Choosing a Payment Gateway for Your Bubble.io App

Narrowing down pricing, structure, features, and location to find the perfect gateway for your Bubble.io app

If you’re monetizing your Bubble.io app, there’s a very good chance you’re using some sort of payment gateway. In fact, some of the most frequent questions we get from clients and students have to do with choosing the right gateways and setting them up.

Of course, there are tons to choose from — Stripe, Braintree, Paypal, Worldpay, Bitpay...the list goes on. So it makes sense why there’s so much confusion about which is the best option.

The thing is, not all payment gateways are created equally, and even more so, they’re not always “one size fits all.” Some people might swear by a certain one, while that same gateway could very well be counterproductive to your app’s specific situation. On top of that, not all gateways work in every country. Depending on where you are in the world, you may or may not even have access to certain options.

Choosing the right payment gateway for your Bubble app isn’t as easy as picking from a list and calling it a day. It takes thought, planning, and a bit of strategy to find the absolute best option for you and your users.

If you’re not sure whether you’ve chosen the right system, or you haven’t quite gotten there yet, keep reading to learn exactly how to choose the best payment option as you build and launch your app.

Location

People building apps on Bubble are located all over the world. I can’t tell you how many times clients have joined calls with us in the mornings or afternoons in our time zone, while they were just starting their days or maybe in the middle of an afternoon on their side of the globe. And while it’s great so many people have access to a mobile or web app maker like Bubble, it can cause some headache when it comes to accepting payments.

Because of certain regulations, you can’t simply choose any payment gateway you want. You have to find one that not only works in your country, but also works for your users, in their country.

Question: Where in the world are you based? Or rather, where will incoming money be going (if your account isn’t located where you are)?

If your account is in South Africa, for example, Stripe is out of the picture (at the time of writing this), in which case, you might be inclined to switch to Paypal. But, what if Paypal doesn’t offer the features you need?

What then?

If all payment gateways were made equally, it’d be easy to just find one that works in your country and move on. Like any other service you might use or integrate with, though, each payment gateway will have features you do and don’t like. Or worse, they might not have features you absolutely need.

The absolute best way to get started, before considering anything else, is to take a look at this list of payment gateways by country to see which ones you even can use. You’ll be hard pressed to find a better breakdown of which gateways work where, and it’s the perfect place to start when developing your app.

Here’s an idea of what you’ll find (at the time of writing this), with examples for a few different countries:

Examples of popular US payment gateways

  • Authorize.net
  • WorldPay
  • Paypal
  • Alipay
  • Amazon Pay
  • Stripe

Examples of popular UK payment gateways

  • Coinbase
  • GoCoin
  • Cybersource
  • Paypal
  • Authorize.net

Examples of popular Brazil payment gateways

  • GoCoin
  • Cybersource
  • Paypal Express
  • 2 Checkout

Of course, the list of countries and options for each country goes on and on, but as you can see, you’re not limited to one major gateway — there are many to choose from.

Once you take a look at the full list of options for your country (and the countries most of your users come from), move onto narrowing down your choices by features and details.

Features and Details

Depending on your app, your necessities can vary greatly. Will you need single payments, subscriptions, or marketplace-type transactions? How are you planning to integrate a service with your app?

Those are just a couple of the questions you’ll want to answer. Use the following criteria to help decide which features and specificities are must-haves for your app.

Transaction Fees

Because your budget is such an important factor when choosing outside services, always check the fee structure of the payment gateway you're considering.

How much will you be charged per transaction?

For many payment gateways, you’ll be charged a set fee, plus a percentage of each transaction. For example, you might be charged 30 cents for each transaction processed, plus an extra 3% of whatever the item purchased cost. That means, if you sold a $100 subscription, service, etc, you’d be charged a flat 30 cents, plus $3 (3% of the purchase price).

For high sales volumes or high ticket items, those fees can certainly add up, so spend time going through the fee structure of each gateway you’re considering.

How will fees scale based off sales volumes?

Some payment gateways will scale their fees based off your sales volumes. So, if you have an app that processes tons of transactions, your fees could be lower. Certain gateways take into account different processing types, so it’s worth checking if your prospective gateway offers something similar.

What if you sell a low-priced product, like an ebook — will you have to pay a $0.30 transaction fee for every $0.99 book you sell?

This is another great example of how, depending on what you sell, your needs will significantly vary. On one hand, if you were selling very high-ticket items, you’d likely be most concerned about the percentage transaction fee mentioned above. If, however, your price points were low, you’d be more concerned about the flat fee charged per transaction (the “30 cent” example mentioned above).

If you sold a 99 cent ebook, for example, and had to pay 30 cents for every single transaction, you’d be cutting your profit nearly in half, especially if you’re charged an extra percentage on top of that. So again, keep in mind both your expected sales volumes and your price point when looking at gateways.

