If you want to raise funds for it, a crowdfunding site exists to support it. Whether it’s creative projects, startup costs, or nonprofit fundraising campaigns—there’s a platform out there designed to help you raise funds from your audience.
Every popular crowdfunding platform comes with its own perks and drawbacks, depending on its features, user interface, and what cut of your earnings it keeps.
Plenty of the best crowdfunding sites for nonprofits and individuals claim to be free while charging fees that can take a hefty percentage of the funds you raise. To help you hit your goals and keep more of your hard-earned donations, we’re comparing the top ten crowdfunding sites on pricing, features, and niche.
Let’s look at what the top crowdfunding sites for nonprofits and organizations have to offer—and how much they’ll cost you.
1. Givebutter: A free crowdfunding site that’s easy and fun
👍 Best for nonprofits including community & faith-based organizations, charities, schools, teams
💸 Fees: Givebutter is free. 0% platform fee, thanks to optional donor tips. Only the standard 2.9% + $0.30 per transaction for secure payment processors, which 95% of donors opt to cover.
🍨The scoop:
Givebutter puts the fun in crowdFUNding, with free, custom fundraising pages, events, and auctions built for donor engagement that you can get up and running in minutes. Each campaign has an interactive supporter wall where you can share updates and exchange GIFs, comments, drawings, and photos with your donors. Plus, Givebutter accepts every kind of payment method under the sun.
Even butter, Givebutter’s crowdfunding platform for nonprofits offers the most features with the least amount of fees and fully transparent pricing. With peer-to-peer campaigns, event ticketing, auctions, and donor management tools, you can keep growing your community of support long after your crowdfunding campaign ends.
2. Patreon: The best crowdfunding platform for the arts
👍 Best for artists with a following like podcasters, journalists, and creative entrepreneurs
💸 Fees: 8 - 12% platform fee, plus payment processing fees (varies), payout fees, and more.
🍨 The scoop:
Patreon is a crowdfunding site that lets fans contribute a recurring donation (from $5 to $50+ per month) to directly support their favorite creatives. In return, they typically receive perks like exclusive content or mail-order goodies. Fans and artists both enjoy the platform because it allows creative freedom and empowers small business growth.
Nonprofits can also fundraise on Patreon, offering different levels of membership and perks to go along with each level. You can get access to crowdfunding pages with messaging tools, member-only livestreams, analytics, e-commerce, and various integrations.
This crowd source funding site does come with limitations, though. For example, artists can’t create one-off fundraising campaigns for specific needs or projects. And Patreon’s pricing model relies on high platform fees, which take a sizable chunk out of any earnings from creatives and nonprofits.
3. GoFundMe: Individual crowdfunding for a variety of needs
👍 Best for individuals fundraising for personal costs and creating campaigns to support nonprofits
💸 Fees: 2.9% + $0.30 payment processing fee (not covered by donors)
🍨 The scoop:
Families, individuals, and nonprofits create crowdfunding pages with GoFundMe to raise money for a range of needs including unexpected medical expenses, memorials, or emergency support in the aftermath of natural disasters.
While GoFundMe is a free crowdfunding platform, this doesn't mean you'll keep every cent you raise. GoFundMe collects payment processing fees, which are hidden from (and cannot be covered by) donors. Meanwhile, GoFundMe asks donors for tips upwards of 15% to support their platform, but none of those funds can help cover fees.
New tools have made it easier for individuals and teams to crowdfund on behalf of a nonprofit organization, but the platform doesn’t include email marketing tools, a CRM, event management, auctions, or interactive supporter feeds.
4. Kickstarter: A high-stakes crowdfunding site
👍 Best for time-bound creative projects like films, recordings, and product launches
💸 Fees: 5% platform fee, and 3% + $0.20 transaction fee (or 5% + $0.05 per transaction if donation is under $10)
🍨 The scoop:
One of the most recognizable names in the crowd fundraising site space, Kickstarter, provides custom campaign pages where creators offer various “rewards” as incentives for contributions. This platform is built to fund concrete, shareable endeavors like books, games, and technology prototypes—all of which must go through an approval process and can span between one and 60 days.
Notably, nonprofits on Kickstarter cannot create campaigns for general charitable donations to fund their programs or advocacy work, and proceeds from a Kickstarter project may not be donated to nonprofits. But many arts-based nonprofits use the platform to fund their work, like this journalism project from the Brooklyn Movement Center.
Kickstarter also operates on an all-or-nothing model. If a project doesn't hit its funding goal, every cent gets returned to a project’s backers—no ifs, ands, or buts. This is not the platform for last-minute crowdfunders!
5. Indiegogo: Crowdfunding for creative endeavors (with a little more flexibility)
👍 Best for launching projects from tech startups, artists, and other creative endeavors
💸 Fees: 5% platform fee, 3% + $0.20 transaction fee + transfer fee (varies)
🍨 The scoop:
Like Kickstarter, Indiegogo is a crowdfunding platform designed to fund innovative projects, products, and inventions from small businesses and artists. But unlike Kickstarter, nonprofits are allowed to raise funds on Indiegogo, and with the platform’s “In Demand” features, creators can continue to raise funds and engage with supporters after their initial, 60-day maximum campaign ends.
