Having a community can be a great way to connect with your audience, share your knowledge, and earn recurring revenue. To bring your community to life, you’ll probably need a community platform, and there are a lot to choose from!
You may have come across Skool as a popular option for building a paid community, and it’s known for having a simple setup with lots of gamification features. But every platform has pros and cons, and no one tool will be the best fit for every business.
In this guide, we’ll talk about:
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What Skool does well and where it falls short
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8 alternatives to Skool for different types of businesses
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How to choose the right platform based on your goals
It’s important to pick a community platform that supports your whole business so you can grow without running into limits. It’s not fun to migrate and rebuild down the line, so let’s make sure you’ve got all the information you need to make the best decision for your work.
We’ll start by looking at where Skool shines and where it may be tricky for some businesses.
Skool Pros and Cons
Skool is primarily a community platform. You can create free or paid communities with multiple tiers, and you can add courses or gated content that members unlock by reaching participation milestones or by paying for premium access.
Skool has two pricing plans, and there’s a 14-day free trial:
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Hobby: $9/month with a 10% transaction fee. Includes unlimited community members, video hosting, and live streaming
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Pro: $99/month with a 2.9% transaction fee. Includes everything in Hobby, plus custom URLs, advanced analytics, and the option to hide suggested communities
Skool Pros (community, gamification, affiliates)
When you log into your Skool community, you’ll see a simple setup with a home feed, a live events calendar, and a classroom area where you can add courses. You can organize posts by category to make it easier for members to find what they’re looking for, and there’s a search bar where people can look up posts, comments, content, and other members.
A big perk of Skool is that your community comes with tools to encourage participation. For instance, there are gamification features like points and leaderboards to motivate members to post and participate. You can also allow members to “unlock” courses and content when they reach certain levels, which can motivate people to be more active in your space.
You can set up as many plan tiers as you like for your Skool community, and you can charge one-time or recurring payments (with monthly or annual billing). You can also let members promote your community and earn a commission. Affiliate marketing is built in with preset commissions of 10%, 20%, 30%, 40%, or 50%.
Skool cons (no website or landing pages, limited email, basic courses)
That said, Skool focuses almost entirely on the community experience, which means you’ll probably need extra tools as your business grows.
Skool does not include a website builder, blog, or landing pages. You can add a simple “About” tab for your community, but that’s all the space you’ll have to convince people to join.
Email functionality is limited to broadcast-style messages for existing members. Skool doesn’t have lead magnets, segmentation, automations, or email list sign-up forms, so you’ll need a separate email service if you plan to promote your community that way.
While it’s nice to have courses built in, the options are relatively simple. You can create evergreen or drip content, but there are no built-in quizzes or completion certificates, and products can’t be sold independently from the community. If you want digital products to stand on their own outside of your community membership, Skool’s structure may feel limiting.
Finally, Skool charges transaction fees on all plans, including the Pro plan. As your revenue increases, the total fees you pay to the platform increase as well. Ideally, it’s best to pick an option where you can remove transaction fees as your income grows, so you aren’t stuck paying more every month.
8 best alternatives to Skool
Skool is a solid option if you only need community features and don’t plan to offer stand-alone digital products, but if you’re looking for more features and flexibility, these alternatives might be a better fit.
#1 Podia
Podia is an all-in-one platform built to run your entire online business. You can create your community, website, blog, landing pages, digital products, courses, coaching offers, webinars, and affiliate program all in one place.
You can run a free or paid community with as many tiers as you like, and you’re not limited to only selling memberships. Podia has standalone online courses, digital downloads, webinars, product bundles, and coaching offers, or you can combine products and community access to create different plans. This flexibility makes it easier to structure your business the way you want, and it gives you the freedom to experiment with different products as you grow.
For example, The Marketing Club has a community membership with live workshops, coworking, and courses. Clients can also book 1:1 private marketing sessions or buy “done for you” content packages that are customized for their business. This gives The Marketing Club several ways to bring in sales in addition to subscriptions.
Podia also includes tools to market your business. You get email newsletters, broadcasts, templates, segmentation, and automations, along with campaigns that trigger when someone takes an action in your business. You can create lead magnets to grow your audience and email funnels that guide people toward paid products or community memberships.
While both Podia and Skool offer community features, Podia includes more tools for building and marketing your business around that community. Instead of connecting separate platforms, everything works together out of the box.
