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Open Collective Pricing

Setting up a Collective is free, but there are fees if you want to receive or pay out money.

(Fees are usually 5%-10%, see below for details)

You hold the money for your Collective

You take care of bookkeeping, admin, and taxes. Best for projects with existing legal entities and bank accounts.

Features

We hold the money for your Collective

Let us take care of the accounting and admin overhead, so you can focus on your mission.

Free

Create a Collective

An instant page online to tell the world about your project

Free

Free

Submit expenses

Track costs transparently and show how funds are spent

Free

Free

Create events

Announce conferences and meetups, and track RSVPs

Free

Free

Post updates

Keep your community in the loop

Free

Not included

(Your responsibility)

Accounting and filing taxes

Included

5%

+ payment processor fees (Stripe)

Receive money online

Donations, sponsorship, ticket sales

10%

+ payment processor fees (Stripe)

No charge

(You record the transactions manually)

Receive money offline

Wire transfers, cheques

10%

Payment processor fees

(PayPal)

Pay out money online

Reinmburse expenses and pay invoices

Payment processor fees

(PayPal)

No charge

(You pay and record transactions manually)

Pay out money offline

Cash or other means

N/A

Features

Price

Create a Collective

Free

Submit expenses

Free

Create events

Free

Post updates

Free

Accounting and tax reports

Not included

(Your responsibility)

Receive money online

5%

+ payment processor fees (Stripe)

Receive money offline

No Charge

(You record the transactions manually)

Pay out money online

Payment processor fees

(PayPal)

Pay out money offline

No charge

(You pay and record transactions manually)

Features

Price

Create a Collective

Free

Submit expenses

Free

Create events

Free

Post updates

Free

Accounting and tax reports

Included

Receive money online

10%

+ payment processor fees (Stripe)

Receive money offline

10%

Pay out money online

Payment processor fees

(PayPal)

Pay out money offline

N/A

Create a Collective

for your project, community, or initiative.

Create a Collective Learn more →

Frequently Asked Questions

You can set up a Collective for absolutely free. However, there are fees to accept and spend money. If you want to do crowdfunding, get sponsorship, sell tickets, pay contributors, reimburse expenses, and generate receipts, you need to pay the Open Collective 5% platform fee, and get a Fiscal Host, who often charge fees on top.
A fiscal host is a legal company or individual who enables financial transactions, holds funds, and takes care of liability and taxes for a Collective. Fiscal Hosts make it possible for Collectives to transact without incorporating their own legal entity. Each Fiscal Host sets its own fees, most commonly between 0% and 5%.
The standard fee for fiscal sponsorship, the service provided by Fiscal Hosts, is 10%. This service is commonly offered by foundations and other organizations who manage funds for unincorporated projects. Open Collective offers not only fiscal sponsorship, but also a great software platform for raising money, paying expenses, record keeping, and transparent budgeting. We charge 5% for Fiscal Hosting (for those Fiscal Hosts that we manage—other hosts set their own fees) and 5% for the software platform (if you put money through the system), so 10% all together. Payment processing fees are determined by the providers we use, Paypal and Stripe.
We want to enable all kinds of diverse Collectives, so we make our platform available to a network of fiscal hosts with different missions in different geographies. Each fiscal host determines its own policies and fees. Some projects can’t be fiscally hosted by the entities Open Collective runs itself, because they are in a country we don’t cover or don’t fit under our entities' missions. For example, Open Source Collective is only for Open Source software projects, and Open Collective Foundation is for US-only charity projects.
Every Collective that receives or pays out money needs a fiscal host because they need to connect the host's bank account, Stripe account, and Paypal account to activate Open Collective’s payment features. If you already have a legal company set up, or you are comfortable taking on the responsibility as an individual, you can fiscally host your own Collective.
Go to the fiscal host's page and click “Apply to create a Collective”. You can see all hosts here.