kajabi alternatives

Seriously in search of the best FREE and PAID Kajabi alternative for 2023?

I got you.

Want to jump straight to the answer? The best Kajabi alternative for this year is Teachable.com (best for online courses) while Podia.com is currently the best cheapest alternative.

Kajabi is one of the top platforms for hosting your online course and running your entire online knowledge broker business.

But here you are searching for its alternatives.

The platform comes with a suite of products enabling you to run your blog, host your courses, build landing pages, pipelines, email marketing, and many more.

Well, the software has some disadvantages which might want you to look into some of the Kajabi competitors.

If you are looking for the right alternatives to Kajabi, this blog post is the right place to be.

In this round-up piece, I’ll be highlighting and reviewing the best Kajabi alternatives and show you how they can suit your online course hosting and creation needs.

Let’s dive in, right away!

Below are our Best Kajabi Alternatives & Competitors for 2023

Now let’s get into the details of each of the alternatives, features, and how pretty they look:

#1. Teachable (Overall best)

Teachable platform

Our favorite pick. And our overall best Kajabi alternative. Teachable.

Teachable is an online course platform and Kajabi competitor that has features that allow you to create and sell an online course even if they have no technical skills.

With Teachable.com, you can upload and host your entire course content.

Build your online course website or sales page, engage and interact with your students, and sell your courses as well.

Teachable is easy to use, all-in-one course creation solution integrating plenty of core features useful for building and selling an online course into one single hosted platform.

You essentially get the infrastructure to build your course website and host your courses.

Plus you have total control over your courses, pricing, marketing strategy, and student data.

Teachable offers a free plan and three paid plans.

All plans would offer you unlimited content storage, courses, and bandwidth.

On the free plan, you’re only charged a transaction fee of $1+10% on course sales and can only have up to 10 students in your school.

The next plan is the Basic Plan which allows you to have an unlimited number of students in your school and costs $39/month. You’ll also have to pay a 5% transaction fee.

Moreover, if you enable BackOffice, there will be an additional 2% fee, taking the transaction fee to 7% which is definitely on the higher side.

The most popular Teachable plan is the Professional Plan and it costs $99/month giving you access to most of the features that Teachable offers with no need to pay a transaction fee.

The fourth plan is the Business Plan which is more suitable for enterprise clients. It costs $499/month and allows you to have up to 25 owners/authors in your school.

You’ll get a discount in the range of 20-25% if you get to choose an annual plan instead of a monthly plan.

Overall, Teachable is a great online course creation tool and is great, suitable, and easy to use for both beginners as well as advanced users.

#2. Podia (best for digital downloads and memberships)

Podia

Podia is an excellent online course creation solution. It is the simplest solution out there for creating and selling online courses and memberships.

The tool lets you host and deliver your content, build a beautiful storefront, and start selling them.

And the best part is you require zero technical knowledge or coding skills.

Here are some of the features podia offers:

  • Sell online courses and create a membership site
  • Host your videos unlimitedly via Wistia
  • Sell your digital downloads
  • Deliver your course professionally through the inbuilt course player
  • Create a highly converting sales page for your course
  • Accept payments through PayPal or Stripe
  • Manage your affiliate marketing program
  • Create and manage automated email campaigns
  • Charge a one-time fee, a recurring subscription, or even a payment plan.

About pricing, Podia doesn’t cost as high as Kajabi which is one benefit it has over the latter.

There are two plans for getting Podia – the Mover Plan for $39/month and the Shaker Plan for $79/month.

Podia Pricing

There are no transaction fees on each pricing plan and you get instant payouts on both plans.

Plus, you’ll get a FREE 14-day trial to try out the platform on either of its pricing plans.

And fantastically, you don’t even need a credit card to start the trial.

Also, you can get a 15% lifetime discount if you purchase one of the premium plans within the first five days of starting your trial.

Personally, I think Podia is the best fit Kajabi alternative because it offers solid online course creation features and provides an amazing solution to host and deliver your courses at a decent, beginner-friendly price.

Plus, the digital download feature is amazing!

Take a look inside for FREE (for 14-days)and see why Podia would work better for you.

#3. Thinkific

Thinkific

Thinkific is an all-in-one learning management system that gives all you need to create, market, and sell your own online courses with ease.

