# Event Ticketing Software Compared: Who Actually Bears the Platform's Cut? > The fee schedule for an event ticketing platform tells you the rate. It does not tell you who ends up paying it. Source: https://saascode.ai/inside/event-ticketing-software-compared-who-actually-bears-the · Published: 2026-08-09 · Section: listicle · Product: Venuo (https://saascode.ai/products/venuo) --- The fee schedule for an event ticketing platform tells you the rate. It does not tell you who ends up paying it. That omission changes the economics more than the rate does. A 3% organizer-absorbed fee is a direct deduction from every ticket sold; a 14% buyer-paid fee leaves the organizer's net revenue untouched — the attendee absorbs it at checkout. Two platforms with different stated rates can produce identical organizer economics. This guide organizes the category by fee incidence — where the cut lands — because that is the variable that determines whether a lower stated rate is actually a better deal. One entry in this guide, Venuo, is a self-hosted event-ticketing platform sold once as source code. You deploy it under your own brand; your organizers create public event pages and sell tickets by type, with ticket revenue settling directly in each organizer's own payment account — the platform charges a flat monthly subscription and takes no percentage of ticket sales. This page places each alternative in its incidence group and states, plainly, where each one is the right tool. ## Four things to understand before reading any rate **Rate and incidence are different.** Rate is the percentage or per-ticket amount the platform charges. Incidence is who bears it: a buyer-paid fee appears at checkout as a price increase the attendee sees before deciding; an organizer-absorbed fee comes off net revenue per ticket. Same dollar, opposite effect on the organizer. **Payment processing applies to every platform, including self-hosted ones.** Stripe charges 2.9% + 30¢ per successful domestic card charge in the US ([stripe.com/pricing](https://stripe.com/pricing), 2026-08-07). Self-hosting removes the platform's cut, not the card network's. **Hosted platforms are free for free events; flat monthly subscriptions are not.** Most hosted platforms in this guide charge nothing for $0-ticket events. A flat monthly applies whether or not your organizers generate ticket revenue. **Discovery is a separate product.** Eventbrite bundles a consumer-facing marketplace — strangers browse by location and category. Tools without discovery are pure organizer tools; the choice is whether the organizer's audience already knows who they are. --- ## The alternatives, by fee incidence ### Group 1 — Buyer-paid by default The platform's fee appears at checkout as a price increase visible to the attendee. The organizer can often opt to absorb the fee, but the default is pass-through. #### Eventbrite Eventbrite's service fee is 3.7% of ticket price plus $1.79 per ticket. Its payment processing is 2.9%, charged on the total order including the service fee — not on face value. (Eventbrite Help Center, article 755615, as of 2026-08-07: "Payment processing fees are calculated using the total order including service fees and tax.") On a $25 ticket: service fee $2.715, processing on $27.715 = $0.804 — the buyer pays $28.52 and the organizer receives $25.00. These fees are buyer-paid by default; the organizer can opt to absorb them, in which case the net per ticket drops by $3.44 and the attendee sees a clean price. ([eventbrite.com/organizer/pricing](https://www.eventbrite.com/organizer/pricing/), as of 2026-08-07.) Free for free events. **What Eventbrite does that tools further down this list do not:** a consumer discovery marketplace — browsable events by location and date, email campaigns to its accumulated attendee database, and paid promotion placements. That acquisition is what the fee pays for — for organizers without an existing audience. **Honest limit:** Eventbrite is a two-sided marketplace, not a pure organizer tool. You cannot white-label it, self-host it, or set your own fee structure. For organizers whose attendees already know who they are, the bundled discovery is overhead on every transaction. --- ### Group 2 — Organizer chooses per event These platforms charge a per-ticket fee or percentage and let the organizer choose whether to add a buyer-facing booking fee, absorb it, or split it. Incidence is