Gumroad vs Framekit: Which Wins in 2026?

Two creators sell the same $25 Lightroom preset pack to a buyer in Ohio.

The first sells it through a Gumroad link and keeps $20.97, because Gumroad takes 10% plus $0.50 and, as its own help page says, card processing of 2.9% plus $0.30 comes on top.

The second sells it through a Framekit checkout link on the free plan and keeps $22.72 after Framekit's 5% and Stripe's processing.

Eighty sales a month later, the gap is no longer pocket change: at $2,000 a month in sales, Gumroad costs $3,864 a year all-in, and Framekit's $39 Business plan costs $1,356 including Stripe.

That is the arithmetic half of Gumroad vs Framekit. The other half is that Gumroad files your sales tax and VAT for you in every country it sells into, and Framekit does not.

A creator who sells mostly to Europe and never wants to think about VAT registration has a real reason to pay Gumroad's rate, and this comparison says so plainly.

A digital product platform is software that hosts your files, takes payment and delivers the download automatically, and in 2026 the category splits into merchants of record that sell on your behalf (Gumroad) and checkout tools that pay you directly through your own Stripe account (Framekit).

Full disclosure: Framekit is our product, Gumroad wins on tax, product range and its marketplace in the sections below, and every Gumroad figure here was re-verified on Gumroad's own help centre on 12 October 2026, replacing the July 2026 numbers this page carried before.

How This Gumroad vs Framekit Comparison Was Built

This comparison reads each platform's own published terms rather than reporting on test purchases, so every Gumroad number traces back to a Gumroad help article and every Framekit number to Framekit's pricing page or its shipped checkout code.

Read at the source on 12 October 2026. Gumroad's fees article, its getting-paid article, its articles on chargebacks, refund policy and file size limits, and its pricing page, which carries the merchant-of-record statement.

For the Stripe side of Framekit, Stripe's documentation on refunds, disputes and payouts.

Read in the product. Framekit's store terms come from its pricing page and from the checkout code that creates each payment: a direct charge on the seller's own Stripe account, with Framekit's fee taken as an application fee on the amount after any discount.

Calculated. One carried example runs through every table: a $25 preset pack bought by a US customer with a card, sold at $500, $2,000 and $5,000 a month. That is 20, 80 and 200 sales a month. The arithmetic is shown so you can swap in your own price.

Not tested. We did not run a live purchase on either platform for this page, so nothing here describes how a checkout felt. Where a mechanic matters (a refund, a dispute, a payout), it is described from the vendor's own documentation.

Gumroad vs Framekit at a Glance

The table below sets Gumroad and Framekit side by side on the fourteen things sellers of presets, LUTs, templates and ebooks actually ask about, using only what each publishes in October 2026.

In one lineGumroad sells the convenience of being the legal seller and a marketplace, and charges roughly twice Framekit's cost for it, while Framekit sells a cheaper store that sits inside a website you control but leaves tax with you.

What Gumroad and Framekit Cost Over a Year

At $2,000 a month in preset sales, Gumroad costs $3,864 a year once processing is counted, and Framekit costs $2,184 on its free plan or $1,356 on Business billed yearly, so the cheapest Framekit setup keeps about $2,500 more a year.

Here is the carried $25 preset pack at three monthly volumes. Every figure is the full annual cost to the seller: the platform fee, card processing, and the subscription where there is one. Framekit's paid plans are shown at yearly billing ($180 for Pro, $372 for Business).

Three things in that table deserve a sentence each.

The $0.50 is the quiet part. On a $25 product, Gumroad's fixed 50 cents adds 2 points to its 10%, so the effective platform take is 12% before processing. On a $9 product it adds 5.6 points. Cheap products sold in volume feel the fixed fee most.

Discover is a different business. A sale that Gumroad's marketplace finds for you costs a flat 30%, processing included. If Discover brings buyers you would never have reached, that 30% is a finder's fee worth paying.

If it mostly reroutes buyers who were already looking for you, it is the most expensive line on this page.

Gumroad's volume break rarely applies. Gumroad drops new direct sales to 5% plus $0.50 only after your paid sales pass $20,000 in a single calendar month, and the discount resets on the 1st. None of the three volumes above reach it.

