Editor Sebastiaan Smits ·
Published November 5, 2026 · Updated November 5, 2026
Brands look past Recharge when the stacked fee (monthly plan, a percentage and 20 cents per transaction) outgrows what they use, or when they want a vendor with no link to the market leader. Most go to Loop or Smartrr, or to Seal at small volume.
Short answer: The closest replacements for Recharge in our subscription commerce software ranking are Loop Subscriptions, Smartrr and Seal Subscriptions. Choose Loop Subscriptions if you want a Shopify-only app with a percentage fee and no per-order charge. We took the other 12 from the Best Subscription Commerce Software in 2026 ranking too, and each is compared with Recharge alone, noting where staying put is the better call.
Vendors can pay for more visibility on this website, for example a higher place in a ranking or more room on a page. Commercial relationships can also affect which products we feature and how prominently. Every vendor link is marked the same, whatever the arrangement behind it. The first three alternatives go to challengers, vendors outside the best-known brands in a category, wherever the category has them; the established names follow in their ranked order. How it works: placement disclosure · editorial process.
Starter is $149 a month plus 1.50% and 20 cents per transaction, and Scale is $499 plus 1.25% and 20 cents. SMS is charged per message segment on Scale. Competitors that drop the per-order charge look cheaper at the same volume.
Customizable bundles, tiered discounts, gifting, A/B tests of subscriber journeys, Concierge SMS and the JavaScript SDK are listed under Scale, not Starter. Migration support is also listed there.
Skio's own blog says Skio is joining Recharge, with both platforms kept for now. Buyers who wanted a rival to Recharge now find its closest competitor under the same owner.
Listed from best to weakest fit for people moving off Recharge. The rightmost column shows where we rank each one out of 14.
| # | Alternative | Headquarters | Switch if | Our rank |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 |  Loop Subscriptions | United States | you want a Shopify-only app with a percentage fee and no per-order charge | #2 |
| 2 |  Smartrr | United States | you want month-to-month terms and a flat 1% share of subscriber sales | #3 |
| 3 |  Seal Subscriptions | Slovenia | you have a small or mid-sized subscriber base and want no cut of renewals | #1 |
| 4 |  Stay AI | United States | you want all retention features in one plan and accept a year contract or a higher monthly fee | #10 |
| 5 |  Bold Subscriptions | Canada | your priority is a low fixed fee and a published price ladder | #7 |
| 6 |  Appstle Subscriptions | United States | you want memberships and loyalty from the same vendor as subscriptions | #8 |
| 7 |  Ordergroove | United States | you run several storefronts or platforms and will go through a sales process | #14 |
| 8 |  Shopify Subscriptions | Canada | you only need a basic offer and want to drop a second vendor | #9 |
| 9 |  Subbly | United Kingdom | you are willing to replatform off Shopify and want store and subscriptions in one product | #5 |
| 10 |  PayWhirl | United States | you sell on a site other than Shopify or need white-label portals | #12 |
| 11 |  Awtomic | United States | you run a wine club or allocation-based membership on Shopify | #11 |
| 12 |  WooCommerce Subscriptions | United States | you run WooCommerce and want to own the stack with no fee on renewals | #13 |
| 13 |  Skio | United States | you want a single all-features plan and accept that Recharge now owns the vendor | #6 |
Starter is $99 a month with a 1.0% transaction rate and no per-order fee, so the 20 cents per transaction Recharge charges disappears. Pro at $399 adds a named success manager, win-back campaigns and API access at 0.75%. Built for Shopify only.
Switch from Recharge if you want a Shopify-only app with a percentage fee and no per-order charge.
Plans run month to month at $99, $299 and from $499, each plus 1% of subscriber sales and with a 30-day trial. The vendor states there are no forced upgrades. Build-a-box and loyalty sit on the top tier, and it integrates with Klaviyo and Gorgias.
Switch from Recharge if you want month-to-month terms and a flat 1% share of subscriber sales.
Free up to 50 subscriptions, then tiers capped by subscriber count with a 0% transaction fee, so a store with 250 subscribers pays $9.95 a month. Higher tiers add a cancellation flow and a custom email domain. Analytics and retention polish trail the larger vendors.
Switch from Recharge if you have a small or mid-sized subscriber base and want no cut of renewals.
Standard is $299 a month plus 1% and 19 cents a transaction on an annual contract, or $499 a month without one, with every feature included either way. Churn surveys, winback campaigns, predictive analytics and A/B tests are part of the list. No trial is shown.
Switch from Recharge if you want all retention features in one plan and accept a year contract or a higher monthly fee.
Three tiers at $24.99, $49.99 and $74.99 a month with unlimited subscribers on each, and a percentage that falls from 2% to 0.9%. The vendor says its team handles migrations from other apps. Support is standard on every plan, and the app has a 30-day trial.
Switch from Recharge if your priority is a low fixed fee and a published price ladder.
