This write-up on The Best 17 PayPal Alternatives is based on the analysis of all top payment processors.

PayPal was once among the most significant disruptions in the technology industry.

At the time, PayPal alternatives drew little interest.

In addition to letting you swiftly send and receive money from loved ones, PayPal prioritizes safety compared to other payment options.

PayPal was a good riddance, since both sellers and buyers on the eBay platform were growing increasingly wary, spurred by fraudulent cases.

PayPal also boasts a robust interface, eCommerce, payment processing, invoicing, and reporting tools that let you pay for services and products quickly.

And because people are used to PayPal, the payment processor remains popular.

Here, we’ll focus on the PayPal alternatives offering responsive customer service, lower rates, and a robust interface, and the PayPal alternatives this piece has trained its eyes on include;

The Best 17 PayPal Alternatives

Wepay

Wepay is a card processing solution mainly supporting online payments, though it’s yet to master a complementary in-store processing framework. The processor was set, right from launch, to go head-to-head with PayPal.

Though Wepay is yet to develop a solid brick-and-mortar framework, that shot in the arm doesn’t limit its online functionality.

You can quickly set up WePay and leverage its robust features to facilitate typical eCommerce transactions.

PayPal trails WePay in online crowdfunding. Wepay has optimized its API & features specifically befitting online crowdfunding transactions.

The payment processor works just fine with several other third-party services, except that it can’t accept payments from PayPal.

Wepay won’t bill you for anything else, except for a 1% + $0.30 ACH payment processing fee and a 2.9% + $0.30 fee for every single card transaction.

Pros

• No monthly charges for using Wepay
• You get to set up your account quickly
• Cut-out for crowdfunding
• Offers a flexible API
• Provides affordable ACH payment processing
• Wepay supports a wide array of online payment options

Cons

• Doesn’t accept payments from PayPal
• Provides no in-store card processing
• PayPal boasts of more robust eCommerce features than those of WePay

Google Pay

If you’re looking for a place to store and use credit and debit cards, Google Wallet is just what you need. Spending money online becomes comfortable with Google Pay.

And since you can add cards to your phone, you can spend at physical locations.

Pros

• Offers tight-lid security
• Sending and receiving payments takes a moment
• Google Business lets you accept Google Pay from clients both online and in person.
• There are zero fees, and your clients won’t get surcharged
• Google Pay features smartphone payments, both online and in-person

Cons

• Security still feels a bit unaccommodating
• Currently only available on iPhones and some Android phones

Klarna

Klarna is one payment processor deeply involved in your eCommerce fulfillment order process.

Klarna bore the bulk of the risk, as the AI system swiftly assesses an individual’s potential risk based on details, transaction history, and the time of purchase.

Afterward, Klarna approves or denies the purchase within seconds, and the fulfillment order ensues, allowing the client to shop conveniently. Finally, the customer has 14 days to clear the payment.

Unlike PayPal’s inconvenient registration process, which requires you to load up your account before you can finally transact, with Klarna, you don’t need to sign up for a service to link directly to your bank. Instead, proceed with the usual online banking details, authentication, and merchant payment transfers asap.

Pros

• Klarna pays merchants upon checkout
• Customers can make installment payments for their orders
• Customers complete payment of purchased products upon delivery
• Offers a convenient checkout process.’
• In case products get returned, clients don’t have to pay

Cons

• Customer refunds could take a bit of time
• Klarna’s customer support response is yet to hit the ace status
• Without any valid reason, purchases can be rescinded

Authorize.Net

Authorize.Net is another popular system for eCommerce stores, offering a user-friendly interface, high-quality customer service, and reasonable rates.

You don’t get to send or receive payments from friends & family with Authorize.Net, but it’s a quality PayPal alternative for those looking to accept payments and tap into the widely used gateway worldwide.