Their platform boasts of over 36,000-course creators, including some big names and features such as:

  • Unlimited Students (Unlimited Courses for all paid plans)
  • Upload and Host Course In various Formats
  • Build and customize your Sales Page from
  • Available templates
  • Integration with various  payment processors (Stripe and PayPal)
  • Integration with Email Marketing service providers
  • Give Quizzes, Assignments, and Badges/Certificates to students
  • Community/Discussion forums or students

The above tools and features are designed to help you get your course up and running and:

  • Build your brand and grow your audience
  • Start selling immediately
  • Create compelling content
  • Scale your business

Thinkific allows you to use their core features like content hosting with a free forever Thinkific plan.

The next plan is the Basic plan which costs $49/month, their PRO Plan goes for $99/month and their Premier plan goes for $499/mo.

There are no transaction fees for any of their plans (including the free plan) but they take a 10% cut of your course profits.

#4. Kartra

Kartra tool

Kartra is easy to use sales funnel builder, course creation platform, and marketing tool that houses essential features you will ever need to run your business online.

If you’re looking for the best all-in-one replacement and alternative to Kajabi, then Kartra is the path to go.

The platform has a lot of outstanding marketing features like:

  • Professional drag and drop Page Editor to build your pages
  • A ton of templates for a sales page, squeeze page, coming soon, checkout, etc.
  • Pre-written sale copy samples on each of the templates you get
  • A/B Split testing to test variations of your funnel, pages, headlines, colors, and more.
  • Kartra Mails Automation to send customized responses to your customers based on their actions within your sales funnel
  • Kartra Marketing Campaigns gives you done-for-you campaigns created by world-class marketers.
  • Course and Membership Platform to host all your online courses (even videos) and give restricted access to contents
  • Customer support help desk tool that takes care of your customer service system
  • Rewarding affiliate centers allows you to manage an affiliate program
  • Kartra Integrations with various payment processors, email marketing tools, Membership platform, SMS services, and Zapier
  • Marketplace to find affiliates to sell your digital products and become one yourself.

Kartra gives out all these features via 4 pricing plans which are based on the size of your business.

Starting from:

  • The Starter Plan for $99/month
  • The Silver Plan for $199/month
  • The Gold Plan for $299/month
  • The Platinum Plan for $499/month

Each lower plan comes with some limitations plus you’ll get a 14-Day trial for $1.

And Kartra also gives a 25% discount when you get pay annually.

In summary, Kartra offers you a ton of marketing solutions like page builder, course hosting platform, video hosting solution, shopping cart software, helpdesk software, email service, automation tool, CRM tool, membership and affiliate center, heatmap app, analytics, and tracking tool, calendar/booking app and an affiliate marketplace in one place.

Like I said earlier:

Hands down, Kartra is the best all-in-one Kajabi alternative and I’ll highly recommend trying it out.

You can read our Kartra vs Kajabi to find out more.

#5. ClickFunnels

ClickFunnels funnel creator and designer

ClickFunnels is an all-in-one solution that helps you build sales pages, sales funnels, host your courses, set up a membership site, and market your message to the world.

With ClickFunnels, you have access to the following marketing features that help you to build:

  • Sales pages
  • Squeeze pages
  • Landing pages
  • Membership sites
  • Affiliate program centers
  • Webinar pages/funnels
  • Checkout pages
  • And a whole lot MORE!

And you DON’T need to know how to code to use ClickFunnels.

ClickFunnels claims to provide to online business owners and marketers everything they need to market, sell and deliver their products and services online without having to hire or rely on a tech team.

It might sound too hard to believe.

But having over 100,000 customers proves it so, right?

It comes with an intuitive drag-and-drop page builder that allows you to arrange page elements with ease and build your business in one place.

Here are some of the ClickFunnels useful features:

  • All-In-One marketing solution
  • Drag & Drop page builder functionality
  • Allows You To Share Funnel
  • A/B split testing
  • Integrations with various third-party marketing tools
  • FunnelFlix (marketing training for entrepreneurs)
  • Profitable affiliate program
  • An excellent customer support team, community & culture

ClickFunnels has two pricing options for you to choose from.

There is the Startup plan which goes for $97/month and the ClickFunnels Platinum Plan for $297/month.

