Skool vs Teachable: Community or Course Platform?

Skool vs Teachable comes down to one question: is the group the product, or is the course? Skool is a community with a classroom tab. Teachable is a course store with quizzes, certificates, upsells and its own checkout, and its help centre now says its community feature is closed to new schools. Below we compare the two on price, fees, payments, tax, course tools, community and marketing. Every fact comes from each company's own pages, checked on 29 September 2026.

We run our own Skool community, so we know Skool from the owner's side. We have not run a school on Teachable, so every Teachable fact below comes from Teachable's own pricing page and help centre, not from our own use.

Skool vs Teachable at a glance

The biggest difference: Teachable has stepped back from community

Teachable's help article on its Community feature, updated in August 2026, opens with a notice that Community is in "maintenance mode". Teachable says it is not adding new features to Community, not fixing bugs reported in it, and that Community is no longer available to new schools or to schools that never created one. Existing communities keep working.

Teachable gives its reason in the same article: most discussion on Teachable happens in and around course content, not in a separate community space. So it is putting its effort into courses and the student hub. For students who want to talk to each other, it points you to comments under each lesson, or to a separate platform such as Discord or Slack, linked from the student dashboard.

Some older plan tables on Teachable's site still list Community. The help article is the newer word, and it says a new school cannot create one.

On Teachable, the course is the product and the talk sits under each lesson. On Skool, the group is the product and the course sits in a tab.

That is the whole choice in one line. If people pay you to learn a skill at their own pace, Teachable is built for it. If people pay to be in a room with you and each other, with calls, posts and a leaderboard, Skool is built for that, and on Teachable you would need a second tool. Our Skool vs Discord comparison covers what that second tool looks like.

Price per month

Skool has two plans. Hobby is $9 a month and Pro is $99 a month. Both include unlimited members, courses, videos and live calls. Skool's pricing page marks Custom URL and Affiliates as not included on Hobby, and Skool's help centre reserves more for Pro, including webinars, group ownership transfer, and plugins such as Zapier, AutoDM and the cancellation video. Yearly billing gets "2 months free", and both plans start with a 14-day free trial. Our Skool pricing guide covers the two plans in detail.

Teachable has three self-serve plans and a Custom plan. Teachable's pricing page shows both billing options, and yearly billing saves 22%.

On Teachable, a product is a course, a coaching offer or a digital download. Memberships, bundles and unpublished drafts do not count toward the limit. Students are unlimited on every plan, and video storage goes up to 1TB. There is no free plan. Teachable offers a 7-day free trial and a 30-day money-back guarantee instead.

The product limit is the number to watch. Five products on Starter goes fast if you sell a main course, a mini course and a few downloads. On Skool, courses in the Classroom are unlimited on both plans, although each course holds up to 200 pages.

If your plan looks more like a paid group than a course catalogue, you can try Skool free for 14 days (affiliate link).

Fees, payments and who holds the money

Skool: one fee, and Skool is the seller

Skool's payments FAQ says Skool is a "merchant of record". All payments run through Skool, and you cannot connect your own Stripe account. Hobby costs 10% + 30c per transaction. Pro costs 2.9% + 30c up to $899, and 3.9% + 30c above $900. No separate card fee is listed on top. Skool pays your balance out every Wednesday, in your local currency, and its help centre lists more than 150 payout countries. Members pay in US dollars.

Teachable: a plan fee, then processing fees

Teachable's fee article splits the cost in two. First the plan fee: 7.5% of every sale on Starter, 0% on Builder, Growth and Custom. Then processing fees, which apply on every plan.

Teachable Payments is Teachable's own checkout, built on Stripe. Your money lands in a Stripe Express account connected to your school. For a school based in the US, a domestic card costs 2.9% + 30c. On the default Standard bundle, Teachable adds 0.7% to every recurring payment and 0.5% to any sale where tax is charged. The optional Global bundle adds 2.8% to every sale instead, drops those two extras, and adds over 35 local payment methods and pricing in the student's currency.

