Is Teachable a Good Deal?
Simple course creation platform for creators and coaches
$59–249/mo
Quick Verdict: Is Teachable Worth It?
Fair — Deal Score: 6.5/10
| Price | $59–249/mo |
| Free Tier | Yes |
| Best For | You want a polished, standalone course platform with a proven track record |
| Skip If | You need marketing tools too — Kajabi or Systeme.io offer more for similar or less money |
✓ Pros
- Clean, intuitive course builder
- Built-in payment processing and affiliates
- Strong brand recognition in the course creator space
✗ Cons
- 5% transaction fee on the $59/mo plan
- Limited marketing features — you'll need other tools
- Systeme.io includes course hosting for free
Our Analysis
Teachable is one of the most established online course platforms on the market, used by over 150,000 creators since its launch in 2014. Current plans include Free (unlimited courses but $1 + 10% transaction fee per sale), Basic at $39/month (5% transaction fee, custom domain), and Pro at $119/month (0% transaction fees, certificates, graded quizzes). The tool lets you create and sell video courses, 1-to-1 coaching, digital downloads, and memberships. On Reddit (r/onlinecoursecreation, r/teachable), the platform is recognized for its ease of use and proven reliability. Teachable was acquired by Hotmart in 2020.
Teachable's strengths include an intuitive course builder with a solid video player and quiz/certificate management, a built-in affiliate system, and 1-to-1 coaching features with scheduling. The automatic tax compliance (VAT/Sales Tax) through Teachable Payments is a real asset for creators selling internationally — it eliminates the complexity of managing VAT across 50 countries. On G2, Teachable scores 4.0/5 with praise for simplicity: a creator with no technical skills can launch a professional course in a few hours. The Zapier integration connects the tool to most existing marketing stacks.
The criticisms on Trustpilot and Reddit are significant: transaction fees on the Free plan (10% + $1 per sale) and Basic plan (5%) considerably eat into margins. For a $50 course, you lose $6 on Free and $2.50 on Basic — on top of payment processor fees. The sales page builder is limited and aesthetically dated compared to ClickFunnels or Kajabi — many creators use an external tool for selling and Teachable only for course delivery. Community features are very basic (no gamification like Skool, no real member-to-member interaction). Customer support is often criticized as slow and generic. Since the Hotmart acquisition, many users report stagnation in new features and a growing focus on the Brazilian market. For a first online course on a tight budget, the free plan is a good starting point despite the fees. For scaling, Kajabi or Skool offer substantially more value.
Cost Breakdown
The free plan works for testing your course idea, but transaction fees eat margins fast — Pro at $119/mo becomes essential once you exceed $3k/month in sales.
What Real Users Report
Teachable got them started with zero upfront cost. But once they hit $5k/mo in course sales, the 5% transaction fee on Basic was costing them $250/mo. Upgraded to Pro and the math worked out instantly.
The course player is solid and students find it easy to navigate. But the sales pages look like they're stuck in 2019. they ended up using ClickFunnels for their sales page and Teachable just for course delivery.
Since Hotmart bought Teachable, development has slowed to a crawl. Features we've been asking for years (better community, mobile app, modern templates) still aren't here. Meanwhile Kajabi and Skool keep innovating.
Worth it if
You want a polished, standalone course platform with a proven track record
Skip if
You need marketing tools too — Kajabi or Systeme.io offer more for similar or less money
