Luma vs Checkout Page for conference ticketing (2026 fees)
Luma's free tier charges a 5% platform fee on paid tickets, while Luma Plus removes it for $69 month to month. On 300 tickets at $299 over three months, the free-tier fee is $4,485, Luma Plus is $207 and Checkout Page is $717 under the even-sales assumption. Stripe processing is separate.
By Checkout Page · Updated September 5, 2026 · 8 min read
Published by Checkout Page, one of the platforms compared. This comparison uses public pricing and documentation, not a hands-on test of both products. Sources and editorial approach.
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The short version
Luma is a calendar and community platform that sells tickets. Its free tier charges 5% of paid ticket sales, while Luma Plus removes that fee for $69 month to month. On 300 tickets at $299 over three months, Luma Plus costs $207 against $717 for Checkout Page under the even-sales assumption; Luma's free-tier fee would be $4,485.
Luma is very good at what it was built for. Recurring meetups, community events, hackathons and conference side events live on a Luma calendar, and the people who follow that calendar see your next event without you doing anything. The event pages look modern and the invite tooling is genuinely useful.
The free tier's 5% becomes expensive at conference prices. It applies with no cap and cannot be passed to the buyer. Luma Plus removes it for $69 month to month, so a fee comparison that ignores Plus can badly overstate Luma's cost.
Platform-fee examples exclude processing unless stated otherwise; the breakdown below shows it separately. Both products use Stripe for these sales, but Stripe rates vary by merchant country, card and payment method. Any fixed processing charge applies per payment, not necessarily per ticket.
Fees compared
On Luma's free tier, the platform fee is 5% of $299, which is $14.95, with no fixed fee and no cap. Across 300 tickets that is $4,485. Luma Plus removes the fee and costs $207 for three month-to-month billing periods. Checkout Page charges no per-ticket fee and costs $239 a month on Scale under the even-sales assumption, or $717 for three months.
For 300 one-ticket US card payments at $299 over three months, the same illustrative Stripe rate of 2.9% + $0.30 per order adds $2,691.30. Fees are absorbed, with no tax, international cards, refunds or optional extras modeled. Aggregate estimates can differ from transaction-level rounding.
| Selected plan | Platform or subscription | Illustrative processing | Estimated total |
|---|---|---|---|
| Luma free tier, 5% | $4,485.00 | $2,691.30 | $7,176.30 |
| Luma Plus, $69 monthly × 3 | $207.00 | $2,691.30 | $2,898.30 |
| Checkout Page Scale, $239 monthly × 3 | $717.00 | $2,691.30 | $3,408.30 |
Luma Plus must be active before the modeled sales. The main platform comparison uses Plus monthly, and separately checks the additional requirements for an own-brand hosted checkout.
Checkout Page's Scale price steps up with billing-period sales volume. The $717 total assumes those $89,700 of sales land evenly across three billing periods, about $29,900 in each. A different sales curve can select different tiers and change the total.
For a 120-person workshop at $75, Luma's free tier charges $450. Two months of Luma Plus cost $138. If the $9,000 of sales land evenly across two months, Checkout Page costs $198. The selected Luma plan therefore changes which platform is cheaper before features are considered.
Luma Plus is $69 month to month, or $59 a month billed annually for a $708 annual commitment, and removes the 5% fee. It also adds custom Luma URLs, tax collection and 5,000 weekly invites. For one event, compare the month-to-month cost across the active periods with both Checkout Page and the annual Luma option.
Where the money goes and when
Both Luma and Checkout Page send ticket payments to the organizer's connected Stripe account. Payout timing is managed in Stripe and depends on settlement, account verification, reserves and the chosen schedule. Neither product's subscription or platform-fee model guarantees that funds will reach a bank account by a particular date.
For a meetup with no upfront costs this is irrelevant. For a conference with a venue deposit, catering guarantee and speaker flights, it is one of the first questions to ask, because those bills land months before the event.
The pass-through rule is the other structural difference. Luma's 5% comes out of the organizer's revenue and cannot be added to the buyer's total, so your ticket price is your ticket price and your margin absorbs the fee. With Checkout Page there is no per-ticket fee to pass on or absorb, and you are the merchant of record, which also means chargebacks, refunds and attendee data sit with you.
Conference features side by side
Luma centers on discovery, calendars and invitations. Checkout Page offers ticket sales windows, conditional multi-step registration fields and post-payment upsells. Compare those workflows directly; Luma Plus has the lower modeled cost here. Cells we cannot verify say check with vendor.
| Feature | Luma | Checkout Page |
|---|---|---|
| Ticket tiers with sales windows | Multiple ticket types; per-tier sales windows check with vendor | Yes, start and end dates per ticket type |
| Group tickets | Check with vendor | Ticket groups, per-order minimums and maximums, bulk discounts on paid plans |
| Registration questions with conditional logic | Yes, registration questions; conditional logic check with vendor | Yes, custom fields with conditional logic and multi-step forms |
| Check-in app and multiple staff | Yes, QR check-in in the Luma app | Yes, any phone or laptop; invited check-in staff require Launch or above; internet required |
| Embed on your website | Embed options available; check with vendor | Yes, popup or inline on WordPress, Webflow, Framer, Squarespace and Wix |
| Marketplace and discovery | Yes, calendars, discovery and invites, a genuine strength | No |
| Community and recurring events | Yes, subscribers follow your calendar | Memberships and season passes for a recurring series |
| Seat maps | Check with vendor | No |
| Badge printing | Check with vendor | No, export CSV or connect a badge tool via Zapier |
| Attendee app | Yes, the Luma app; agenda tooling check with vendor | No |
| Add-ons and upsells at checkout | Check with vendor | Yes, order bumps on every plan, one-click upsells on Scale |
Checkout Page's gaps, stated plainly: no seat maps, no discovery, no built-in badge printing, no attendee networking app, and a check-in scanner that needs an internet connection.
