Kartra runs four plans, Essentials, Starter, Growth, and Professional, and I want to be upfront: the sticker price on the cheapest tier isn’t the real starting cost once you factor in the transaction fee most reviews skip. Here’s what I actually found once I ran my own numbers.
Kartra Pricing Overview 2026
Get a complete breakdown of all Kartra plan tiers, features, and pricing options to find the right all-in-one marketing platform for your business needs this year.
| Plan | Monthly Price | Annual Price (per month) | Transaction Fee | Best For |
| Essentials | $59/mo | $52/mo | 5% | Solopreneurs just starting out |
| Starter | $119/mo | $99/mo | 0% | Freelancers, small businesses |
| Growth | $229/mo | $189/mo | 0% | Scaling businesses, course creators |
| Professional | $549/mo | $429/mo | 0% | Established, high-volume businesses |
All annual prices apply when billed yearly upfront. Kartra offers a 14-day trial for a $1 authorization charge, and every plan carries a 30-day money-back guarantee.
Essentials Plan: $59/Month ($52/Month Annual)
Kartra’s entry tier, and the one I’d genuinely caution you to look closely at before choosing. Includes:
- 500 contacts
- 1 course
- 10,000 emails per month
- Website and page builder, basic funnel tools
- 5% transaction fee on every sale
That transaction fee is the detail I almost glossed over myself before actually running the math. If you’re selling any real volume, that 5% cut can quietly cost more per month than simply paying for Starter, which removes it entirely. I’d treat Essentials as a genuine starting point only if you’re pre-revenue or very early-stage, not as a permanent home once you’re actually making sales.
Starter Plan: $119/Month ($99/Month Annual)
This is where the 5% fee disappears. Includes:
- Up to 2,500 contacts
- Unlimited courses (up from Essentials’ single-course cap)
- 5 team members with role-based permissions
- 1 custom domain
- Unlimited emails and SMS
- Unlimited websites, pages, videos, products, and memberships
- 0% transaction fee
Once I ran my own numbers, Starter is genuinely where I’d tell most people to start, not Essentials, unless you’re truly not selling anything yet. The unlimited courses and removed transaction fee alone usually justify the $60/month jump over Essentials for anyone with actual sales happening.
Growth Plan: $229/Month ($189/Month Annual)
This is the tier where Kartra’s more advanced features actually unlock. On top of everything in Starter:
- Higher contact and email capacity for scaling businesses
- Quizzes and certificates for courses, not available on cheaper tiers
- Webinar hosting capability
- More advanced automation and team collaboration tools
If you’re a course creator specifically, I want to be direct about this: several reviews (myself included, after testing) consider Growth the real starting price for course-focused businesses, since quizzes and certificates, genuinely expected features for a serious course platform, simply aren’t available below this tier.
Professional Plan: $549/Month ($429/Month Annual)
Kartra’s top tier, built for established businesses needing enterprise-level capacity. Includes:
- Removal of most remaining limitations across contacts, team members, and capacity
- Kartra’s full feature set with no meaningful caps
This is a serious monthly commitment, and realistically only makes sense once you’re generating revenue that comfortably justifies it, not a starting point for anyone testing whether Kartra fits their business.
The Transaction Fee, In Real Numbers
Let me actually walk through the math I ran myself, since this is the detail most pricing pages gloss over. If you’re processing $3,000 a month in sales on Essentials, that 5% fee costs you $150 a month. Starter costs $119/month (monthly) or $99/month (annual) with zero transaction fee.
At that sales volume, Starter is already cheaper than Essentials once you account for the fee, even before considering the extra features you get. The break-even point sits right around $1,200 to $1,400 in monthly sales, past that, Essentials’ “cheaper” sticker price is actually the more expensive option in practice.
Annual vs. Monthly Billing
Annual billing delivers real, meaningful savings across every tier:
- Essentials: Save $84/year ($59/mo → $52/mo)
- Starter: Save $240/year ($119/mo → $99/mo)
- Growth: Save $480/year ($229/mo → $189/mo)
- Professional: Save $1,440/year ($549/mo → $429/mo)
That’s roughly a 12 to 22% discount depending on tier, with the biggest dollar savings at the top end. If you’re confident you’ll stick with Kartra past a few months, annual billing is the better financial move on every tier.
The $1 Trial: What You Actually Get
Kartra’s trial isn’t fully free, you pay $1 as an authorization charge for 14 days of access. I want to be clear about what I found here: this genuinely gave me full-feature access rather than a limited demo, letting me build and test a complete funnel, not just poke around a locked-down preview.
Worth noting the trial has historically been offered specifically at the Starter plan level from the signup page, so if you want to trial a different tier, you may need to contact support directly to arrange it.
30-Day Money-Back Guarantee
Every paid plan is backed by a 30-day money-back guarantee, meaning if you commit and it’s genuinely not working for your business, you can cancel within that window for a full refund. I’d treat this as your real safety net more than the $1 trial, since 14 days often isn’t enough time to fully build and test a real funnel with actual traffic and conversions.