Pros

• You can sync with QuickBooks
• Your account comes with a free mobile app and swiper
• Zero setup fees for gateway payments and merchant accounts
• With more than a staggering 400,000 merchants, Authorize.Net must be ticking the right boxes
• Authorize.Net punches way above the competition in terms of security and reliability
• Offers the best free 24/7 support in the industry

Cons

• $25 applies to chargebacks
• In contrast to PayPal, you don’t get personal finance & sending functionalities
• Global sales attract a 1.5% assessment for international transactions
• $25 monthly gateway fees

PayPal Alternatives: Amazon Pay

Amazon Pay ranks high on the list for checkout from your online store, and, like PayPal, Amazon Payments speeds up the entire process.

The processor compares to a Facebook login, where user info is stored; thus, a login or checkout with Amazon Pay happens much faster than with a regular shopping cart and checkout.

Pros

• Owing to Amazon’s popularity, clients have it easy in making payments
• Amazon accounts offer an easy sign-up process with a user-friendly interface
• Transaction fees are similar to those of PayPal
• Amazon boasts of very advanced security, contrasting its competition

Cons

• Integration with your online store may require programming expertise.
• You’d incur arbitrary fees such as cross-border & domestic processing fees.

PayPal Alternatives: TransferWise

For international transfers, TransferWise is a bargain alternative to PayPal. TransferWise has introduced a multi-currency cross-border account that lets online businesses, freelancers, and consumers send, receive, and spend money across borders at reasonable fees.

TransferWise imposes a one-off upfront fee; no hidden charges. To move the money around, we’ll assume, for instance, you reside in the UK and need to send money to a friend in Norway.

Once you make a payment and the money is deposited into TransferWise’s UK bank account, using a real-time exchange rate, TransferWise pays your friend from Wise’s Norwegian bank account.

As such, money never crosses the border, making transfers swift and helping keep prices low.

Pros

• Transparent pricing 
• TransferWise Business lets you invoice customers in their preferred currency.
• With 4 million customers worldwide, TransferWise ranks among the most widely accepted and affordable tools for international transfers.
• And because money never crosses borders, you keep rates low and the transfer is fast.
• The introduced cross-border accounts let you hold and transfer funds in 40+ currencies.

Cons

• You won’t get extra features like recurring billing
• Unless it’s a bank transfer, you can’t send or receive money
• The borderless account only allows you to receive cash in GBP, AUD, EUR, and US dollars.

PayPal Alternatives: Shopify Payments

Shopify Payments comes as a default in-built payment processing system on the Shopify platform, and as such, you won’t have to worry about incorporating an external payment option. Right from Shopify’s central dashboard, you can conveniently manage your transaction processing system.

Read also: International Seller’s Guide To Shopify Payments

Besides enabling online payment, Shopify Payments provides POS hardware to facilitate well-synchronized in-store payments. 

Whereas using PayPal on Shopify incurs transaction fees of 0.5% to 2% above card processing charges, Shopify Payments charges zero transaction fees.

The accompanying benefits let you avoid paying card processing fees, whose rates vary by Shopify plan. Currently, with the Shopify Payments alternative, you’ll pay between 2.4% + $0.30 on the lower end and 2.9% + $0.30 on the higher end.

PayPal scheduled payouts take 5-7 business days, while Shopify Payments schedules payouts for every three (3) business days.

Pros

It works to offer a smooth payment processing management experience on 

• Shopify
• Shopify Payments integrates with multiple platforms & solutions, even third-party processors
• It qualifies you for zero transaction fees on Shopify
• It works just fine with several accounting apps, thus enabling accounting & reporting

Cons

• Shopify Payments deducts $15 for each chargeback
• Shopify Payments operates in a handful of countries
• Without notice, your account could be frozen and put under investigation

PayPal Alternatives: Skrill

On the surface, Skrill appears similar to PayPal, given the matching rates and fees. However, the simple interface and the prepaid debit card sets Skrill apart.

And because money is sent to the debit card asap, Skrill makes international payments much easier. The debit card lets you use your Skrill account at brick-and-mortar stores and ATMs.