Indiegogo offers two kinds of crowdfunding: fixed funding (you keep what you raise), and flexible funding (you must hit your fundraising target to keep your earnings)—both of which require a minimum of $500 raised.
Crowdfunding pages enable creators to share their stories, add pictures and videos, invite other campaign members, and track data with Google Analytics. Unfortunately, Indiegogo lacks event management features and livestreaming functionality, and doesn’t accept a wide variety of payment methods.And in addition to charging platform and payment processing fees, Indiegogo automatically keeps an additional 5% of your earnings for a reserved funds account (to be used in case of donor refunds). Even if no refunds occur, Indiegogo will hold these earnings for up to six months.
6. Bonfire: Crowdfunding via merch
👍 Best for quick T-shirt campaigns
💸 Fees: 8% donation processing fee (reduced to 3.5% for verified nonprofits)
🍨 The scoop:
Bonfire is a crowd fund website built entirely around T-shirt campaigns. With Bonfire, users design custom T-shirts, totes, and other merch before selling them through their donation pages or an online merchandise store. The platform is free to use, but takes a cut of your gross sales to pay for manufacturing, sourcing, printing, and shipping costs.
Bonfire is very user-friendly, allowing users to design a page from scratch or start from a pre-designed template. And while individuals and nonprofits can launch peer-to-peer fundraising campaigns and supporters can contribute extra dollars to your cause, ongoing donor engagement and other fundraising activities are not offered on the platform.
7. Fundrise: Real estate crowdfunding
👍 Best for looking for investors for your real estate project
💸 Fees: 0.15% advisory fee for assets, 0.85% for real estate funds, and 1.85% for innovation funds
🍨 The scoop:
Fundrise makes it possible for individuals to invest in real estate, without going through the traditional route. They can start with as little as $10, making it an attractive option for people that want to add real estate to their portfolio.
If you have a real estate project that you want to submit to Fundrise, you’ll need to contact them with details on your investment package, track record, and sponsorship information. It’s not as straightforward as raising funds for a nonprofit project, but specialist crowdfunding and investment sites tend to be more selective.
8. Wefunder: Crowdfunding for startups
👍 Best for securing funds for your early-stage startup
💸 Fees: 7.9% of the total raise if successful (for regulation crowdfunding), or a flat fee of $395K (for regulation A+)
🍨 The scoop:
Wefunder allows individuals to invest in founders, startups, and small businesses in exchange for equity. This gives those organizations much-needed funds to develop and grow, and gives potential investors the chance to be part of that exciting journey.
Startups can use Wefunder to turn loyal fans into people with a financial interest in helping their organization succeed. Upload your pitch deck, personalize your company page, and follow the useful prompts to start raising funds for growth and development.
9. Honeyfund: Crowdfunding for weddings
👍 Best for topping up your honeymoon fund
💸 Fees: 0% fees for Honeyfund Wallet (gift cards, PayPal, Venmo), or 3.5% for bank account deposits
🍨 The scoop:
Couples can use Honeyfund to take a crowdfunding-style approach to raising money for that big exciting trip—their honeymoon! This fun alternative to asking wedding guests and loved ones to give cash brings honeymoon funds into the digital age, and all for zero fees.
Whether it’s to raise money for travel or getting set up in a new home together, Honeyfund’s one-page website and easy donation options make it a useful option for personal causes. While this niche need might not apply to you, it’s another reminder that if you have a project or need, there’s probably a fuss-free way out there to raise funds for it.
10. Experiment: Scientific research crowdfunding
👍 Best for funding scientific research
💸 Fees: 8% platform fee plus 3-5% payment processor fee, and a 2.9% + $0.30 transaction fee
🍨 The scoop:
Experiment is a niche crowdfunding website designed to help researchers fund their projects and share results with the public. It brings attention (and funds) to much-needed research projects, allowing scientists to pursue directions that may not be funded via a more traditional route.
The platform uses an “all or nothing” model, which requires fundraisers to achieve their entire project total by the given deadline. Projects must also meet core criteria and have a well-defined hypothesis. Once live on the site, researchers can use their page to share their story, connect with an audience, and raise funds for their project.
✏️ Note: As of June 2024, Experiment is only able to support payouts to researchers based in the United States. It’s hoped that payment to international researchers will resume as normal in Fall 2024.
Crowdfund better with Givebutter
Whether you're raising funds for your child's elementary school, opening your first online store, or launching a grassroots nonprofit, the best crowdfunding websites can rally people together. If you’re asking supporters to donate towards your fundraising goal, choose a top crowdfunding website with the best possible user experience and affordable fees.
Givebutter is the best crowdfunding site for nonprofits because it offers a huge range of free features with no subscriptions, platform fees, or add-on costs. Givebutter's all-in-one fundraising platform comes complete with branded online fundraising pages and forms, event ticketing, auctions, email marketing and text messaging, third-party integrations, and a nonprofit CRM—all for free.
Ready to see how Givebutter can boost your crowdfunding efforts? Create your free account to launch your crowdfunding campaign today.
Methodology
Our editorial team sources comparison metrics directly from sites like G2, Capterra, Trustpilot, BBB, InHerSight, Comparably, Glassdoor, and more. Data gathered in June 2024.