In general, fee structures all vary, but many fall somewhere within the [$0.30 + 2.9%] per transaction range. Depending on what you’re selling, that could quickly add up, in which case, you might consider negotiating an enterprise plan (high volume sales can often warrant a different fee structure). You might also be able to negotiate based on micro-sales (like the ebook scenario), where it simply wouldn't make sense to pay that much on such a low-priced item.

On top of that, if you’re a student or a nonprofit, you could also qualify for lowered fees; compare your options with that piece of knowledge in mind.

Payment Model

How do you monetize your Bubble.io app? Do you offer subscriptions, marketplace sales, or products?

Each requires a different setup with different features.

Depending on your app’s structure, you might be able to eliminate certain gateways based off pure necessity. Not all offer convenient subscription options, and not all work in a marketplace setting.

On top of that, consider refunds.

Especially when it comes to subscriptions, refunds need to be clear and cut. If someone requests a refund on a monthly payment, for example, will your gateway allow you to prorate the refunded amount?

Try to consider all possible scenarios when it comes to refunds so you can avoid any surprises or mistakes down the road.

By choosing a gateway that works with your app’s model right out of the box (rather than you working for it), you can save hours of headache and stress. Find a gateway that can do most, if not all, of the heavy lifting for you. Otherwise, little, repetitive tasks will eat up all your time.

Bank Details

Here’s a big one:

What kind of access will you have to your money?

Some payment gateways require additional customer details (beyond the norm) to run ACH transactions, which can take more work to set up.

Some gateways give you immediate and frequent access to your funds without a waiting period. Others won’t.

Check to make sure you can transfer and access money at the rate you need to. And if ACH transactions are a must, see if the gateway offers pre-built onboarding forms to make the registration process easy for your users.

Beyond accessing your money, also keep in mind what type of information a payment gateway will require from you, the merchant, to open an account in the first place.

Some details they might need are:

  • EIN or Social security number in the US (or equivalent outside the US)
  • Business bank account number
  • Expected sales volumes

That could mean, if you’re not yet setup as an official business (with proper identification), some options might not be viable right off the bat.

Payment Gateways in Bubble

Beyond looking at how well your app coheres with a payment gateway, also consider how well the gateway works with Bubble, which will make a huge difference when it comes to your ease of use.

Once you’ve narrowed down your gateway options, take a look at their APIs to see how comprehensive they are (try looking for a “developers” link in a website’s footer to find the service’s API documentation).

Most will connect with Bubble in some way, but many will be limited in features.

For example, the gateway you choose might work fundamentally (as in, money can be exchanged). When it comes to the details and features, though, like automatic receipt emails or notifications, for example — those might not be supported through the API.

By checking the API documentation, you’ll be able to see exactly which features will be supported once you connect the gateway to your Bubble app. Based off the details, you should then consider how much work you want to do vs. how much the gateway will handle for you.

It’s also important to note that Bubble is not PCI compliant, meaning you can’t safely store sensitive data on your app (like credit card numbers). Your gateway should store all the information it needs to process transactions securely so you don't have to. Also note that we're not compliance professionals or experts, so if you need to comply with certain laws and regulations, consult with an expert in that field prior to making any decisions.

With security in mind, confirm how “ tokenization” is handled, too — which is where the payment gateway creates a “token” for you (a string of random characters like an ID) to represent the card’s information, rather than the card number itself. (All gateways handle tokenization, but some require a bit of coding to do so. If you’re not comfortable with that, opt for a platform that lets you redirect the user to their site to enter card details.)

Lastly, Bubble already has plugins available for Stripe and Paypal, which means you won’t have to handle any of the API side of things. If you choose another gateway, however, you’ll need to connect it yourself.

If you’re not confident making those connections on your own, I suggest taking a look at these resources for API and payment-specific help:

Making the Choice

If you’re located in the US (or operate your business within the country), Stripe is often a natural go-to. It supports tons of features, is simple to integrate with Bubble, and has a reasonable fee structure.

If Stripe isn’t available, Paypal is another largely trusted payment system, and Amazon Pay might soon be climbing the ranks (it’s still limited at this point, but worth checking out). Each have their own features, so look closely.

If none of those options work for you, use the above breakdown of location, features, and details to help narrow down your options. In some cases, you might only be left with 1-2 choices after sorting through logistics and details.

At that point, if all else seems equal, reach out to customer support. See how helpful they are in solving problems. Navigate the interface. Is it easy to use?

Finish your search by making sure you're comfortable with the gateway. Because again, using a payment gateway should never mean more work; instead, it should streamline and automate your Bubble app's sales, making the process simple and straightforward for you.