Pros

• You can use a Skrill account from anywhere across the globe
• Account setup counts among the easiest in the industry
• You’ll need an email address to make & accept payments
• Spending at Skrill merchants, uploading & receiving funds costs close to nothing
• Skrill offers tight security 
• Skrill has put up a fully-fledged system catering to gambling and gaming options

Cons

• Going by reports, Skrill customer service does not enjoy glowing tributes.
• A 1% fee applies to money sent to an email address or another Skrill wallet; the charges cap at $ 10. You might find your account frozen owing to the company’s strict fraud prevention tools, though the same happens with PayPal.

PayPal Alternatives: Payoneer

As with Skrill, Payoneer also offers you both an online account and a debit card. Sending and accepting take just one step, making shopping online a smooth experience.

Payoneer has a global presence in the payments market, with features that let you get paid & send payments to customers & marketplaces.

The debit card lets you use your Payoneer account at brick-and-mortar stores and ATMs.

Pros

• It won’t take long to set up an account.
• Payoneer is available worldwide.
• You can quickly access funds at an ATM or from your bank account.
• Transacting on the system requires no programming know-how, and you can soon get your money.
• Payoneer offers tools & integrations that freelancers find helpful for accepting payments from customers, especially international payments.
• Payoneer has a simple monthly billing, and payments between Payoneer accounts cost nothing.

Cons

• Expect to pay high fees on the ATM
• With Payoneer, you won’t find any gateway
• Payoneer’s customer service gets no such glowing acknowledgments from users
• Accepting credit cards attracts high fees
• With Payoneer, you’ll have to pay to transfer to a bank account, contrary to PayPal’s free bank transfer

PayPal Alternatives: Braintree

Disclaimer: PayPal owns Braintree; however, that has not deterred them from competing independently with PayPal.

Just like Google Pay, Braintree stores your credit cards and, in addition to offering recurring billing, provides a payment gateway. Much as Braintree packs personal finance functionality, it works just fine for merchants.

Pros

• Provides a unique marketplace payment system
• Simple, straightforward pricing
• Offers more advanced features than PayPal
• Allows both online and mobile payments
• Has solid customer support
• Braintree accepts all kinds of payment methods, like Venmo, PayPal, and cards
• Store credit cards & collects recurring billing

Cons

• You require a separate account for the system to function
• You’ll need some programming know-how to have Braintree on your website
• Besides the transaction fees, you have a listing of other expenses to consider

PayPal Alternatives: Dwallo

Although Dwallo flies under the radar, it compares to PayPal and is therefore worth a look. In addition to letting you send and accept funds from individuals and companies, Dwallo is big on ACH bank transfers; as such, it’s your best bet for both sending and receiving many bank transfers.

Dwallo isn’t a card processing solution, quite a departure from what PayPal offers. Instead, it allows money transfer by directly linking with your bank account.

The thing with quashing the cards is that it helps keep the transaction costs low. In principle, Dwallo aims to help everyone with an internet-enabled device send money at the lowest possible price.

In executing the low-pricing objective, processing funds under $10 incurs zero, and each transaction above $10 incurs a fixed rate of $0.25.

Dwallo’s pricing model makes PayPal’s 2.9% + $0.30 fee seem inflated, especially when handling a large volume of transactions.

For instance, an entrepreneur handling 10 transactions worth $100 each with Dwolla incurs $2.5, whereas the same is deducted $32.

Pros

• Transaction fees cost only $0.25 
• Offers instant cash transfer
• Offers next-day transfer at a flat fee
• Provides easy-to-use, robust branding tools
• Senders pay transaction fees if needed
• Makes bank transfer easy
• If in a marketplace, automation of mass payouts is possible

Cons

• Dwolla’s monthly fee is quite inflated
• Those outside the US can’t have a Dwolla account
• Both sender and receiver must have a Dwolla account for payments to go through

PayPal Alternatives: 2Checkout

In this review, 2Checkut ranks highly primarily because it accepts payments from across the globe. As alluded to already, PayPal still limits the countries from which you can accept payments, while 2Checkout is set to change that.