configurable. #### Ticket Tailor Ticket Tailor is a pure organizer tool — no consumer marketplace. Its pricing page states that it "does not touch or process the payment for your tickets"; organizers connect their own Stripe, PayPal, or Square account and can optionally pass a booking fee to attendees. The platform fee is per-ticket: £0.60 pay-as-you-go, or from £0.22 on prepaid credit bundles — GBP figures verified at [tickettailor.com/en-us/pricing](https://www.tickettailor.com/en-us/pricing), 2026-08-07; USD equivalents should be confirmed in-browser before publishing as the page renders GBP by default. Ticket Tailor also advertises a discount for lower-priced tickets with no published eligibility threshold — if it applies, any break-even figure based on standard rates would need recalculation. Free for free events (up to 5,000 per year); the first 5 paid ticket sales per event are also free. **What Ticket Tailor does that Venuo does not:** a mature hosted product with an active team, years of release history, and a vendor-managed roadmap. A native check-in app rather than browser-based scanning. Free for organizers at low paid-ticket volume. **Honest limit:** Ticket Tailor cannot be purchased, self-hosted, rebranded, or operated as a multi-tenant platform for other organizers. The per-ticket model is cheaper at low volume (roughly 35 tickets/month on PAYG, 97/month on prepaid credits — platform fee only, Stripe cancels out on both sides). #### TicketSpice TicketSpice charges $0.99 per ticket ($0.49 for tickets under $5 or via box-office app); the organizer can absorb or pass it on. Payment processing is bundled via Webconnex at 2.9% + 30¢ — the money routes through Webconnex before settling, not directly into an account the organizer owns. ([ticketspice.com/pricing](https://www.ticketspice.com/pricing), 2026-08-07.) Free-event pricing is available for organizers who also run paid events. **Honest limit:** TicketSpice routes payment processing through Webconnex, not the organizer's own account. It cannot be self-hosted or purchased as a codebase. #### RSVPify RSVPify charges 1.95% + $0.90 per ticket; the organizer can pass part or all to guests via their own connected payment account. ([rsvpify.com/pricing/selling-tickets](https://rsvpify.com/pricing/selling-tickets/), 2026-08-07.) Built primarily for RSVP and guest-list management at private and corporate events — seating assignments, invite-only registration, custom intake flows — with ticket selling as one module inside a broader event-management suite. **Honest limit:** RSVPify is built for private or corporate event management, not recurring public-ticketed events. Cannot be self-hosted or operated as a multi-tenant platform. #### Hi.Events Cloud Hi.Events Cloud charges 0.75% + $0.40 per ticket; the organizer can pass the fee to the attendee or absorb it. Payment processing routes through the organizer's own Stripe account. Free for free events. ([hi.events/pricing](https://hi.events/pricing), 2026-08-07.) Organizer tool, BYO payments, no consumer marketplace — actively maintained codebase (last commit 2026-08-06). **Honest limit:** Hi.Events Cloud is a hosted rental. For the self-hosted path — and the licensing discussion that comes with it — see Group 4. --- ### Group 3 — Organizer absorbs by default The platform's fee comes off organizer margin. Attendees see the ticket's face value at checkout. #### Tito Tito charges 3% of ticket price, capped at €25 per ticket on paid plans (charity and nonprofit: 2.5%) — the organizer absorbs it, the attendee always sees a clean price. BYO Stripe or PayPal. Free for free events. ([ti.to/home/pricing](https://ti.to/home/pricing), 2026-08-07.) Developer-friendly, with strong adoption in the conference and tech-event space. **Honest limit:** Tito cannot be white-labeled or self-hosted. The 3% organizer-absorbed rate is a direct margin cost — unlike Eventbrite in its default buyer-paid mode, where the organizer nets the face value. #### Humanitix Humanitix charges 2.1% + $0.99 per ticket in the US (charities and schools: 1% + $0.99), with platform profits directed to charitable causes ([humanitix.com/us/pricing](https://www.humanitix.com/us/pricing), 2026-08-07). Fee incidence — whether it defaults to organizer-absorbed or buyer-paid, and whether it can be passed on — is not stated on either the US or AU pricing page; verify directly before building any incidence comparison. **Honest limit:** Humanitix's pitch is charitable giving, not price. Fee incidence is unverified for this guide. Cannot be self-hosted or purchased as a codebase. --- ### Group 4 — No platform fee (payment processing cost only) These tools carry no per-ticket fee; your only cost is payment processing and, for self-hosted options, your own infrastructure. #### Hi.Events — self-hosted Hi.Events publishes the full source code; the self-hosted version carries no per-ticket platform fee. Last commit: 2026-08-06 (GitHub REST API, 2026-08-07). Published under AGPL-3.0 with additional terms — read the full licence at [github.com/HiEventsDev/hi.events](https://github.com/HiEventsDev/hi.events) and seek legal advice before any commercial deployment; a commercial licence is available from the project. AGPL-3.0 copyleft requires that software incorporating the codebase be distributed under the same terms when accessed over a network; the additional terms extend those restrictions further. Self-hosting means you own the ops, upgrades, and bugs without a vendor upstream. **Honest limit:** The licence requires review for any deployment offering the software to other organizations as a managed service — a different legal question from running it for your own events. #### Pretix — self-hosted Pretix is a production-hardened self-hosted event ticketing platform published under AGPL-3.0 with additional proprietary terms. Last commit to the default branch: 2026-08-07 (GitHub REST API, 2026-08-08). No per-ticket platform fee on the self-hosted version — your cost is infrastructure and payment processing. A hosted SaaS option is also available from the pretix team at 2.5% of ticket price. ([pretix.eu/about/en/pricing](https://pretix.eu/about/en/pricing/); [github.com/pretix/pretix](https://github.com/pretix/pretix), 2026-08-08.) **What Pretix does that Venuo does not:** a proven production record at scale (millions of tickets), an extensive plugin ecosystem, broad localisation, and a vendor-hosted option for teams that do not want to manage infrastructure. Free for own-event use, no purchase price. **Honest limit:** The additional terms explicitly prohibit "making the functionality of pretix available to third parties as a service" and "using pretix to organise, promote, or sell products or services offered or executed by third parties." (Pretix licence file, github.com/pretix/pretix, 2026-08-08.) A commercial licence is available from pretix.eu — consult it and legal counsel before any multi-tenant deployment. #### Alf.io — self-hosted Alf.io is a free and open source event attendance management system published under GPL-3.0. Last commit to the default branch: 2026-07-26 (GitHub REST API, 2026-08-08). No platform fee in any configuration — you pay only for infrastructure and the payment processors your organizers use. The companion check-in app, Alf.io Scan, is published separately under Apache 2.0. ([github.com/alfio-event/alf.io](https://github.com/alfio-event/alf.io); [alf.io](https://alf.io), 2026-08-08.) **What Alf.io does that Venuo does not:** no purchase price, no recurring subscription, no platform fee beyond payment processing. A dedicated native check-in app (Alf.io Scan). Community-maintained with multiple active contributors. **Honest limit:** GPL-3.0 applies copyleft to binary distribution, not network-deployed use — running Alf.io as a service does not trigger a source-release requirement for server-side modifications. Alf.io is built and supported as a tool for organisations running their own events; consult legal counsel before any commercial managed-service deployment for other organizers. #### Venuo — own-the-code Venuo is a self-hosted event-ticketing platform sold once as source code at $229. You deploy it under your own brand; your organizers create public event pages, sell tickets by type, and check attendees in with a browser QR scanner on any camera-equipped phone or tablet. Ticket money settles in each organizer's own Stripe, MercadoPago, or Razorpay account — the platform charges a flat monthly subscription, takes no percentage, and holds no funds. The codebase ships with a multi-tenant architecture, a full admin panel for the operator, and a commercial licence that explicitly permits operating it as a SaaS under your own brand. The subscription applies every month regardless of whether organizers run paid events or free ones. The flat monthly becomes more economical at roughly 35 paid tickets per month against Ticket Tailor PAYG rates, or 97 per month against prepaid credits (platform fee only; Stripe cancels out on both sides). Below those thresholds, per-ticket hosted tools cost less. [Try the live demo →](https://venuo.saascode.ai) **Honest limit:** Venuo's subscription applies even in months your organizers run only free events — every major hosted incumbent is free for free events. Venuo provides no consumer discovery: no marketplace, no cross-organizer event search, no email campaigns to audiences the organizer has not built. For organizers whose ticket sales depend on strangers finding them, Eventbrite is the more honest answer. The door scanner is browser-based, capable on any device with a camera, and does not require a dedicated app download — but it is not a native dedicated application. --- ### Dead software: Attendize Attendize appears in older comparisons with over 4,000 GitHub stars. Its last commit and last release are both **2023-01-26** — not actively maintained. If you encounter it in a comparison without a maintenance date, treat the list as stale. --- ## Reading the fee schedule: three numbers that matter **The Eventbrite calculation most people get wrong.** Eventbrite's 2.9% processing fee applies to the total order including the service fee, not the ticket face value. On a $25 ticket: service fee $2.715, total order $27.715, processing $0.804 — the buyer pays $28.52; the organizer nets $25.00. The difference from face-value math is small per ticket. The significance: any fee comparison applying 2.9% to face value is calculating Eventbrite wrong — this includes most competitor comparison pages. **Where the fee load is heaviest.** Eventbrite's $1.79 fixed component means cheap tickets carry a heavier percentage burden. At $10 the service fee is $2.16 (21.6% of face value); at $50 it is $3.64 (7.3%). The percentage gap narrows as ticket prices rise. **Two verifiable comparisons, not one.** Against Tito at 3% organizer-absorbed: 300 tickets at $25 = $225 Tito + $307.50 Stripe = $532.50 total. Venuo Growth at the same volume: $49 + $307.50 Stripe = $356.50 — approximately **$176/month** less ([ti.to/home/pricing](https://ti.to/home/pricing), 2026-08-07). Against Eventbrite buyer-paid: approximately $699 in buyer-paid fees on $7,500 face value ([eventbrite.com/organizer/pricing](https://www.eventbrite.com/organizer/pricing/), 2026-08-07) — the attendee bears this, not the organizer. Neither figure is "the" saving; both are honest comparisons of specific scenarios. --- ## How to choose | If the platform serves... | The right pick | |---|---| | Organizers who rely on a marketplace to find their audience | Eventbrite — discovery is what the fee buys, and Venuo does not provide it | | Free-event-only organizers needing door check-in, no paid tickets | Ticket Tailor (free up to 5,000/year), Tito, or Hi.Events Cloud | | Low-volume paid organizers (under ~35 tickets/month per event) | Ticket Tailor PAYG or Hi.Events Cloud — per-ticket cheaper at that volume | | Private or corporate events with guest-list and RSVP management | RSVPify | | Developer-friendly conferences where the organizer absorbs a 3% fee | Tito | | Self-hosting with zero software cost, for your own events only | Hi.Events self-hosted (AGPL-3.0 + additional terms), Pretix self-hosted (additional terms restrict third-party service use), or Alf.io (GPL-3.0) — read each licence | | Running a ticketing platform as a SaaS business, flat subscription, no platform fee, organizer money direct to their own accounts | **Venuo** ($229, one-time; commercial licence; organizer money direct to their own accounts) | Hi.Events' and Pretix's additional terms restrict or explicitly prohibit third-party managed-service deployment; Alf.io's GPL-3.0 does not carry the network-deployment trigger but was built for own-event use. Venuo's commercial licence explicitly permits multi-tenant SaaS operation. --- ## Honest verdict For an organizer managing their own events, the right tool depends on one question and then volume. Discovery needed? Eventbrite earns its fee. Own audience, low ticket volume? Ticket Tailor or Hi.Events Cloud is cheaper at that volume than a flat subscription. Wants to absorb fees and show a clean price? Tito. Free events? Every hosted incumbent is the economically honest choice over a flat monthly. Venuo earns its