You can read my ClickFunnels vs Kajabi review here.

Plus, you’ll get a 14-day FREE trial to test and see if ClickFunnels is a GREAT fit for creating courses and a good replacement for Kajabi.

#6. GrooveFunnels (best free and cheaper alternative)

GrooveFunnels lifetime

GrooveFunnels is currently the cheapest and also a free alternative to Kajabi available right now.

This is a suite of software applications to help build your entire sales funnels, websites, membership sites, sell your digital products, and do a bunch of other things.

However, they are currently in the beta launch stage.

That’s why they’re currently giving a free forever plan to their users.

It consists of the following solutions (though most of its tools are still in the work):

  • GroupPages: The website, page, and funnel builder
  • GrooveMember: The membership area and course creation platform
  • GrooveSell: Special checkout/shopping cart system
  • GrooveMail: Built-in email marketing and CRM
  • WebinarGroove: Webinar platform
  • GrooveAffiliate: Sales and affiliate platform with marketplace
  • Plus, lots more…

Like I said earlier, you can test drive this platform for free without entering your card details.

You also keep your free account for life.

But this free deal is going away pretty soon.

Though there would be limitations on the free plan, you can choose to upgrade later.

#7. BuilderAll

Builderall funnel software

Builderall is an online platform that lets you build businesses from scratch or grow your online store.

According to its official website, Builderall now has over 40,000 users and more than 500,000 websites. The tool provides you various tools that you can use to create a website, blog, sales funnel, and even online courses.

BuilderAll offers you the following tops and features in your business:

  • Simple and customizable drag-and-drop page builder
  • Email marketing tool 10,000 leads.
  • Checkout application
  • Affiliate system
  • Integration with third-party Tools
  • Site protection with SSL
  • Unlimited bandwidth and site visitors,
  • A ticketing support system
  • Automatic daily backups
  • Webinar and streaming platform
  • Evergreen webinar with ghost audience,
  • iOS/Android app builder
  • CRM
  • directory builder, and Facebook Messenger chatbot.
  • Video tags tool
  • Auto tag funnels
  • Site bot builder
  • eLearning platform
  • SMS & WhatsApp messaging.
  • Canvas funnel builder which is exclusive to the platform, as well as email marketing workflow.

From the above features – it’s clearly obvious that BuilderAll can be categorized as an all-in-one platform. But it comes associated with some cons like clunky and inconsistent editing interface.

However, not bad to be called a Kajabi alternative.

Builderall offers two plans: the Essential and Premium plans.

The essential plan costs $29.99 per month while the premium Builderall plan costs $69.90 each month.

#8. LearnDash

LearnDash

If you’re a WordPress user and fan, then this is one of the best Kajabi competitors I’ll highly recommend you to check out.

LearnDash is the most powerful LMS (learning management system) WordPress plugin and is one of the top choices for many businesses, universities, and training organizations.

The plugin gives you lots of features and total control over your course content and delivery.

It allows you to create and design your course according to your standards and taste.

You’re also able to interact with students, create forums, give out awards and certificates, and a lot more.

Plus, it has a basic in-built shopping cart functionality that you can comfortably use with another shopping cart plugin like WooCommerce.

Here are the core features:

  • Powerful course builder
  • Drip-feed content
  • Advanced quizzing
  • Create course forums
  • Certificates and badges
  • Gradebook
  • Course points
  • Different course bundles & subscription options
  • Email triggers
  • Mobile compatibility and responsiveness

LearnDash is really affordable with their Basic plan going for $199/year (1 Site License) and their Pro plan for $369/year (25 Sites License).

Although they do not free trials. If you purchase and decide within 30 days that LearnDash isn’t going to be the right fit for your project, you are eligible for reimbursement.

Also, you may need to buy premium add-ons alongside the plugin for added functionality.

In summary, LearnDash is the best Kajabi WordPress alternative and I can’t recommend it enough.

#9. LifterLMS

LifterLMS

LifterLMS is another cool WordPress Learning Management System plugin that allows you to that makes it easy to create, sell, and protect engaging online courses and training-based membership websites.

This is the second-best WordPress Kajabi alternative after LearnDash.

Just like LearnDash, it also works with any well-coded WordPress theme and all the popular WordPress page builders (like Elementor, Divi, etc.).