2Checkout’s fees in the US correspond to PayPal’s prices. However, some countries offer better rates for accepting customer payments.

For payment pricing, calculate which is the most affordable between 2Checkout and PayPal.

2Checkout is undoubtedly among the best alternatives to PayPal, especially for international payments. Regardless of where you base, fuss not.

Pros

• You can accept significant payments from PayPal, debit, and credit cards (Maestro, MasterCard, Visa)
• You won’t incur monthly or setup fees
• Set up recurring billing for your clients
• You get to choose from eight payment types, 15 languages, and 87 currencies
• You can link a merchant account with a payment gateway
• Let’s you integrate with sandbox, API, & more than 100 online carts
• You get the privilege of fraud protection that encompasses more than 300 security rules for every single transaction
• Offers access to several branded, localized, and mobile-friendly checkout options

Cons

• Currency conversion draws an average of 2-5% on top of the daily bank exchange rate
• Payments from clients outside the US attract a 1% fee
• $20 applies to your account for all chargebacks

PayPal Alternatives: Stripe

You may have noticed that some eCommerce platforms list Stripe as the preferred payment processor, possibly because it’s the most prominent PayPal alternative. 

For a long time now, Squarespace, for instance, has worked with Stripe. And currently, Shopify administers its Shopify Payments system via Stripe.

Stripe presents itself as a highly streamlined alternative, which is no wonder it’s popular with so many eCommerce platforms. Stripe handles all aspects, from collecting payments to sending them to the bank—including Bitcoin transactions & ACH payments.

More or less, Stripe’s transaction fees are similar to those of PayPal

Pros

• Pay is only for what you use
• Stripe supports both Android & Apple Pay
• Accepts money from people & companies from across the globe
• Stripe automatically deposits transaction funds into a bank account
• You won’t incur setup, monthly, or hidden fees thanks to the transparent pricing model
• Allows for mobile payments
• Allows for real-time reporting

Cons

• The interface may call for some programming know-how
• It’s only Australia, Canada, the UK, the US, and several European countries that offer merchant accounts
• To access your funds, you often’ll need to wait a couple of days after the transaction
• An additional 1% transaction fee applies to international cards

PayPal Alternatives: Square

In comparing PayPal with other solutions, Square counts among the leading alternatives to pop up.

It’s an open secret that PayPal dwarfs Square in popularity because only merchants based in Canada, Japan, the US, and the UK accept credit card payments with Square.

Square isn’t your ordinary payment processor, as it offers an online store, domain, virtual terminal, invoicing, card vault, and shopping cart integration.

Both POS & mPOS integrations are among the free supplementary provisions that help with card processing.

Over the years, Square has undoubtedly done well for itself. Offering extensive features that appeal to small businesses, Square has expanded its user base. 

Add-on solutions such as payroll, employee management, and appointment booking extend the complete Square platform.

For transaction fees, Square has retained the industry-standard rates, which are also available with other payment processors. Online and invoiced payments, for instance, incur a 2.9% + $0.30 fee, whereas in-store card processing charges are 2.75%.

As a payment processing option, Square offers remarkable value.

Pros

• Square is an extensive all-in-one payment processor
• It offers a free domain and online store
• No monthly fees
• Best suiting low-volume merchants
• The extra add-ons provide room for business growth

Cons

• The solution is only available in Australia, the UK, Canada, Japan, and the US
• Not the best gateway to high-risk merchants
• As a third-party payment aggregator, Square accounts pose unreliability

PayPal Alternatives: Worldpay

Formerly trading as RBS Worldpay, Worldpay is yet another payment processing platform that poses significant competition to PayPal, given its global network and support for a wide range of payment options, including debit & credit cards.

Like PayPal, Worldpay offers both offline & online card transactions; therefore, Worldpay can help both your in-store and eCommerce business.

