Chargebee Pricing (2026): The New Flow Plan, Fees and What It Costs a Startup
Chargebee now charges from the first dollar you bill. Its self-serve plan, Flow, costs $0 + 0.80% of monthly invoicing volume, or $99/month + 0.65% (the second option wins above $66K a month). Between May and August 2026 it replaced the old Starter plan, which was free for the first $250K of cumulative billing, and the $7,188/year Performance plan. Flow fits a SaaS company from seed stage up that wants billing, dunning and tax on top of its own gateway. At pre-seed it is no longer free unless you qualify for Chargebee for Startups, and at every volume we model it costs a little more than Stripe Billing's platform fee.
Chargebee pricing (2026)
| Plan | Price (monthly / billed yearly) | For / limits |
|---|---|---|
| Flow (pay as you go) | $0 + 0.80% of monthly invoicing volume | Self-serve Billing plan; no platform fee, percentage charged from the first dollar invoiced; Includes 100M usage events/mo |
| Flow (commit monthly) | $99/mo + 0.65% of monthly invoicing volume | Same Flow features; lower percentage for a $99 monthly platform fee; Includes 100M usage events/mo |
| Enterprise | Custom (schedule a demo) | Multi-entity, account hierarchy, contract terms, on-demand discounting; Paid add-ons: up to 500M usage events/mo, multi-entity up to 100 business entities |
| Add-on: Chargebee RevRec (Performance / Enterprise) | Quote only | Marked $ (paid) on both Billing plans; RevRec Performance is available only to Chargebee Billing customers. |
| Add-on: Chargebee Growth Starter (retention: cancel pages, pricing tables) | $0 | Free for Chargebee Billing customers; 1 play. Growth Enterprise (AI churn prediction, unlimited experiments) is quote only. |
| Add-on: Chargebee CPQ Lite | First 50 quotes free | Full Chargebee CPQ is quote only. |
| Add-on: Avalara AvaTax / NetSuite / Intacct / Salesforce integrations | Paid, Enterprise only (quote) | Built-in sales tax (US, EU VAT and global taxes) and Anrok are included on Flow. |
| Add-on: Chargebee for Startups | $0 until $1M cumulative billing | Eligibility: new customer, part of a partner accelerator or VC portfolio network, raised less than $5M. Application reviewed by Chargebee. Source: https://www.chargebee.com/startups/ |
| Negotiated contracts | median ~$57,600/yr (low $8,148, high $178,709; 65 purchases) | Page says "Last updated: February 2026", before Chargebee's August 2026 move to the Flow plan; Vendr's tier descriptions (Launch/Rise/Scale) are outdated. Applies to sales-negotiated deals, not Flow self-serve.; reported by Vendr |
Prices verified on chargebee.com/pricing on October 11, 2026.
Flow is billed monthly with no annual commitment; the percentage applies to the value you invoice through Chargebee each month, and payment gateway fees come on top. Source: chargebee.com/pricing.
What changed in 2026, and why most pages still show the old plans
Web archive snapshots of Chargebee's pricing page date the change. The May 23, 2026 capture shows Starter ("Free for the first USD 250K of cumulative billing, then 0.75% on billing") and Performance ("USD 7,188 /yr", billed monthly for up to $100K billing a month). The August 13, 2026 capture shows Flow at 0.80%, or a $99 fee plus 0.65%, and an Enterprise tier. A pricing tracker, usagepricing.com, logged the switch between captures of August 6 and August 11. We found no announcement from Chargebee.
Most ranking pages for "chargebee pricing", and Google's AI answer when we checked on October 11, 2026, still describe Starter and Performance. Part of the reason may be on Chargebee's own site: the pricing page's structured data still reads "First $250K in cumulative billing free, then 0.75%", and its help article on pricing describes "a fixed fee up to a revenue threshold, plus an overage percentage", which is the old model. The visible pricing widget shows Flow, so we treat that as current. We could not find out whether existing Starter accounts were moved to Flow.
What it means for an early startup: take a company that signs up at $10K MRR and stays there. Under Starter it paid nothing for the first 25 months, then 0.75% ($75 a month). Under Flow it pays $80 a month from day one: $960 in year one instead of $0, and $2,880 over three years instead of $825. At $50K MRR the free allowance lasted only five months, so the gap is smaller ($4,800 vs $2,625 in year one). Against old Performance ($599/month), Flow is cheaper up to about $77K of monthly billing and dearer above it.