Who should choose Luma
Choose Luma if your event lives inside a community that already follows your calendar. Meetups, hackathons, community summits and free conference side events get real distribution from Luma subscribers and invites, and free events cost nothing. On Luma Plus the 5% disappears and the price is competitive.
The calendar model is the point. When someone subscribes to your Luma calendar, every future event reaches them without a mailing list, which is a genuine advantage that Checkout Page does not attempt to match. For a monthly series that occasionally puts on a bigger one-day conference, keeping everything in one place is worth something.
Luma's visual design may appeal to teams that want to publish an event page with little customization. Treat appearance as a preference and review a live example from each product before choosing.
Who should choose Checkout Page
Choose Checkout Page when its ticket tiers, add-ons, registration workflow and website checkout are a better fit. In this scenario it costs $717 across three months, which is less than Luma's $4,485 free-tier fee but more than $207 for three months of Luma Plus. Both products send ticket payments to the organizer's Stripe account.
When a meetup becomes a larger paid conference, first price Luma Plus before treating its free-tier fee as a reason to migrate. Then test the registration flow you need: dietary requirements, employer invoice details, workshop selections and any follow-up offers.
You should not move for discovery, because Checkout Page has none. If Luma subscribers are how people find you, keep your calendar and consider running ticket sales alongside it.
Switching from Luma
Export the guest list, rebuild the tiers, and keep the Luma page alive. Guests find events through their Luma calendar, so leaving the event page published with a link to your new ticket page matters more here than with other platforms. Rebuild ticket types, questions and the embed, and connect your own Stripe account.
- Export guests and their registration answers from Luma as CSV. Keep it for badges and as your offline check-in fallback.
- Rebuild your ticket types in Checkout Page with prices, capacities and sales windows so early bird closes on its own.
- Recreate registration questions as custom fields, adding conditional logic where a question applies to only some tickets.
- Connect Stripe, buy a real test ticket and refund it, so you see the QR ticket email an attendee receives.
- Embed the new ticket page on your website and update the link in your newsletter and social profiles.
- Keep the Luma event page published with a clear link to the new page, because your calendar subscribers will still land there.
Anyone who already bought on Luma keeps that ticket, so run both lists at check-in or use the CSV for name searches. Free migration is included on the Unlimited plan.
From our publisher · Checkout Page
Put your ticket plan into practice
Set up ticket types and registration questions on Checkout Page. Free up to $3,000 in monthly sales; Stripe processing fees apply.
Bottom line
Luma's free-tier 5% costs $4,485 on a 300-ticket, $299 conference. Three months of Luma Plus cost $207 and remove that fee, while Checkout Page costs $717 under the even-sales assumption. With Plus cheaper in this example, features and workflow should decide the fit.
Run the numbers for your own ticket price and volume in the ticketing fee calculator, and read the guide to conference ticketing fees for how percentage fees and processing compound at higher ticket prices. If discovery is what you value in Luma, Eventbrite is the other marketplace worth pricing, and Tito is the closest thing to Luma without one.
Fees on this page were verified on 2026-09-05 against Luma's pricing page and Checkout Page pricing.
Frequently asked questions
- Is Luma or Checkout Page cheaper for a conference?
- Luma Plus is cheaper in this scenario: three month-to-month payments at $69 total $207, versus $717 for Checkout Page if sales land evenly across three billing periods. Luma's free tier would charge $4,485 in platform fees. Compare the required features, billing periods and actual sales curve.
- Can I switch from Luma to Checkout Page before my event?
- Yes. Export your guest list and registration answers to CSV, rebuild your ticket types in Checkout Page, connect your own Stripe account, and embed the new page on your site. Keep the Luma event page published until the conference, since people find it through their Luma calendar.
- Does Luma Plus remove the 5% fee?
- Yes. Luma Plus is $69 month to month, or $59 a month billed annually, and removes the 5% platform fee. It also adds custom Luma URLs, tax collection and 5,000 weekly invites. Compare the monthly option with the full annual commitment for your selling period.
- Can I pass Luma's fee to ticket buyers?
- No. The 5% is paid by the organizer, so it comes out of your ticket revenue rather than being added at checkout. That is cleaner for the buyer and more expensive for you. On a $299 ticket it is $14.95, which is the largest per-ticket platform fee in this comparison set.
- Is Luma suitable for a multi-day conference?
- It can be, though it was built for meetups and community events. Luma is strongest when your audience already follows your calendar and events are recurring and social. For a multi-day conference with tracks, workshop add-ons, invoiced tickets and conditional registration questions, it is a stretch.
Published by
Checkout Page builds checkout and event ticketing software. This site covers conference registration through product documentation, fee calculations and practical planning examples.
Published by Checkout Page, one of the platforms covered. Comparisons use public pricing and documentation. Our editorial approach.
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From our publisher · Checkout Page
Sell conference tickets on your own website with Checkout Page
Create ticket types, collect registration details and check attendees in with QR tickets. Checkout Page connects to your Stripe account and charges no per-ticket platform fee. Free up to $3,000 in monthly sales; paid plans add features and higher sales allowances.
No card required for the free plan. Stripe processing fees apply. Staff accounts and bulk discounts require a paid plan. About the publisher.