Pros
Podia is a great fit if you want to manage your whole business in one spot. You get a website, landing pages, and a blog, so you don’t need a separate platform to establish your brand. Email marketing and automations are built in, making it easy to stay connected with members and customers.
You can sell community access on its own, sell products independently, or bundle everything together. Members can move between tiers, and you can create private spaces within your community for different groups of people.
On the pricing side, Podia’s Shaker plan is less expensive than Skool’s Pro plan, and there are no transaction fees, which allows you to grow revenue without increasing your monthly expenses.
Overall, Podia combines product creation, community management, and marketing tools in one system, so you don’t have to connect and pay for a bunch of platforms as you grow.
Cons
Podia is designed primarily for digital businesses. It isn’t optimized for selling physical products, so it’s a better fit for creators offering digital products, memberships, coaching, courses, or community-based programs.
Pricing
Podia has two plans, Mover and Shaker. Both plans include your products and community, as well as unlimited sales and unlimited community members.
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Mover: $39/month and 5% transaction fee ($33/month when paid annually): Includes your community, website builder, blog, landing pages, digital products, courses, custom domains, customer messaging, and third-party code
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Shaker: $89/month and 0% transaction fee ($75/month when paid annually): Includes everything in Mover, plus affiliate marketing
All Podia plans include email marketing features for up to 100 subscribers, like automations, newsletters, email templates, segmentation, tagging, and campaigns. If you like, you can upgrade your Podia Email plan at any time to add more subscribers as your list grows.
Podia also includes a free migration service on paid plans. The team will move your products and customers over from another platform so you can get set up faster without extra work. Learn more about how migrations work here.
#2 Mighty Networks
Mighty Networks is a community platform that allows you to host your community and courses in the same space. Communities can be free or paid, and you can create multiple spaces for members to interact. Mighty Networks also has live streaming, virtual events, and you can build a resource library inside your community.
Mighty Networks also has an option to build a fully branded mobile app. Pricing for custom apps isn’t listed publicly, but it’s available for higher-tier customers if that’s something your business needs.
Pros
Mighty Networks includes a wide range of community features. Members see an activity feed, and you can create private groups, topic-based spaces, polls, questions, and both live and pre-recorded events. All plans include streaming, with the number of streaming hours increasing on higher tiers.
You can also build drip and cohort courses directly inside your community, and add quizzes for structured learning. All plans have space for unlimited members, which is a nice perk as your business grows.
Mighty Networks works well if you primarily need community features with courses added in, and it’s a good option if you anticipate needing a custom-branded mobile app in the future.
Cons
The downside is that Mighty Networks charges transaction fees on all plans. While the fees aren’t huge (2% — 0.5% depending on the plan), they can still add up as your revenue grows.
Landing page functionality is also limited. The Launch and Scale plans include only one landing page, and the Growth plan includes three. If you plan to run multiple offers or campaigns, this may feel restrictive.
There are no traditional email marketing features with Mighty Networks, so you’ll likely need a separate tool to build and manage your email list. Mighty Networks does not include a full website or blogging feature, which means you might need to use an additional website tool alongside it.
While you can create courses within your community, the platform is primarily structured around community memberships rather than selling standalone digital products independently from your network.
Pricing
Mighty Networks has three main plans and a 14-day free trial. They also offer an enterprise-level Pro plan that allows you to build a custom-branded app, but you’ll need to reach out to them directly to learn more about what that includes and how much it costs.
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Launch Plan: $95/month and 2% transaction fee ($79/month when paid annually): Includes community, courses, basic automations, and 20 community spaces
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Scale Plan: $215/month and 1% transaction fee ($179/month when paid annually): Includes everything in Launch plus more automations, APIs, integrations, and 40 spaces
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Growth Plan: $354/month and 0.5% transaction fee ($354/month when paid annually): Includes everything in Scale plus advanced automations, 80 spaces, more storage, streaming hours, and landing pages
#3 Circle
Circle is a community platform that allows you to build your community, website, and courses in one place. The platform puts strong emphasis on AI tools, so if you’re interested in building your business with the help of AI, this could be an interesting option for you.
In terms of community features, Circle has live streams, live events, live rooms, and messaging inside your space. You can also create courses and gate content behind paywalls, including add-ons like coaching or access to premium community areas. Courses live inside your community rather than as standalone products.
