Podia Review: Is It Worth the Monthly Bill?
Podia killed its free plan. If you’re comparing it to something that still has one, that gap matters.
The short answer: Podia is worth it if you sell courses, communities, and digital downloads under one roof and don’t need affiliate tools or PayPal on day one. If you do need those, the entry plan won’t cut it, and you’ll be paying more than the sticker price suggests.
What does Podia actually cost?
There’s no free tier anymore, just a 14-day free trial with no card required. After that, you’re choosing between three paid plans, and the cheapest one is more limited than it looks.
| Podia | |
|---|---|
| Entry plan | Mover |
| Monthly price | $49/month |
| Yearly price | $42/month |
| Free option | No free plan (discontinued). 14-day free trial, no card required. Refunds: contact support within 72 hours of the last payment; no partial refunds on annual plans. |
| Transaction fee | Platform fee: 5% on Mover; 0% on Shaker and Earthquaker. Payment processing applies on every plan on top of this: Stripe or PayPal charge 2.9% + 30c (varies by country); Podia does not receive the processing fee |
| Key limit | 100 email subscribers included, 50 products, 500 videos, 25 spaces. No affiliate marketing, upsells, PayPal, Zapier or assistant seats |
Prices verified September 2026.
The Mover plan runs $49/month, or $42/month if you pay yearly. That gets you 100 email subscribers included, 50 products, 500 videos, and 25 spaces. It sounds workable until you hit the fine print: no affiliate marketing, no upsells, no PayPal, no Zapier, and no assistant seats.
Shaker, at $99/month ($84/month yearly), adds all of that back in: affiliate marketing, upsells, PayPal, Zapier, and one assistant seat. It also bumps your included subscribers to 500, products to 150, videos to 1,000, and spaces to 100. Earthquaker tops out at $179/month ($150/month yearly) with 1,000 included subscribers and unlimited products, videos, spaces, and assistants.
The catch that isn’t on the pricing page’s headline
Here’s the part that catches people off guard: Mover charges a 5% platform fee on top of your sales. Shaker and Earthquaker charge 0%. That’s not a small detail — it can be the real difference between plans, bigger than the $50/month gap between Mover and Shaker once you’re actually selling.
And that 5% is separate from payment processing. Every plan, including the two with no platform fee, still pays Stripe or PayPal’s standard cut — 2.9% + 30 cents, roughly, depending on your country. Podia doesn’t touch that money; it goes straight to the processor. So the “0% fee” plans aren’t free of fees, they’re just free of Podia’s cut on top of the processor’s.
One more wrinkle worth knowing before you commit: those subscriber numbers (100 on Mover, 500 on Shaker, 1,000 on Earthquaker) are included amounts, not hard ceilings. You can buy more subscribers on any plan. The problem is Podia doesn’t publish what that costs on its pricing page, so budget for an unknown line item if your list grows past the included amount.
What Podia does well
All three plans include a real website with a custom domain, a blog, landing pages, and built-in checkout, you’re not stitching together a page builder and a separate cart. Tax handling across 230 countries and support for 20+ currencies is included on every tier, which matters if you sell internationally and don’t want to think about VAT yourself. There are also 1,900+ integrations listed, plus migration help.
That migration help is tiered too: Mover gets free migration assistance for up to 50 products, Shaker and Earthquaker get it for up to 150. If you’re moving an existing catalog over, that’s a genuine cost saver, normally that’s hours of manual work or a paid migration service.
Every plan also supports unlimited customers, and you can switch between monthly and annual billing, or upgrade and downgrade, any time. That flexibility is worth something if your revenue is unpredictable month to month.
Who should NOT choose Podia
Skip Mover specifically if you plan to run an affiliate program, sell upsells, or need PayPal as a checkout option, none of that exists on the entry plan. You’d be paying $49/month for a platform that can’t do the selling techniques most creators eventually want.
Skip Podia entirely if you need a working free tier to test an idea with zero financial risk. The 14-day trial is generous in that it needs no card, but 14 days is a hard deadline, not an indefinite test drive. If your idea needs longer to prove itself, that’s a real constraint.
If you’re deciding between Podia and other all-in-one platforms, the trade-offs shift depending on what you value most, see Kajabi vs Podia: Which One Is Worth the Monthly Bill? for how the math compares against a pricier competitor, or Podia vs Teachable: Which One Actually Saves You Money? if transaction fees are your main worry.
Reader scenarios
A first-time creator testing a $30 mini-course with no list yet: start on the trial, then Mover, the 5% fee stings less when your revenue is small anyway, and you don’t need affiliates or PayPal on launch day.
A coach with an existing 300-person email list and a paid community: Mover’s 100-subscriber allowance won’t cover you, and you’ll want Shaker for the PayPal option and zero platform fee once real money starts moving.
A creator running an affiliate program to grow a course business: Shaker is the floor, not Mover, affiliate marketing simply isn’t available on the cheaper tier no matter how small your operation is.
Switch cost
Moving into Podia is cushioned by the free migration help, up to 50 or 150 products depending on plan. Moving out is the usual story: your content exports, but reviews, on-platform community history, and email automations built inside Podia don’t travel with you cleanly. If you’re weighing Podia against a more course-focused competitor, Podia vs Thinkific: Which One Is Worth Your Monthly Bill? walks through what that migration actually involves.
FAQ
Does Podia have a free plan? No, it was discontinued. What remains is a 14-day free trial that doesn’t require a card, so at least you won’t get an unexpected charge if you forget to cancel.
What happens if I go over my included subscriber count? You can buy more subscribers on any plan, but the add-on price isn’t listed on the public pricing page, so ask support for the current rate before you commit to a growth plan built around your list size.
Are there transaction fees on top of the platform fee? Yes, on every plan. Mover adds a 5% platform fee on top of standard Stripe or PayPal processing (2.9% + 30 cents, roughly). Shaker and Earthquaker drop the platform fee to 0%, but processing charges still apply everywhere.
Can I get a refund if I don’t like it? Contact support within 72 hours of your last payment. Annual plans don’t get partial refunds, so if you’re not sure yet, paying monthly first is the safer bet even though it costs more per month.
Is Mover ever the right choice, or should I just start on Shaker? Mover works fine if you’re purely selling a course or downloads with no affiliate program and no PayPal requirement. The moment you want upsells or affiliates, you’re paying for Shaker anyway, so don’t buy Mover as a “starter” if you already know you’ll need those features in three months.
How many products can I actually list? Mover caps at 50 products, Shaker at 150, Earthquaker is unlimited. If you sell a large library of downloads or mini-courses rather than one flagship product, that cap creeps up on you faster than expected.
How we got these numbers. Prices and fees come straight from the official pricing pages of Podia, checked in September 2026. Where a value wasn’t published, the table shows “—”. Prices in this space change often — confirm on the provider’s site before you buy.