Sells subscriptions, memberships, loyalty and bundles as separate products, each priced on its own page, so a single bill is unlikely. The vendor offers merchant migration help and runs comparison pages aimed at Recharge users. Its offices are listed in Menlo Park, Canada and India.
Switch from Recharge if you want memberships and loyalty from the same vendor as subscriptions.
Aimed at larger retailers, with integrations for Shopify, BigCommerce, Commercetools, Adobe Commerce and Salesforce. It covers bundles, clubs, digital access and memberships, and introduced AI agents in June 2026. No price is published; it sells by demo and quote.
Switch from Recharge if you run several storefronts or platforms and will go through a sales process.
Free to install, with only normal Shopify payment processing fees. It handles weekly, monthly or yearly plans, customer pause, skip and cancel, point-of-sale sales and moving contracts in from other apps. Bundles, cancellation-offer builders and dunning tuning are not part of it.
Switch from Recharge if you only need a basic offer and want to drop a second vendor.
Replaces the storefront as well as the subscription app, at $79 a month ($59 billed yearly) or $199 for stores with a team, plus 1% and 19 cents a transaction. Migration is free and the vendor says your data and payment tokens stay yours.
Switch from Recharge if you are willing to replatform off Shopify and want store and subscriptions in one product.
Fees fall as the plan rises: the Shopify app runs from Free at 3% to Scale at $149 a month and 0.75%, while other sites use a separate grid. The comparison table lists data export, white-label portals and MRR and churn reports. Weaker on physical-goods retention.
Switch from Recharge if you sell on a site other than Shopify or need white-label portals.
One Professional plan at $299 a month plus 1% per order ($249 on a one-year minimum), with unlimited subscriptions and migration help. Built around wine clubs: allocations, batch billing on release day, ShipCompliant and Avalara links. Shopify and Shopify Plus only.
Switch from Recharge if you run a wine club or allocation-based membership on Shopify.
A WordPress extension at 252 euros for one year with a 30-day money-back guarantee, running on your own hosting. No vendor takes a cut of renewals, and it works with more than 25 payment gateways. Retention tools need further extensions, and hosting is your job.
Switch from Recharge if you run WooCommerce and want to own the stack with no fee on renewals.
One plan at $499 a month billed annually ($599 monthly) plus 1.25% and 20 cents on subscription orders, with no feature gating. Skio's own blog says it is joining Recharge and both platforms keep running for now, so moving there is not a move away from the owner.
Switch from Recharge if you want a single all-features plan and accept that Recharge now owns the vendor.
Recharge is the right choice for a Shopify brand with a team that wants every lever in one product and will use bundles, A/B tests, SMS and the SDK. Scale lists hands-on implementation and migration support, and Custom adds priority technical support. At that scope the per-order fee is part of the price of the tooling.
Run the CSV exports from the Export Builder before you cancel. Recharge's terms say to complete the export before cancelling, and stored data may be deleted 30 days after the account is deleted. Linked records appear as IDs, so run related exports as well.
Custom plans run on 12-month terms according to the pricing page FAQ, and the order form terms say ending early can trigger liquidated damages. Read your own order form for the term and plan the cutover around its end date.
Recharge's help center says cancelling the merchant account does not notify subscribers. Whichever platform you move to, plan how existing contracts and payment methods are carried over, and ask the new vendor what its migration help covers.
Yes, the merchant portal has an Export Builder that produces CSV files for subscriptions, customers and other records. Some exports reference related records only by ID, so run the matching Customers or Addresses export too. Dates in the CSV files are in Eastern Time.
A merchant without a contract can cancel from the billing settings in the merchant portal, after a short survey. A merchant on a contract has to go through the account manager or support. Cancelling does not notify your subscribers.
Access to the account and uploaded content ends on termination. The terms say Recharge may begin deleting stored data 30 days after the account is deleted. The terms ask you to finish any export before you cancel.
On Custom plans, yes: the pricing FAQ says they run on 12-month terms. The terms say ending an order form early, for a reason other than Recharge's breach, can trigger liquidated damages. Check your own order form for the exact amount.
No, not any more. Skio's own blog says it is joining Recharge and that both platforms keep running while the teams decide how to combine them. If independence of ownership matters, compare Loop, Smartrr or Seal instead.
Fees stay fixed during each order-form term unless the form says otherwise, per the terms. Starter can be upgraded at any time, and Scale-level features require the higher plan. The pricing page does not state what happens at renewal.
We opened the vendors' own pages on November 5, 2026 to confirm each price and limit quoted for Recharge and its rivals. Those pages move without warning, so the numbers describe that day only.
Sebastiaan Smits, Founder, wrote, edited and fact-checked this page.
Founder of The Interregnum and of 2 Steps Ahead, an AI search visibility agency. Editorially responsible for every page here; research and drafting are AI-assisted. Last reviewed November 5, 2026.
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