Pros
With Circle, you can run your community, build a website, create courses, and manage email from a single platform. Circle has gamification elements, live streaming, events, and direct messaging to encourage engagement among your members.
Courses can be layered into your community, and people can upgrade their plan tier to get access to more content or perks.
Circle also offers more advanced options on higher-tier plans, including AI agents and enterprise-level white-label mobile apps. For larger organizations or brands that want a custom app, these enterprise features may be appealing.
Email marketing is available as an add-on. The first 100 subscribers are included, and paid email plans begin at $19/month for up to 500 subscribers.
Cons
Like Skool, Circle charges transaction fees on all plans. As your revenue grows, those fees also grow with it, which can increase your long-term costs.
While it’s nice to have features like workflows and automations, Circle only offers these on higher-tier plans. If your business relies on advanced automation, you may need to upgrade to keep things running behind the scenes.
Pricing
Circle has two main pricing plans and a 14-day free trial. They also offer an enterprise-level solution with custom pricing based on what your business needs.
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Professional: $89/month and 2% transaction fee when paid annually (monthly price not listed): Includes your community, courses, events, website, live streams, and 20 spaces
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Business: $199/month and 1% transaction fee when paid annually (monthly price not listed): Includes everything in Professional plus automated workflows, 30 spaces, and more AI tools
Circle also offers email for an additional price. It’s free for your first 100 subscribers, and after that, the pricing goes up as your list increases. Plans start at $19/month on top of your base plan for up to 500 subscribers. Circle’s email tool comes with email broadcasts and campaigns.
#4 Kajabi
Kajabi is an all-in-one platform for building and running an online business. You can sell courses, digital downloads, coaching, and memberships, and Kajabi also has a community feature.
In addition to products, Kajabi also includes a website builder, email marketing, and affiliate management so you can run most parts of your business in one place. This is a good option if you want community to be a part of your business, but you also want to sell standalone digital products that aren’t necessarily linked to that community.
Pros
Kajabi is an all-in-one option with your products, marketing, and community. Your community can be free or paid, and you can organize it into channels based on topics. Channels can function as feed-style discussions or group chats, depending on how you want members to interact.
You can also create community challenges and tasks, allow members to share progress, award prizes, and host live rooms or events. Like Skool, Kajabi includes gamification features such as points and badges to encourage participation.
On higher-tier plans, Kajabi has more advanced functionality, including the option to add a branded mobile app for an additional cost. For businesses that need more customization and premium features, those higher plans could be a good option.
Cons
Kajabi has contact limits on all plans and product limits on the Basic and Growth plans. Both free and paid products count toward your total product limit, which can become restrictive if you plan to make lots of different products for your customers.
Kajabi’s starting price is also much higher than other community tools. While you do receive more built-in features, the cost can be challenging for creators who are just starting out or testing a new idea.
Overall, Kajabi is a strong option for established businesses with a limited number of products that want an all-in-one system and the option to upgrade for advanced features in the future.
Pricing
Kajabi has three pricing plans and a 14-day free trial. One thing to note is that you need to put in your credit card to start the trial, and you’ll automatically be charged at the end of the trial period. If you test it out and decide it’s not for you, you need to cancel to avoid the charge.
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Basic Plan: $179/month ($143/month when paid annually): Includes 5 products, 2,500 contacts, 1 website, 1 community, 1 extra admin user, unlimited landing pages and marketing emails, and funnels
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Growth Plan: $249/month ($199/month when paid annually): Includes everything in Basic plus 50 products, 25,000 contacts, 10 extra admin users, and expanded automation capabilities
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Pro Plan: $499/month ($399/month when paid annually): Includes everything in Growth plus unlimited products, 100,000 contacts, 3 websites, 3 communities, 25 extra admin users, and advanced customization options
#5 Teachable
Teachable is primarily known as an online course platform, but it has expanded its feature set to include community, coaching, digital downloads, memberships, and basic website functionality. You can sell multiple product types from one account, and Teachable has recently added AI tools designed to help creators build courses and other products more quickly.
While it’s possible to make a community, courses are the core focus of the platform, so this is a good option if you want courses to be your primary offer with community as an additional perk.
Pros
Again, Teachable is a strong option for creators who want to build and sell online courses. Courses can be as in-depth as you like, and you can require students to complete lessons in order, watch videos fully, or pass quizzes before progressing. This makes it a good fit for creators who want a guided, sequential learning experience.