Worldpay supports a wide range of offline payment channels. Also, you can leverage its POS systems, ATM processing, and mobile payment systems that work to accept cash and credit card payments.

Worldpay has verified its pricing system and modeling to offer interchange-plus & tiered packages. Both your transaction history & average monthly processing volume are primary factors that determine the monthly amount you pay.

For instance, each offline transaction attracts a standard 2.9%+$0.30/

Pros

• 24/7 customer support
• Flexible pricing model
• Worldpay offers an extensive payment network
• Interchange plus pricing enhances transparency
• Supports a horde of offline processing options

Cons

• The free terminal offer misleads
• You’ll be tied to your contract for three years
• An early service termination fee is $295

QuickBooks Payments

This payment processor provides a comprehensive set of tools tailored to your business requirements. The processor is well-known, and it lets you get paid with the QuickBooks tool.

Intuit lets you integrate QuickBooks for accounting functionality; as such, it’s among the best solutions.

Pros

• Like PayPal, you send invoices
• Accept an ACH transfer
• Allows for mobile payments anywhere
• Integrate with QuickBooks
• Link your payments with the timesheet & payroll
• Allows access to TurboTax
• It’s possible to embed the Pay Now button on your site

Cons

• For personal sending and receiving funds, this PayPal isn’t the best solution.
• It’s only without QuickBooks that the processor offers competitive prices

Payline

Payline facilitates the typical eCommerce checkout process with a wide array of solutions, from in-store to mobile to online payments. However, the payment processor is best suited for in-store payments.

On the retail front, Payline elbows PayPal because it’s more flexible and much cheaper. Unlike a static standard pricing system, Payline offers a dynamic interchange-plus pricing model. It means fees can vary consistently depending on the types of cards you process.

The interchange-plus pricing system fosters transparency in payment processing, but the only downside is that you can’t estimate future expenses with the model.

Although PayPal offers you the headroom to forecast future costs by charging a reasonable static rate of 2.7% for offline transactions, you incur less with Payline guaranteed.

The package you opt into dictates the features you get for card processing; for instance, Payline offers a bargain with its Spark & Surge packages, well-tailored for small businesses that work just fine with a mobile reader. 

Although the Payline Shop package offers access to tabletop card readers and other reliable card processing features, enterprises pay top dollar for it. It’s the most expensive.

Payline Shop’s option pales in comparison to PayPal’s inflexible in-store card processing, which comes with two card readers, and only one reader supports EMV. However, PayPal redeems itself by outshining Payline in the arena of commerce transactions.

Pros

• Payline facilitates mobile payments.
• The interchange-plus pricing model provides transparency and flexibility.
• Payline offers cut-price offline transaction fees lower than PayPal’s
• Payline’s API enables integration with third-party solutions and platforms
• Payline offers a diverse array of credit card processing solutions, complete with a sound supporting hardware framework

Cons

• PayPal’s eCommerce payment processing features are superior to Payline’s
• The interchange plus pricing system makes it hard to estimate future costs
• Presently, Payline only serves the US

Final Word

In the past, people were reluctant to migrate from PayPal due to rampant compatibility issues, but not anymore. Now you find more sound solutions to help facilitate business in different parts of the globe.

Compared to other options, PayPal’s rates lag, and make no mistake: PayPal has had its fair share of legal suits. That’s not to say you ought to rule out PayPal in totality, no. Just get to savor the best alternative to PayPal’s taste.

You stand to save big and end up liking your payment processor of choice —you never know.

Some of the payment processors in this write-up are best suited for personal sending & accepting, while others are ideal for eCommerce payments. Alternatively, you can collect & send ACH bank transfers. 

If you are looking for the best international payments, go with TransferWise. Authorize.Net & Stripe rank high for eCommerce transactions, whereas Google gets it right with card storage.

Consider 2Checkout to help with completing transactions in any country. But if you’re looking for a close PayPal replica, opt for Skrill or Dwolla.

Hit us up in the comments below if you have questions or comments about the best PayPal alternative.

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