Two more details. Teachable's pricing page lists 3.9% + 30c for international cards, but its newer fee article lists 4.4% + 30c for a US school, so check the fee screen in your own account. And chargebacks cost $15 each. Refunds and disputes come straight out of your Teachable Payments balance, or out of your bank account if the balance is short.

Payouts can be daily (about two business days after a sale), weekly on Thursdays, or monthly. That is faster than Skool's weekly schedule. But Teachable Payments is only open to creators in 41 countries. Everywhere else, you connect your own Stripe account as a custom payment gateway, pay Stripe's fees, and handle all tax yourself. US schools on a custom gateway also pay Teachable a 2% integration fee.

A worked example

We worked out the monthly cost for two common setups from each company's listed rates: a $50 a month membership, and a $297 course sold 50 times in a month. This assumes a US creator, US cards, monthly billing, no refunds, no sales tax charged, and Teachable's default Standard bundle.

For a membership, Skool Pro is the cheapest, because Teachable adds 0.7% to every recurring payment and Skool's 2.9% + 30c already includes the card. For a one-off course, Teachable Builder comes out $10 cheaper than Skool Pro, because the card rate is the same and Builder's plan costs $10 less. The entry plans only make sense while you are small. Skool Hobby costs more than Pro once you sell about $1,270 a month, and Teachable Starter costs more than Builder once you sell about $670 a month.

Skool has one cost Teachable does not. If Skool finds you a paying member through its Discovery search or its own ads, Skool's Growth Boost takes 30% of that member's payments, plus fees, for as long as they stay. It is on by default, and you can switch it off in Settings, then Discovery.

Sales tax and VAT

Skool handles all of it. Its payments FAQ says Skool collects, files and pays sales tax, and adds EU VAT on top of your price. It does not charge UK VAT, because it is registered as a virtual training business, which is VAT-exempt in the UK.

Teachable does most of it on Teachable Payments. Teachable's tax article says it calculates, collects and remits US sales tax in the 30 states plus Washington DC where it says the law requires it, EU and UK VAT, and digital taxes in more than 20 other markets. The gap: outside the US, EU and UK, a sale where you and your student live in the same country is usually your job, except in Mexico and Taiwan. On a custom gateway, tax is all yours.

Course tools: Teachable is the stronger course builder

This is where Teachable earns its price. Every plan includes drip content, auto-graded quizzes, short-answer assessments, lesson comments, course design templates and course compliance, which makes students complete set lessons, videos or quizzes. Growth adds completion certificates and bulk student imports. Every plan card also lists AI tools for creating course content, and iOS and Android apps for students. Beyond courses, Teachable sells coaching, digital downloads and memberships from the same school.

Skool's Classroom is simpler. You add pages, turn them into lessons with video, attach files and links, add transcripts so videos are searchable, and group pages into folders. Skool hosts video itself and adds English captions automatically. You can drip a page so it opens a set number of days after someone joins, or lock a course until a member reaches a level. You can also sell a single course with a one-time Buy Now price inside a free or paid group. Skool's Classroom article does not mention quizzes, certificates or assignments.

So if your students need tests, proof of completion or a strict lesson order, Teachable fits. If the course supports the group, Skool's Classroom covers the basics.

Community and live calls: Skool's home ground

On Skool, the community is the main screen. Members post in one feed. Each like earns the author one point, points move members up nine levels, and a leaderboard shows who is most active. You can lock courses until a member reaches a level, which gives people a reason to take part.

Skool's Calendar tab holds your events. They can repeat daily, weekly, monthly or yearly, and they default to a Skool Call, which is included on both plans. You can pick Zoom, Meet or a real address instead. Skool says you can go live in the app or the browser with no third-party tools, record the call, and download the recording within 14 days. Webinars, for one-to-many talks, are a Pro feature.