In addition to courses, you can also create and sell downloads, coaching, memberships, and community plans, and your students can access their content online or with Teachable’s mobile app.
Teachable also includes built-in AI tools to assist with course and product creation, which can help speed up setup.
Cons
Teachable has product and student limits on all plans, which may be an issue as your business grows. Email marketing features are only available on higher-tier plans, and even then, they’re relatively basic, focused on list building and sending newsletters rather than full automation or segmentation. There are also limits on integrations depending on your plan.
While Teachable does include community features, they’re primarily designed to support your courses or memberships as discussion spaces. The community is a feature that comes with your products, rather than a standalone offering. You can make it broadly accessible by offering a free product that includes community access, but it’s not designed as a community-first platform.
Overall, Teachable is a better fit if courses are your main product and community is a supplement to support student engagement, rather than the central focus of your business.
Pricing
Teachable has four pricing plans and a 7-day free trial.
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Starter Plan: $39/month and 7.5% transaction fee ($29/month when paid annually): Includes 1 published product, 100 students, built-in community, and course features
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Builder Plan: $89/month and 0% transaction fee ($69/month when paid annually): Includes up to 5 published products, 1000 students, email marketing, affiliate marketing, and expanded sales features
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Growth Plan: $189/month and 0% transaction fee ($139/month when paid annually): Includes up to 25 published products, 5,000 students, integrations, advanced customization, and developer tools
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Advanced Plan: $399/month and 0% transaction fee ($309/month when paid annually): Includes up to 100 published products, 5,000 students, more video storage, and more access to developer tools
#6 Patreon
Patreon is a well-known platform for creators who want ongoing support from their audience. It’s commonly used by musicians, artists, podcasters, YouTubers, and other content creators who already have a following and want to monetize that audience.
On Patreon, supporters typically pay a monthly subscription in exchange for perks like exclusive content, bonus episodes, behind-the-scenes updates, or early access. You don’t have to offer rewards, though — some creators also use it as a way for fans to support their work financially so they can keep things running in their business.
Patreon also has a community feature where you can add posts and content, and your members can interact with you and each other. You can make a community group chat, send DMs, and sell digital products within your space too.
Pros
Patreon is free to get started, which lowers the barrier to entry. It also has strong brand recognition, so many audiences are already familiar with how it works. This can make it easier to explain your offer and encourage supporters to join.
Patreon is especially interesting for creators who want recurring support tied to their existing content. While you can offer tiered perks, it’s also possible to receive support without building complex products or courses.
If you want to keep doing what you’re doing (making podcast episodes, creating YouTube videos, etc.) and need to build an additional income stream, this is a fun way to do that and give your supporters space to connect over their shared interest.
Cons
Patreon does not include a standalone website or customizable landing pages beyond your creator profile on the platform. If you want more control over your brand, blog, or sales pages, you’ll need a separate website tool.
While you can message and chat with members via Patreon, there are no email marketing tools for building and nurturing an email list outside the platform. This can make it harder to grow your audience independently, especially if you’re starting without an established following.
Finally, Patreon charges platform and payment processing fees on earnings, and those fees remain in place as your revenue grows. Over time, this can represent a significant portion of your income, particularly for higher-earning creators.
Pricing
It’s free to use Patreon, but you’ll always pay 10% in transaction fees on any revenue you bring in. The basic plan includes a hosted creator page, membership tiers, community feed, messaging, and basic creator tools.
You can also sell digital products, posts, and collections with a one-time payment, which will have a transaction fee of 5% — 12%.
#7 Heights Platform
Heights Platform is built for course creators who want to pair online courses with a community. In addition to courses and community spaces, it includes a website builder, blog, and landing pages.
A major part of Heights is its AI tools, which are designed to help you with course creation and content. You can create unlimited courses and community spaces on higher plans, run live streams and group calls, and build an affiliate program. Unlike Skool, courses can be sold as standalone products rather than being tied to a community.
Heights also includes built-in email functionality, allowing you to schedule and send messages to your students and customers.
Pros
Within the community, Heights includes gamification features to encourage engagement. Members can earn points and badges, and can also create and share projects to showcase what they’ve learned, adding a hands-on element to the learning experience.