Apart from allowing you to create engaging online courses on your already built WordPress site – LifterLMS is also pretty easy to set up and offers a wonderful learning experience.

Plus lots of other cool functionalities.

Some features include:

  • Quizzes
  • Drip content
  • Certifications and badges
  • Discussion areas
  • Set payment types, plans, and modes
  • Offer coupons
  • Community feature
  • Course management features

LifterLMS pricing options start from Individual add-ons at $99 per year (one site) to $999 per year.

Final Thoughts

In order to choose the best online course platform that would ultimately replace Kajabi, you need to consider a few things like the page builder, design features, course content hosting, email marketing & automation, learning curve, and price.

Out of all the software reviewed in this post, Teachable ticks a lot of boxes and is the best Kajabi alternative.

Has all the advanced course hosting and membership features both new and professional course builders desires.

With reasonable pricing and fast support.

Then, followed by Podia.

Podia is a simple and excellent course creation solution for creating and selling online courses and memberships.

It allows you to host and deliver your content with zero technical knowledge or coding skills. And it comes at $$39 per month for the base plan.

And to cap it all – their customer service is pretty SOLID!

You can get Podia Free 14days trial at the official website https://www.podia.com/

However, if you want an all-in-one solution that performs more functions than just creating courses, then you should go for Kartra.

Kartra is the best with an awesome course builder that seamlessly syncs with your entire funnels.

Kartra is a sales funnel builder, course creation tool, and marketing platform that houses essential features you will ever need to run your business online.

And comes with a few distinctive features as follows:

If you’re in need of a platform to create and host courses without leaving the WordPress premises, then LearnDash LMS is your ultimate go-to plugin.

LearnDash is the most powerful LMS WordPress plugin used by many businesses, universities, and training organizations.

Plus, it is really affordable with their Basic plan going for $199/year (1 Site License) and their Pro plan for $369/year (25 Sites License).

For the best free and cheapest option, you can take on the lifetime FREE deal of GrooveFunnels.

Which Is The Best – A WordPress Plugin or a Hosted Platform?

This is a common question that’s being asked all the time by course creators.

To me, I would say it depends on a few factors as there is no single answer to this question.

But personally, I’d go for hosted platforms over WordPress LMS plugins.

The reason being that these hosted course building platforms are much easy to use, understand, and create courses on. They require little or no technical know-how to build and manage your membership site or digital products.

Teachable is a perfect example of a nice dedicated hosted course platform.

Including Podia, and Thinkific.

Furthermore, you do not need to worry about a domain, hosting, security, backups, etc. when on a dedicated course hosting solution – which I think frees up a lot of time and saves resources and extra subscription so you can focus more on serving your students better.

I hope that makes sense?

Before we round up, lets recap on…

What is Kajabi?

Kajabi

Kajabi is an all-in-one software solution that has the ability to create online courses, build landing pages, websites, and even help you to launch highly profitable marketing campaigns.

Here’s a rundown of the major features you’ll get with Kajabi.

  • Drag-and-drop, code-free landing page editor
  • Landing pages, sales pages, and webinar pages template
  • Create online courses and add quizzes and surveys
  • Build memberships sites
  • Create, host, and deliver online course content
  • Automated or live event webinars
  • Get email marketing automation with a native email provider
  • Website builder and hosting
  • Shopping Cart and payment processor

Kajabi is an awesome all-in-one solution and online course platform but it does have some cons.

The price point is a factor that scares and pushes users away from the software.

Even though they don’t charge you any transaction fee on any of the plans, Kajabi comes at $149/month, $199/month, and $399/month for the most popular plan.

Kajabi pricing

This is A LOT for most beginners or anyone who just needs a simple tool to create and sell online courses.

Asides from the price factor, Kajabi doesn’t allow you to create certificates natively and doesn’t support advanced quiz elements like question banks, randomization, etc.

This is why I gave you a list of better alternatives to Kajabi 🙂

There, you have it – the best Kajabi alternatives perfect for any use case.

Let me know which you’d be starting with below.

Meanwhile, you can check our list of best Webinar platforms if you plan to implement webinars in your business.

2 Comments

  1. This was awesome! 👏🏻 Well written, clear, honest and concise in layman’s terms that everyone can understand. Excellent blog!

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *