starts at $16.58 a month when paid by the year and scores 2.0 out of 4 on features, ease of use and platforms. Lemon Squeezy starts at $10 a month and scores 2.7.
Lemon Squeezy scores higher and starts $6.58 a month lower. Of the other tools for selling digital products on the chart, 7 score higher than Easy Digital Downloads for less, and 2 score higher than Lemon Squeezy for less.
Features, ease of use and platforms, averaged
What paid plans start at, a month (each step along is roughly double) →
- The best score at each price
- Has a free plan
- No free plan
Where they differ
- Easy Digital Downloads starts at $199 per year at renewal, after a first year for $99.50. Lemon Squeezy starts at $10 per month for email marketing to 1,000 subscribers.
- Lemon Squeezy also covers email campaigns, affiliate tracking and merchant of record.
At a glance
| Easy Digital Downloads | Lemon Squeezy | |
|---|---|---|
| Pricing | Free plan | Free plan |
| Starts at | $199 per year at renewal, after a first year for $99.50 | $10 per month for email marketing to 1,000 subscribers |
| Free plan | The Lite plugin is free on WordPress.org with unlimited products and transactions and Stripe and PayPal checkout; Stripe sales carry an extra 3% fee in the free version. | Selling is free to start with every ecommerce feature included; Lemon Squeezy keeps 5% + 50¢ of each order. Email marketing is free up to 500 subscribers. |
| Free trial | None listed | None listed |
| Web | ||
| Made by | Sandhills Development, LLC | Link, LLC (formerly Lemon Squeezy LLC) |
| Price read from | easydigitaldownloads.com | lemonsqueezy.com |
| Checked | Oct 18, 2026 | Oct 18, 2026 |
Who each one suits
Easy Digital Downloads
- WordPress site owners who want to sell files from their own site
- Plugin and theme makers who need license keys and updates
- Sellers who want no platform fee once on a paid pass
Lemon Squeezy
- Software makers selling licenses or subscriptions worldwide
- Sellers who want sales tax and VAT filed for them
- Creators who want no monthly fee until they make sales
Worth knowing
Easy Digital Downloads
- It needs a WordPress site you run yourself, or a WordPress.com business plan, which allows third-party plugins.
- First-year prices are introductory: passes renew at full price, from $199 a year for Personal.
- The free version and the Personal pass do not include no-platform-fees; EDD's blog puts the free version's Stripe fee at 3%.
- Licenses renew yearly; cancelling ends support and updates, and you lose your locked-in price.
Lemon Squeezy
- Stripe's 2026 update admits slower support and fewer updates while the team builds Stripe Managed Payments, and plans a migration path for users.
- Each order costs 5% + 50¢, plus 1.5% for buyers outside the US, 1.5% for PayPal and 0.5% for subscription payments.
- Recovered abandoned carts add 5% and affiliate referrals add 3% to the fee; payouts to non-US banks cost 1% each.
- Products priced under $10 and high-volume sellers are asked to contact sales for custom pricing.
Key features
Easy Digital Downloads
- Store on your own WordPress site
- Unlimited products, a cart and checkout inside WordPress, with full ownership of your store data and Elementor checkout templates.
- Payments
- Stripe, PayPal and Square in the free plugin, Apple Pay listed on every paid pass, and Authorize.net and 2Checkout from Extended up.
- Subscriptions and memberships
- Recurring payments with free trials and setup fees on paid passes, plus content restriction for members from Extended up.
- Software licensing
- Issue license keys and deliver updates for plugins, themes and other software, on Professional and All Access.
- Marketplace and commissions
- Run a multi-vendor marketplace and pay commissions to sellers, on Professional and All Access.
- Marketing tools
- Discount codes, abandoned cart recovery, cross-sells and upsells, AI product recommendations and syncing with Mailchimp, ConvertKit and others.
Lemon Squeezy
- Merchant of record
- Lemon Squeezy is the seller on each order: it calculates, collects, files and pays sales tax and VAT, and takes on the tax liability.
- Subscriptions and usage billing
- Weekly, monthly or yearly plans with upgrades, downgrades, free trials, PayPal subscriptions, usage-based billing and a customer portal.
- License keys and secure files
- License keys are issued after each sale and can be deactivated or reissued; download links are signed and throttled.
- Checkout anywhere
- Hosted checkout links, an overlay checkout for any website, or a store on a custom domain, taking cards, PayPal and payments in many currencies.
- Email marketing
- Broadcasts, signup forms, segments that update from purchase behavior and email reports, free up to 500 subscribers.
- Affiliates and recovery
- A built-in affiliate program, discount codes, bundles and upsells, plus abandoned cart emails and failed payment recovery.
Plans
Easy Digital Downloads
Lite$0
Free plugin from WordPress.org that you run on your own WordPress site. EDD adds a 3% fee to each Stripe transaction in the free version.
Personal$199
per year at renewal, after a first year for $99.50
1 site, subscriptions and free trials, discount codes, EU VAT, AI recommendations and cart recovery. Platform fees are not waived on this pass.
Extended$399
per year at renewal, after a first year for $199.50
1 site, no platform fees, Authorize.net and 2Checkout, multi-currency, content restriction, bundles, reviews and Zapier.
Professional$599
per year at renewal, after a first year for $299.50
2 sites, adds software licensing and API, a multi-vendor marketplace with commissions, shipping, post-purchase funnels and premium support.
All Access$999
per year at renewal, after a first year for $499.50
3 sites, every extension, including loyalty rewards, fraud prevention, advanced reports and bulk discount codes.
Lemon Squeezy
Ecommerce$0
No monthly charge. The seller pays 5% + 50¢ of each order, covering card fees and tax, plus 1.5% abroad, 1.5% on PayPal and 0.5% on subscriptions.
Email marketing$10
per month for up to 1,000 subscribers, billed monthly
Free up to 500 subscribers. The price rises with the list: $24 a month at 3,000 subscribers and $60 a month at 10,000.
Ways to pay less
Easy Digital Downloads
- Other savings
Half price in the first year
EDD's pricing page shows introductory first-year prices of half the regular rate, from $99.50 for Personal; renewals are at full price.
Lemon Squeezy
- Annual discount
Two months free on yearly email marketing
Lemon Squeezy prices yearly email marketing at ten times the monthly rate: $100 a year instead of $10 a month at 1,000 subscribers.