Heights does not charge transaction fees on its plans. It also combines courses, community, and website features in one platform, giving creators more flexibility than a community-only tool.
Cons
Heights limits the number of students and contacts you can have on most plans, and you only get unlimited students on the top-tier Academy plan.
The entry-level Challenge plan is designed to help you build a single challenge-style course that runs on a fixed schedule with dripped emails. That structure works well if that’s your exact business model, but you’ll need to upgrade to the Basic plan if you want more flexibility.
Community features are not available until the $49/month Basic plan. Website functionality is also tiered: the Challenge plan includes landing pages but not a full website, and the Basic plan limits you to five website pages. To unlock a more complete website experience, you’ll need to upgrade to the Pro plan.
Pricing
Heights Platform has four paid plans and a 30-day free trial. Heights doesn’t charge transaction fees on any plans.
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Challenge Plan: $29/month ($19/month when paid annually): Includes 1 challenge course, unlimited students, 1,000 contacts, 100 students, and a built-in community
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Basic Plan: $49/month ($39/month when paid annually): Includes unlimited courses and challenges, unlimited community channels, digital products, 5 website pages, 5,000 contacts, 5,000 students, and an affiliate program
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Pro Plan: $119/month ($99/month when paid annually): Includes everything in Basic plus full website builder, custom domain, live streaming, remove Heights branding, 10,000 contacts, 10,000 students, and additional admin users
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Academy Plan: $499/month ($399/month when paid annually): Includes everything in Pro plus unlimited students, 100,000 contacts, advanced admin roles, personal setup consultation, and priority support
#8 Heartbeat
Heartbeat is a community-focused platform with a strong emphasis on AI tools and live or virtual events. It’s good for running interactive communities, where you can host events, create public or private spaces, and trigger automated workflows when members take certain actions. You can also build evergreen or cohort-based courses inside your community and set up a referral program so members can invite others.
While Heartbeat includes some basic marketing features like landing pages and affiliate tools, it’s built first and foremost as a community platform rather than a full business system.
Pros
Heartbeat is a good fit if you want a community tool with AI features and event hosting at the center of the experience. Within your community, you can set up private channels, groups, and allow members to message one another. You also get unlimited voice and video room hours on all plans.
Automation workflows make it easy to trigger messages or actions based on member behavior, and Heartbeat supports both evergreen and cohort-style courses inside the community.
Cons
Heartbeat charges transaction fees on all plans, which can increase your costs as revenue grows. It does not include a full website builder or blogging platform, so most creators will need a separate tool for their main website. While you do get landing pages and automated in-platform messaging, there aren’t traditional email marketing features for building your list or sending newsletters.
If you use email marketing in your business or want to sell standalone digital products outside of your community, you’ll likely need additional tools alongside Heartbeat.
Pricing
Heartbeat has three pricing plans and a 14-day free trial.
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Starter Plan: $49/month and 3% transaction fee ($40/month when paid annually): Includes up to 1,000 members, community discussions, courses, events, payments, landing pages, automated workflows, voice and video rooms, and direct messages
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Growth Plan: $129/month and 2% transaction fee ($108/month when paid annually): Includes everything in Starter plus unlimited members, API access, email white-labeling, and priority support
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Business Plan: Custom pricing and 1% transaction fees: Includes everything in Growth plus a branded mobile app, concierge onboarding, advanced security options, and dedicated support
Find the right alternative to Skool for your business
Choosing the best Skool alternative comes down to what kind of business you’re building.
Skool is a solid option if you only need community features and you’re happy managing your website, email marketing, and digital products elsewhere. If your business is centered entirely around discussion and engagement inside a single membership space, Skool can work well.
But if you’re looking for an all-in-one home base that helps you grow that community, not just host it, Podia is a great option.
With Podia, your community connects directly to your website, blog, landing pages, email marketing, and digital products. You can sell courses, downloads, coaching, webinars, and bundles alongside your membership, or combine them into one offer.
You can build your email list with lead magnets, nurture subscribers with automations, and guide people from free content to paid products without stitching together extra tools.
And as your business grows, Podia grows with you. You have flexibility in how you structure plans and products, control over your marketing, and the option to remove transaction fees on higher plans. Everything works together out of the box, so your community becomes part of a bigger system rather than the only thing you sell.
If you want a platform that brings your community, products, and marketing under one roof, you can start a 30-day free trial of Podia today. Happy building!