What it costs at pre-seed, seed and Series A
| All-in billing cost | Pre-seed $10,000 MRR, 500 charges | Seed $50,000 MRR, 2,000 charges | Series A $250,000 MRR, 8,000 charges |
|---|---|---|---|
| Chargebee | $520/mo 5.20 pts | $2,450/mo 4.90 pts | $11,374/mo 4.55 pts |
| Stripe Billing | $510/mo 5.10 pts | $2,400/mo 4.80 pts | $11,150/mo 4.46 pts |
| Recurly | $689/mo 6.89 pts | $2,389/mo 4.78 pts | $11,789/mo 4.72 pts |
| Maxio | $1,039/mo 10.39 pts | $2,649/mo 5.30 pts | Quote only |
Platform fee plus card processing at Stripe's US rate (2.9% + 30¢) wherever the tool's own fee does not include it. A merchant of record also collects and files sales tax and VAT. "pts" = share of revenue, which comes straight off gross margin. Cheapest plan per tool at each volume. Fees verified on the vendors' pricing pages, latest on October 11, 2026. Run your own numbers.
Read the platform fee in gross-margin points. Chargebee takes 0.80 points at $10K and $50K MRR, and about 0.69 points at $250K once the $99 option kicks in. Stripe Billing takes 0.70 points on pay as you go, and less on its annual plans. Recurly is expensive at $10K (its $249 floor is 2.49 points) and cheapest of the three around $50K. Maxio's Grow plan starts at $599 a month, which only makes sense near its $100K cap. Card processing, here Stripe's 2.9% + 30¢, costs five to six times more than Chargebee's fee, so the gateway rate you negotiate matters more than the billing tool. Run your own numbers with your MRR and charge count.
What each plan includes (the parts that change cost)
- Flow (both options): 100M usage events a month, 40+ payment gateways (Stripe, Braintree, Adyen, PayPal Commerce, GoCardless, Checkout.com and others), basic and smart dunning, built-in sales tax (US, EU VAT and global taxes) and Anrok, offline and consolidated invoicing, credit notes, Xero and QuickBooks sync, and the free Growth Starter retention play.
- Enterprise (quote): multi-entity (up to 100 entities), account hierarchy, contract terms, on-demand discounting, plus paid NetSuite, Intacct and Avalara integrations and higher event and API limits.
Add-ons and hidden costs
- Gateway fees. Chargebee is not a payment processor in this setup. You pay your gateway (for example Stripe at 2.9% + 30¢ per US card) on top of the 0.80%.
- RevRec. Chargebee RevRec is a paid add-on on both plans, quote only. If you need ASC 606 schedules, read our SaaS revenue recognition guide before you buy.
- Annual invoices. The fee is on invoicing volume, so an annual prepay is charged in the month you bill it. Annual-heavy SaaS will see lumpy monthly fees, the same timing as deferred revenue.
- Negotiated deals. Vendr reports a median of $57,600 a year across 65 Chargebee purchases (low $8,148, high $178,709). That page was last updated in February 2026, before Flow, and covers sales-negotiated contracts, not self-serve Flow.
- Chargebee for Startups. Free until $1M of cumulative billing, then pay as you go with no annual commitment. You qualify if you are new to Chargebee (not on a paid plan), belong to a partner accelerator or VC portfolio network, and have raised less than $5M. It is an application, reviewed in 2-3 business days, not a self-serve tier. Source: chargebee.com/startups.
Not hands-on tested yet: we have not run a live account on Chargebee. Prices and terms come from Chargebee's published pricing page and help docs, read on October 11, 2026.
Alternatives at a glance
- Stripe Billing: 0.7% pay as you go, or $620/month and up on a 1-year contract. Cheaper platform fee if you already process on Stripe. See Chargebee vs Stripe Billing and Stripe Billing pricing.
- Recurly: $249/month + 0.9% above $40K a month, with a 90-day trial. See Recurly pricing.
- Paddle: 5% + 50¢ per transaction as merchant of record, so tax and payments are included. See Paddle pricing.
Frequently asked questions
How much does Chargebee cost?
On Flow, 0.80% of what you invoice each month, or $99/month plus 0.65%. At $10K MRR that is $80 a month; at $50K, $400; at $250K, $1,724. Gateway fees are extra. Enterprise is quote only.
Is Chargebee free to use?
Not any more for most companies. The free Starter plan (free up to $250K cumulative billing) was retired in mid-2026. The only free route is Chargebee for Startups, which is free to $1M cumulative billing for eligible startups in a partner network with under $5M raised.
Does Chargebee take a percentage of revenue?
Yes. Flow charges a percentage of monthly invoicing volume (0.80%, or 0.65% with the $99 fee), from the first dollar. It is charged on invoiced amounts, not on ARR or MRR as you report them.
Is Chargebee trustworthy?
Chargebee is an established, privately held billing vendor (Chargebee Inc.) with 40+ gateway integrations. The practical risk is pricing change, as 2026 showed: check the live page before you sign, and keep your billing data exportable.
Related: billing software compared, Chargebee alternatives, and how fees hit SaaS gross margin.