On a new Teachable school, the social side is comments under lessons. Anything more means a second platform, linked from the student dashboard.

Selling and marketing tools

Teachable gives you more ways to sell. Every plan has coupons, order bumps and upsells at checkout, abandoned cart emails and bundles. Builder and up add built-in email marketing, an affiliate program, CSS snippets and a custom domain. Growth removes Teachable branding and opens Zapier, webhooks and the public API.

Skool keeps selling simple. Your sales page is your group's About page, which Skool calls a landing and checkout page, and links in its description do not work. Skool's pricing page lists no email marketing tool. Member affiliates and the Zapier plugin are Pro features. Your custom URL is your group's address on skool.com. Changing it is Pro only: the first change is free, and each one after that costs $100. What Skool has that Teachable does not is Discovery, where people browse and join groups on skool.com, with Growth Boost behind it.

Pick Skool if, pick Teachable if

Pick Skool if

• People pay to be part of a group, with posts, calls and each other.
• You charge a monthly membership and want the lowest cost per payment.
• You want points, levels and a leaderboard built in.
• You live outside the 41 countries where Teachable Payments works, and want payments and tax handled anyway.
• You want members to find you through Skool's Discovery, and accept the 30% Growth Boost cut on those members.

Pick Teachable if

• You sell courses, coaching and downloads, and people buy them one at a time.
• You need quizzes, assessments, course compliance or certificates.
• You want upsells, order bumps, abandoned cart emails and email marketing in one place.
• You want your school on your own domain.
• Your students talk under lessons, or you are happy to run a separate chat tool.

You can also run both. Teachable lets you add links to any web address on the student dashboard, so a course on Teachable can point to a group elsewhere. If you want the course side compared with another school platform, read our Skool vs Thinkific post, and for a wider list see our Skool alternatives guide.

For most people weighing Skool vs Teachable, the answer follows the product. A course business with a catalogue belongs on Teachable. A paid community with a course inside it belongs on Skool. If that second one is you, start a Skool community here (affiliate link) on the 14-day free trial.

FAQ

Does Teachable have a community feature?

Not for new schools. Teachable's help centre says Community is in maintenance mode: no new features, no bug fixes, and no new communities for schools that never created one. Existing communities keep working. Teachable suggests lesson comments, or a separate platform such as Discord or Slack linked from the student dashboard.

Is Skool cheaper than Teachable?

For a membership, yes. In our example of 100 members paying $50 a month, Skool Pro costs $274 and Teachable Builder costs $299, because Teachable adds 0.7% to recurring payments. For one-off course sales, Teachable Builder can be slightly cheaper, since its plan is $89 against Skool Pro's $99.

Does Teachable charge transaction fees?

On Starter, yes: 7.5% of every sale. Builder, Growth and Custom charge 0%. Processing fees apply on every plan, starting at 2.9% + 30c for a US card, with 0.7% more on recurring payments on the default bundle. Chargebacks cost $15 each. Skool's fee already includes card processing.

Can you sell a course on Skool?

Yes. Skool lets you set a one-time Buy Now price on a course inside a free or paid group, and buyers get access straight away. You can also make the whole group a one-time payment. Skool's Classroom has video, files, drip and level locks, but its help article does not mention quizzes or certificates.

Does Teachable have quizzes and certificates?

Yes. Teachable's pricing page lists auto-graded quizzes and short-answer assessments on every plan. Completion certificates start on the Growth plan, at $189 a month on monthly billing or $139 a month billed yearly. Skool's Classroom help article does not mention quizzes, certificates or assignments.

Who handles sales tax on Skool and Teachable?

Skool handles all of it as merchant of record, including EU VAT. Teachable Payments collects and remits US sales tax, EU and UK VAT and taxes in 20+ other markets, but same-country sales outside the US, EU and UK are usually yours. On a custom payment gateway, all tax is yours.

We may earn a commission if you start a Skool community through a link on this page. It costs you nothing extra, and it does not change what we write.