Group 4 position at one intersection: own and run a ticketing SaaS, charge a flat subscription, take no platform cut, hold no organizer funds. The closest structural alternatives are Hi.Events self-hosted, Pretix, and Alf.io — all three carry no per-ticket fee, and all three have licences that require review for managed-service deployment. None ships with a commercial licence for multi-tenant SaaS operation. That is the gap. If you want to sell tickets for your own events, start at Ticket Tailor or Eventbrite. If you want to run the platform that other organizers sell through, this guide ends at Venuo. [See the live demo →](https://venuo.saascode.ai) · [Purchase →](https://saascode.ai/products/venuo) · $229 one-time. --- ## Common questions ### Does absorbing ticketing platform fees increase conversion rates for recurring events? No published controlled study exists from any platform in this guide. The theoretical case: a buyer-paid fee appears at checkout above the face value the attendee committed to; for recurring audiences the friction compounds. Absorbing the fee removes the checkout surprise but adds a direct margin cost. Ticket Tailor, TicketSpice, and Hi.Events Cloud let organizers choose per event. Venuo has no platform fee — the only buyer-visible cost is what the organizer prices into the ticket. ### Which ticketing platforms in this guide charge nothing when an event is free? Eventbrite, Ticket Tailor (up to 5,000 free tickets per year, plus the first 5 paid ticket sales per event free), Tito, Hi.Events Cloud, TicketSpice (for organizers who also run paid events), Hi.Events self-hosted, Pretix self-hosted, and Alf.io all charge nothing for free events. Venuo's flat monthly subscription applies whether or not your organizers' events produce ticket revenue. The flat monthly makes economic sense at consistent paid-ticket volume; for organizers running mostly free events or with seasonal gaps, hosted per-ticket platforms are cheaper. ### What is the real cost of selling a $10 ticket versus a $50 ticket through Eventbrite? At $10 per ticket (fees buyer-paid): Eventbrite service fee = $2.16, processing on $12.16 = $0.35, total $2.51 — 25.1% of face value. At $50: service fee $3.64, processing on $53.64 = $1.56, total $5.20 — 10.4% of face value. The fixed $1.79 makes cheaper tickets carry a heavier percentage burden. All figures US/USD; Eventbrite states fees vary by country (Help Center article 755615; [eventbrite.com/organizer/pricing](https://www.eventbrite.com/organizer/pricing/), as of 2026-08-07). ### What is the practical difference between AGPL-3.0 event ticketing software and a commercial own-the-code purchase like Venuo? AGPL-3.0 (the licence Hi.Events is published under, with additional terms) requires that software incorporating the codebase be distributed under the same licence when deployed over a network. Pretix's additional terms go further, explicitly prohibiting making the software available to third parties as a service or organising events for third parties. Alf.io's GPL-3.0 does not carry the network-deployment trigger — SaaS use does not require releasing server-side modifications. Commercial licences are available from Hi.Events (github.com/HiEventsDev/hi.events) and pretix.eu; consult legal counsel before any commercial managed-service deployment (MEDIUM-HIGH confidence, repository pages, 2026-08-08). Venuo is sold under a commercial licence that explicitly permits operating it as a multi-tenant SaaS for other organizers under your own brand, with no copyleft requirement or royalty after the one-time purchase. ### Which ticketing platforms offer a flat monthly fee with no per-ticket charge? Among the hosted platforms in this guide, none offer a flat monthly with zero per-ticket component. The flat monthly exists in Venuo, purchased as a codebase: your organizers pay a flat subscription, the platform charges no per-ticket fee. The break-even against Ticket Tailor is roughly 35 paid tickets per month (vs PAYG) or 97 per month (vs prepaid credits) — platform fee only; Stripe's 2.9% + 30¢ cancels out on both sides. --- ## Related reading - [Venuo vs Ticket Tailor, Eventbrite, and the Other Ways to Own a Ticketing Platform](https://saascode.ai/inside/venuo-vs-ticket-tailor-eventbrite-and-the-other-ways-to-own.md) - [Venuo: event ticketing you run yourself, from public pages to QR check-in](https://saascode.ai/inside/road-to-venuo.md)