Per sale, at four price points

Where Framekit's own plans cross over

The 5% free plan equals the $39 Business plan at $780 a month in sales ($39 divided by 5%). Pro's 3% equals Business at about $667 a month ($20 price gap divided by 3%), or about $533 on yearly billing.

Below $780 a month, stay on Free; above it, Business is the cheaper Framekit plan and Pro only makes sense if you want discount codes without paying for Business.

Run it yourselftake last month's Gumroad payout report, add up the fee column, and multiply by twelve. Then take the same gross sales, multiply by 2.9%, add 30 cents per sale, and add $372.

The first number is what Gumroad costs you a year; the second is Framekit Business with Stripe. If the difference is smaller than what you would pay an accountant for VAT and sales tax, Gumroad is still the better deal for you.

Refunds, Chargebacks and Payouts: The Mechanics

Gumroad hands its own fee back when you refund a buyer and keeps only the processing portion, while Framekit keeps its percentage on a refund and Stripe keeps its processing fee, so a refunded $25 sale costs a Gumroad seller about $1.03 and a Framekit free-plan seller about $2.28.

These are the mechanics that decide what a bad week costs, and they differ more than the headline fees.

The refund difference is real but small. On a $25 sale, Framekit's free plan keeps $1.25 more than Gumroad on a refund.

If you refund one sale in fifty, that is $25 a year at $2,000 a month in sales, which does not move the comparison. On Business the gap disappears because there is no Framekit fee to keep.

The payout difference is felt every week. Gumroad's weekly payout covers sales up to the previous Friday and holds each sale for at least seven days, behind a $100 minimum.

A seller making $300 a month waits for the balance to clear $100 each time. US creators can skip the wait with instant payouts, at 3% of the amount, once their account has processed for 60 days.

On Framekit the money is a Stripe balance in your own account from the moment the buyer pays, and Stripe moves it to your bank on your account's schedule.

Chargebacks cost about the same, but the work sits in a different place. Gumroad fights card disputes for you on sales it processed, which is genuinely less work.

With Framekit, the dispute lands in your Stripe dashboard and you write the evidence; Framekit emails you and marks the order as disputed, but the response is yours.

Our guide to refunds and chargebacks on digital products covers how to write that evidence for a download.

Sales Tax, VAT and Who Is the Merchant of Record

Gumroad has been the merchant of record for its sellers since 1 January 2025, which means it calculates, collects and remits sales tax and VAT on your sales worldwide, while Framekit charges your buyer through your own Stripe account and leaves every tax obligation with you.

Gumroad's pricing page puts it directly: it manages sales tax collection and remittance worldwide, and the tax settings that used to live in creators' dashboards were switched off.

You never register for EU VAT, never file a UK return, and never track US state thresholds.

Framekit works the other way, and it is worth being specific about what that means:

• You are the seller on the buyer's statement. Framekit creates the payment on your connected Stripe account; Framekit is not a party to the sale beyond its application fee.
• Framekit does not add tax at checkout. It does not calculate VAT or sales tax, so if you owe tax, your price has to carry it.
• EU and UK buyers are the hard case. A seller outside the EU owes VAT on digital sales to EU consumers from the first sale, usually through the EU's One Stop Shop, and a non-UK seller owes UK VAT on digital sales to UK consumers from the first sale too. EU-based sellers get a €10,000 a year threshold for cross-border digital sales before other countries' rates apply.
• US sales tax depends on state thresholds. Most states only require you to register once your sales into that state cross their economic nexus threshold, commonly $100,000 a year, and states disagree about whether digital downloads are taxable at all.

What that is worth in money. If your buyers are mostly in your own country and you are under its thresholds, Gumroad's tax handling is worth very little to you and the fee gap above is the whole story.

If a third of your buyers are in the EU and you live outside it, Gumroad is doing a job that otherwise costs registration, quarterly returns and either software or an accountant.

Our VAT on digital products guide and do you need a merchant of record walk through where the line usually falls.

Checkout, Payment Methods and File Delivery

Gumroad accepts more ways to pay than Framekit's checkout typically shows, including PayPal and local methods such as UPI in India, while Framekit's checkout offers whatever payment methods the seller has switched on in Stripe, which for a US buyer usually means card, Link and Cash App Pay.

Delivery is where small differences add up to support emails, so here is what each platform publishes.

Two rows matter more than they look. The 7-day link on Framekit means a buyer who loses their files in month three has to email you, and you resend a fresh link from the order.

On Gumroad they open the old receipt or log into the Library themselves. And if you extend a LUT pack every season, Framekit leaves telling past buyers to you; budget a short email per update, sent from the list your orders have built.

Where Gumroad Wins

Gumroad is the stronger choice for sellers who want the platform to be the legal seller, who sell anything recurring or licensed, or who get a meaningful share of sales from its marketplace, and no Framekit plan closes any of those gaps.

It is the merchant of record. This is the big one. Worldwide sales tax and VAT handled, no registrations, no returns.

For a seller in Australia selling LUTs to buyers in thirty countries, that is worth more than the fee difference at most volumes under $2,000 a month.

It sells more kinds of product. Gumroad's own pricing FAQ lists courses, tutorials and memberships alongside downloads, and its help centre covers license keys, pay-what-you-want pricing and affiliates who earn a share of each sale.

Framekit's store sells one-off downloads only, with no subscriptions, no license keys, no pay-what-you-want and no affiliate program.

Discover can find buyers you cannot. The 30% marketplace fee is steep, but it is only charged on sales the marketplace generated. A new seller with no audience gets a shelf in a busy shop that Framekit does not have.

It returns its fee on refunds. A small thing, but Gumroad's policy of handing back its own cut when you refund is kinder than Framekit's, which keeps its percentage.

It is free with no plan decisions. There is no plan to choose and nothing to pay until you sell, and at very low volume, a few sales a month, the convenience costs only a few dollars.

Verdict: if you sell globally and never want to see a VAT form, or you sell memberships, licensed software or courses, Gumroad is the better home and the fee is the price of that service. Readers weighing it against other hosted options should see Gumroad vs Lemon Squeezy, and anyone already feeling the 10% should read Gumroad's fees explained to see exactly when moving pays off.

Where Framekit Wins

Framekit wins for sellers whose buyers come from their own audience, because its fee falls to 0% on a flat $39 plan, the money lands in their own Stripe account at the moment of sale, and the product page sits on a portfolio site that also carries client galleries, video review and Slides.

Framekit is an AI website builder with a digital-download store built in, so the store is one part of an account that also holds your site, client galleries, Frame.io-style video review and decks, with storage pooled across them (10GB free, 50GB on Starter, 300GB on Pro, 2TB on Business).

The texture. You add a product with a file, a price and a cover, and Framekit gives it two front doors: a product section on your Framekit site, and a direct buy link at framekit.ai/buy that you can paste into a YouTube description or a link-in-bio with no website at all.

The checkout carries your name and logo, takes payment into your Stripe account, and shows the download the moment the payment clears.

The number that matters$0 in platform fees on Business, from the first sale. At $5,000 a month in sales that is $2,832 a year all-in with Stripe, against $9,660 on Gumroad.

The detail most comparisons missFramekit's fee is charged on the amount after a discount code. A $25 pack sold at 40% off for a launch pays 5% of $15, not of $25, so launch discounts do not pay a fee on money you never received.

The gotchathe checkout is not on your domain. Your product page can live on your own domain from Starter up, but the payment step always opens at framekit.ai/buy with a "Powered by Framekit" line, on every plan including Business.

And because you are the merchant, the VAT and sales tax work described above is yours.

Skip it ifyou need subscriptions, courses, license keys, affiliates or pay-what-you-want, or you want someone else to remit your VAT.

Verdict: for a photographer, filmmaker or designer selling presets, LUTs, templates or guides to people who already follow their work, Framekit keeps more of every sale than Gumroad at every volume we priced and gives the store a real site around it. The step-by-step setup is in our guides to selling Lightroom presets from your own website and selling LUTs online.

Selling From Your Own Site Instead of a Hosted Page

The practical difference between a Gumroad page and a Framekit store is where the buyer is standing before they pay: on a gumroad.com product page, or on your own site next to the photographs, films or designs that made them want the preset in the first place.

For visual products, that context does a lot of selling. A LUT pack converts better beside the graded film it came from; a preset pack sells beside the photographs that show it.

On Framekit, the product section is just another block on your site, so it can sit on the same page as a case study, a before-and-after grid or a reel.

Product pages are indexed under your domain, so a page titled after your preset pack earns search traffic for your name rather than for the platform.

There is also a reason to keep the hosted link in your pocket. Framekit's framekit.ai/buy links work without a site at all, which is the same job a Gumroad link does: paste it into a newsletter, a YouTube description or a link-in-bio.

If you want both, the site and the bare link point at the same product and the same Stripe account.

Our guide to selling a digital product from one link covers when the bare link is enough.

Switching From Gumroad to Framekit: A Checklist

Moving from Gumroad to Framekit is mostly a re-upload and a link swap, and the one decision to make before you start is what to do about tax, because Gumroad stops being your merchant of record on the day your first Framekit sale goes through.

The step most people skip is 8. Deleting products on Gumroad cuts off buyers who bought before the move, and that is the support inbox you were trying to escape.

How to Choose Between Gumroad and Framekit

Work through these questions in order, because the first three are about capabilities rather than price, and a yes to any of them settles Gumroad vs Framekit before the fee tables come into it.

1. Do you sell memberships, subscriptions, courses, license keys or pay-what-you-want products? If yes, Gumroad. Framekit sells one-off downloads only. If not, go to question 2.

2. Do you want someone else to be the legal seller and remit VAT and sales tax? If yes and a large share of buyers are abroad, Gumroad (or another merchant of record such as Lemon Squeezy).

If your buyers are mostly domestic and under thresholds, go to question 3.

3. Does Gumroad's Discover marketplace bring a meaningful share of your sales today? If yes, keep those products on Gumroad and consider running Framekit beside it for your own audience. If not, go to question 4.

4. Do you also need a portfolio site, client galleries or review links? If yes, Framekit, because all of them share one account and one storage pool. If not, go to question 5.

5. How much do you sell a month? Under $780, Framekit Free at 5% is the cheapest setup on either platform. Over $780, Framekit Business at $39 a month (or $31 billed yearly) is cheaper than every other option on this page.

6. Are you just testing an idea with a handful of sales? Either works; Gumroad has fewer decisions and Framekit gives you a site to grow into.

Frequently Asked Questions

Is Framekit cheaper than Gumroad?

Yes, Framekit is cheaper than Gumroad at every volume we priced. On a $25 product sold to US card buyers, Gumroad costs $966 a year at $500 a month in sales, $3,864 at $2,000 and $9,660 at $5,000, including processing.

Framekit's cheapest setup costs $546, $1,356 and $2,832 at the same volumes, using Free at the lowest volume and Business above it. Gumroad's price includes tax handling, which Framekit's does not.

How much does Gumroad take from a $25 sale in 2026?

Gumroad takes about $4.03 from a $25 direct sale to a US card buyer, leaving $20.97. That is its 10% plus $0.50 platform fee ($3.00) and card processing of 2.9% plus $0.30 ($1.03), which Gumroad's fee article says is not included.

A sale that comes through Gumroad's Discover marketplace pays a flat 30% instead, $7.50, with processing included.

Does Gumroad or Framekit refund its fee when I refund a buyer?

Gumroad returns its own fee on the refunded portion and keeps only the payment processing, so a refunded $25 sale costs you about $1.03.

Framekit keeps its fee when you refund, which is $1.25 on Free and Starter, $0.75 on Pro and nothing on Business, and Stripe keeps its original processing fee of about $1.03 as well.

Who handles VAT and sales tax, Gumroad or Framekit?

Gumroad does: it has been the merchant of record since 1 January 2025 and collects and remits sales tax and VAT worldwide. Framekit does not handle tax at all.

Payments go through your own Stripe account, you are the seller, and registering, charging and filing VAT or sales tax where you owe it is your responsibility.

Is Gumroad's 10% worth it just for the tax handling?

Gumroad's 10% is worth it if a large share of your buyers are in countries where you would otherwise have to register for VAT, such as EU buyers when you live outside the EU.