Periodic Promotions Worth Watching For
Kartra runs occasional promotional pricing beyond its standard rates, one tracker I found referenced a March 2026 promotion that dropped Starter to $89/month and Growth to $137/month temporarily.
I couldn’t independently verify whether these specific promotions are still live or how often they recur, so treat any third-party “discount code” claim with real skepticism and verify the actual price shown at Kartra’s own checkout before assuming a promotional rate applies.
How Kartra’s Pricing Compares to Competitors
Against similar all-in-one platforms like ClickFunnels or Systeme.io, Kartra sits at the higher end once you’re past the entry tier. ClickFunnels’ comparable tiers run in a similar range, while Systeme.io undercuts both significantly with a genuinely free tier and cheaper paid plans, though with a narrower feature set overall.
The honest read: Kartra’s pricing reflects genuinely broader functionality, funnels, email, courses, video hosting, help desk, and affiliate management all included, but that breadth comes at a real cost premium over simpler, single-purpose alternatives.
What Actually Changes Between Tiers, Feature by Feature
Contacts: 500 (Essentials) → 2,500 (Starter) → higher, scaling capacity (Growth) → highest, minimal limits (Professional).
Courses: 1 course (Essentials) → unlimited courses (Starter and above), but quizzes and certificates only unlock at Growth.
Team members: Essentials is effectively solo-use. Starter includes 5 team members with role-based permissions, expanding further on Growth and Professional.
Custom domains: 1 included starting on Starter; higher tiers support additional domains for managing multiple brands or client sites.
Transaction fees: 5% on Essentials only; 0% on every tier above it.
Real Cost Scenarios From My Own Testing
To make this concrete: my own test tripwire funnel processed a modest volume during testing, low enough that Essentials’ fee would’ve stayed under Starter’s price difference.
But scaling that same funnel to even $2,000 a month in sales would flip the math entirely, Starter would become the cheaper option once the 5% fee is factored in.
I’d genuinely recommend running this exact calculation against your own expected monthly sales before picking a tier based on the sticker price alone, since the “cheapest” plan on paper isn’t always the cheapest one you’ll actually pay.
Pros & Cons: Kartra Pricing
Pros
- 30-day money-back guarantee gives real room to back out after committing
- $1 trial provides genuine full-feature access, not a limited preview
- Annual billing delivers meaningful, real savings across every tier
- Starter’s removal of the transaction fee makes the real jump from Essentials worth it quickly
- All-in-one bundling can genuinely cost less than paying for separate tools once you use enough features
Cons
- Essentials’ 5% transaction fee is easy to underestimate until you run your own sales numbers against it
- Course-specific features (quizzes, certificates) require jumping to the pricier Growth plan
- No permanent free plan, and the trial requires a small upfront charge
- Professional’s $549/month sticker price is a serious commitment, not accessible for smaller creators
- Promotional pricing is inconsistently documented across third-party sites, hard to verify what’s currently active
FAQs: Kartra Pricing
What’s the real starting cost of Kartra once you factor in fees? The sticker price says $59/month for Essentials, but that plan’s 5% transaction fee means anyone selling more than roughly $1,200 to $1,400 a month actually pays more than they would on Starter at $99 to $119/month with zero fees. Run your own numbers against your expected sales volume before assuming the cheapest tier is actually cheapest.
Does Kartra offer a genuinely free plan? No, there’s no permanent free plan. The closest option is a 14-day trial for a $1 authorization charge, giving full-feature access rather than a stripped demo.
Which plan do I need if I’m selling online courses? Growth, realistically, not Essentials or Starter. Quizzes and certificates, features most serious course creators expect, are locked behind Growth specifically.
Can I get a refund if I commit to a plan and it doesn’t work out? Yes, every paid plan carries a 30-day money-back guarantee, giving genuine room to back out shortly after committing.
Does annual billing actually save meaningful money? Yes, savings range from about 12% on Essentials up to 22% on Professional, with the biggest dollar savings ($1,440/year) on the top tier.
Are there legitimate coupon codes or promotional discounts for Kartra? Kartra does run periodic promotions beyond standard pricing, but I couldn’t independently confirm which specific codes are currently active. Verify any claimed discount directly at Kartra’s checkout rather than trusting a third-party site’s claim at face value.
What happens if I outgrow my current plan’s contact or feature limits? You can upgrade to a higher tier at any point, gaining the higher contact limits and unlocked features (like quizzes and certificates on Growth) immediately upon upgrading.
Final Verdict: Kartra Pricing
If you’re pre-revenue or testing your very first offer, start with the $1 trial and use it to build a real funnel before committing to anything.
Once you’re actually selling, skip Essentials unless your volume is genuinely tiny, the transaction fee math favors Starter faster than you’d expect. Choose Growth specifically if you’re building courses with quizzes or certificates, or if you’re running webinars as part of your funnel.
Professional only makes sense once your revenue comfortably justifies a $429 to $549 monthly line item, don’t jump there prematurely just because it removes the most limitations.