Stripe Vs Paypal: Which is Better?

If you have a computer or smartphone, then most likely you participated in a digital transaction on both sides. And the likelihood that you are using an e-wallet like PayPal is also high.

PayPal boasts 295 million users worldwide. In the first half of 2019 alone, it processed nearly six billion transactions. It is widely known because it is a consumer-friendly platform.

What if you want to be a small business owner – should you stick with PayPal because it’s a leader? Or should you risk switching to its competitor Stripe instead?

Stripe vs. PayPal: Pick the Best for Your Business

Before you decide to sign up with PayPal or switch to Stripe, let’s look at some of the differences between the two.

Transaction Fee

While the transaction fees (2.9% + 0.30 cents per transaction) are the same across the two platforms, PayPal details the cost breakdown in more detail.

For example, you can view fees for:

US and international transactions.
Micropayments and large payments
Commercial or non-commercial payments
Transactions processed through the virtual terminal

You can also estimate commissions for:

recurring billing;
currency conversion;
refund;
chargeback
Amex payments.
Transactions for mobile card readers.
etc.

Based on this, some will say that PayPal benefits from transparency. However, others would agree that Stripe maintains a simplified commission structure, which means there are no unexpected costs.

Types of payments accepted

If you do business online, you need a platform that accepts as many forms of payment as possible. For PayPal, this includes:

PayPal (of course)
Credit Cards
Debit Cards
PayPal Credit
Pay by phone

However, not all payment methods are available to everyone. For example, pay-by-phone transactions are only available if you have a Payments Pro plan.

Stripe, on the other hand, accepts payment types such as credit and debit cards, Apple Pay, Google Pay, and more.

Accepted countries and currencies

So, if you are planning to enter the global market, you need appropriate support. Let’s see what offers the best.

First of all, this is Paypal, which accepts payments from over 200 countries Stripe, on the other hand, only accepts 25 countries. However, PayPal only processes transactions in 25 currencies, while the Stripe has 135+.

We might call it a tie, depending on how you look at it (and what’s more important to your business).

Advanced payment options

How do you plan to process payments from your customers? You will find that both come with exceptional advanced billing options such as:

Billing
Marketplace Solutions (Stripe Connect)
Subscriptions

Since Stripe is more focused on e-commerce, it lacks the ability for mobile chip readers or POS integration.

Integration with other tools

Both Stripe and PayPal integrate with a variety of e-commerce and finance tools. However, Stripe takes over as it has a lot more options.

Here are a few things you can integrate the platform with:

Customer Relationship Management (CRM)
Customer Support
Email Marketing
Fundraising
Inventory Management
Recurring Payments
Form Formation
Referral Marketing
And much more other

So how do you set up Stripe?

The good thing about online payment tools is that you can test them out for free. So if you want to test Stripe, you can get started in no time.

Sign up with your email address, full name, and a strong password (at least one capital letter, number, and non-alphanumeric character).

Confirm your account email address (check your inbox).
Since you are most likely not a developer, select the Turnkey Solutions option.

On this page, you can integrate the platforms you use, such as Squarespace or Xero. Otherwise, click Skip.

You are now in the dashboard where you can see all your transactions for a day, week, month, quarter or year.

To start accepting payments with Stripe, you need to set up your bank account. Funds are not credited to your account like PayPal. However, you will have to wait seven or so days, depending on your type of business. The riskier your business is, the longer the waiting period.
At the top of your dashboard, you’ll see “Activate Your Stripe Account”. Click here to expand the menu and select “Start”.

Then you need to provide all the information about your company. Finally, enter your bank details and set up 2-Step Verification (recommended for security).

Use Your Stripe Account

Once you’ve got everything set up, you can check out all the great features of Stripe For example, you can view your payments and categorize your submission based on whether it was successful, was returned, or not captured.

You can also review your open disputes that require your response. Plus, you can filter them by the ones you won or lost.

In the “Balance” section, you can see how much money is on the way to your bank and how much is on hold. To hold funds, you will need to resolve an issue with your bank account.

In the “Balance” section you will find “Payments and Transactions”. Your payments are funds sent to your bank account. All transactions are displayed – sent and pending.

In the Clients section, you can add clients so you can easily bill them when the time comes.

The “Reports” section is another handy tool that will allow you to see an overview of your transactions over several months or over the last year.

Radar is another analytic feature that you can use to view an overview of your account. This will tell you how many controversies you got (lost and won).

Then, under the Payments tab, you can see more insights about your business. For example, you can see a snapshot of your:

revenue and subscriber growth;
retention and churn
average income per subscriber
Unpaid bills

Under the Invoices section of the menu, you can view your products, tax rates, coupons, subscriptions and invoices.

If you would like your orders to be placed, you can click “Orders” in the menu. Also, you can view your products.

When you’re ready to get down to the technical side, you can play around with the Terminal section where you integrate a POS terminal.

The Developers section will allow you to access the API, where you can perform further integration.

In Settings, you can change your business details, add Stripe apps, and view compliance and reporting documents.

Strive Vs Paypal: Stripe is a simple and safe bet!

Stripe is a growing competitor to Paypal, and for good reason – it offers more. It has something for coders as well as business owners who want more integration for their payment setup.

Getting started with Stripe is quick and easy, so why not set up your account and see how it compares to PayPal?

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