Billing platforms

Three categories

Most “billing platforms” fall into one of three categories. They solve different problems and often work together.

• —Payment processors — move money, handle cards.
• —Subscription management — model plans, seats, and usage on top of a processor.
• —Merchants of record — legally sell your product and take on tax and compliance.

Payment processors

The layer that actually moves money. You are the seller of record; the processor charges cards, handles 3DS, and pays you out.

When it fits: you want maximum control over billing logic and your team can own tax, compliance, and dispute handling.

The default: Stripe — deep API, large ecosystem, most third-party tools integrate with it first.

Subscription management platforms

These sit on top of a processor and own the billing logic — plans, seats, proration, usage, entitlements, dunning, revenue reporting. You still legally sell the product.

When it fits: billing logic is complex enough that a Stripe-only setup becomes brittle — multiple plans, seats, add-ons, trials, usage, upgrades, downgrades, proration.

• —Chargebee, Recurly, Zuora — subscription and enterprise billing.
• —Orb, Metronome, Lago — usage-based and hybrid billing, designed for API, infra, and AI products.

Merchants of record

A different model entirely. The MoR is the seller on the invoice. They handle tax registration, VAT and sales tax, chargebacks, fraud, and compliance globally. You get paid net of their fee.

When it fits: global digital sales, B2C SaaS, indie developers, and any team that doesn’t want to build a tax and compliance function.

• —Paddle — established MoR for scaling SaaS.
• —Dodo Payments — developer-first MoR for digital products.
• —Polar — open-source MoR, GitHub-native monetization for developer products.
• —FastSpring — veteran MoR for global software sales.
• —Lemon Squeezy — acquired by Stripe; evolving into Stripe Managed Payments.

Picking the right category

Start with the category, not the vendor.

• —Need global tax and compliance handled? Start with a merchant of record.
• —Need maximum control and your team can own compliance? Start with a payment processor.
• —Complex billing logic on top of a processor? Add a subscription management platform.
• —Usage-based or hybrid pricing? Pick a platform built for metering.

The 2026 landscape is consolidating — Stripe acquired Metronome and Lemon Squeezy; the lines between categories are blurring — but the categories themselves still hold.

If you need clarity, use one of the entry points on the site.