At $2,000 a month the gap to Framekit Business is about $2,500 a year, so compare that with what VAT registration, quarterly filing and software or an accountant would cost you.

For mostly domestic sales under state or national thresholds, it usually is not worth it.

What happens to my Gumroad buyers and their downloads if I move to Framekit?

Your past Gumroad buyers keep downloading from Gumroad as long as you leave those products live, because their receipts and Library point there. Only new sales move to Framekit.

Export your customer CSV from Gumroad first, and do not delete products until you are sure nobody still needs them.

How fast do I get paid on Gumroad compared with Framekit?

Framekit pays faster for most sellers because the money lands in your own Stripe account, and Stripe can pay out daily once the first payout (typically 7 to 14 days after your first live payment) has gone through.

Gumroad's weekly payouts cover sales up to the previous Friday, hold each sale for at least seven days and need a $100 balance; US creators can pay 3% for instant payouts.

What happens when a buyer files a chargeback?

On Gumroad, a chargeback is treated as a full refund: you cover the amount and the processing fees, Gumroad returns its platform fee and contests the dispute with any evidence you add within 72 hours.

On Framekit, the dispute arrives in your Stripe account, Stripe deducts the amount plus a $15 dispute fee for US accounts, and you respond in Stripe, paying another $15 that is returned if you win.

Can I sell subscriptions or memberships on Framekit?

No. Framekit's store sells one-off digital downloads only, with no recurring billing, memberships, courses, license keys, pay-what-you-want pricing or affiliate program.

If any of those is part of your income, Gumroad, Lemon Squeezy or a membership platform is the right tool, and you can still use Framekit for the site.

Does Framekit have a marketplace like Gumroad Discover?

No, Framekit has no marketplace, so every buyer comes from your own site, links, search traffic and audience. That is why it charges no 30% finder's fee, and it is also why a seller with no audience may get more first sales from Gumroad's Discover than from a new store.

Is the Framekit checkout on my own domain?

No. Your Framekit site and product pages can use your own domain from the Starter plan, but the payment step always opens on a hosted page at framekit.ai/buy with your name and logo and a "Powered by Framekit" line, on every plan.

Can I sell on Framekit without a website?

Yes. Every Framekit product gets a direct buy link at framekit.ai/buy that you can share anywhere, which works like a Gumroad link with no site behind it. Most sellers also put the product on a Framekit site, but the link works on its own.

Which is cheapest at $5,000 a month in sales?

Framekit Business is the cheapest of these options at $5,000 a month: $2,832 a year including Stripe processing on the carried $25 product, against $9,660 on Gumroad direct sales.

Gumroad's volume discount, 5% plus $0.50, only starts once paid sales pass $20,000 in a calendar month.

Gumroad vs Lemon Squeezy vs Framekit: which is best for a preset seller?

For a preset seller with their own audience, Framekit is the cheapest of the three above roughly $780 a month in sales and the only one that comes with a portfolio site.

Lemon Squeezy is the cheaper merchant of record, at 5% plus $0.50 with processing included, and Gumroad is the merchant of record with a marketplace.

Our Lemon Squeezy vs Framekit comparison prices that pairing in the same detail.

Final Verdict

Choose Framekit if you sell presets, LUTs, templates or guides to an audience that already follows your work, because at $2,000 a month its Business plan costs about a third of what Gumroad does, the money arrives in your own Stripe account, and the store sits on a site that also handles your client work.

Choose Gumroad if you want the platform to be the legal seller worldwide, if you sell memberships, courses, license keys or pay-what-you-want products, or if Discover brings you buyers you would not otherwise reach.

Those are capabilities, not prices, and no Framekit plan adds them.

Where Framekit loses, it loses clearly: it does not remit VAT or sales tax, does not sell anything recurring, does not push updated files to past buyers, and does not put the checkout on your own domain.

The trade-off is that you keep the margin and the site and take on the tax admin, and for a creator whose buyers are mostly at home, that trade usually pays.

Related reading: the best Gumroad alternatives ranks the wider field, Stripe fees for creators explains the processing line in every table above, and Framekit's pricing covers what each plan adds beyond the store.