Kajabi vs. Thinkific: Comparison of Two of the Best Online Course Tools

Kajabi boasts a user base of over 40,000 Kajabi Heroes (people who use the platform to sell knowledge products).

Although a Capterra rating of 4.3/5 is pretty decent, let’s look at some pros and cons that have been stated by Kajabi users to see why it isn’t higher:

The Thinkific platform is trusted and used by over 50,000 people and about 60 million students that have access to the courses.

With a Capterra rating of 4.6/5, here are some pros and cons that have been stated by Thinkific consumers:

Both Kajabi and Thinkific are similar in that they offer their users intuitive tools to create and sell courses.

These platforms, however, don’t come without flaws.

Just by looking at the two platforms’ pros and cons, we’ve concluded that this comparison is not to see which platform is best, but rather which platform is best for a certain entrepreneur or business.

In the next section, we’ll have a more in-depth discussion on all the features Kajabi and Thinkific have to offer.

To get an idea of how Kajabi and Thinkific work, here’s a comprehensive tour of their core features and how they can help you build a thriving online business.

Any online course platform’s backbone is its course creation features.

Let’s take a look at how these two platforms perform.

Kajabi’s course builder provides a variety of online courses to build:

With these features, you have complete control over your course content and design.

The pre-built templates cover courses such as:

All of the templates are easily customizable and Thinkific offers tips to help you create the ultimate online course — they can be switched off if you prefer.

Both Kajabi and Thinkific know that you can’t have an effective online course without a brand behind it, which is why they’ve also turned their attention to website design.

The main platform for engaging and converting your target audience into buyers is your course website.

Here’s how Kajabi and Thinkific stack up against each other.

You can have the best-looking website and course, but without a solid sales and marketing strategy, you won’t attract any customers.

Here are the sales and marketing features that Kajabi and Thinkific offer.

Kajabi boasts effective and ready-to-use templates, but what they don’t tell you is that you’ll need to upgrade your plan to get access to other more professional-looking blueprints.

In the “Design Your Site” section, you can create sales pages, checkout pages, and order pages to market and sell your courses.

Finally, Thinkific integrates with a number of platforms to help you with your marketing and sales efforts.

Your online course’s success depends on happy student experiences.

Here’s how Kajabi and Thinkific ensure a smooth user experience.

One thing Kajabi doesn’t have is course completion certificates — you’ll need to use a third-party app such as Canva or Google Slides if you want to reward your student after completion of the course.

Thinkific allows you to manage and organize your students from the start — when students sign up to your website, they provide you with the necessary information, which is captured and can be accessed later.

Additionally, you can sort your students into specific groups — this feature allows you to sell your courses in bulk and to a certain audience.

By sorting your students into groups you can easily track the effectiveness of your offerings with each group and refine them where necessary.

The pricing of your course platform has a big influence on the cost and profitability of your course.

Here’s what you pay for when using either Kajabi or Thinkific.

With the Basic plan, you get:

Additionally, you’ll be able to access:

The Basic plan doesn’t include the following:

Kajabi allows you to upgrade your subscription plan at any time.

The Growth plan includes everything that the Basic plan includes, but still does not have access to Kajabi’s code editor.

The main difference between Basic and Growth is the number of products, pipelines, and contacts available to you.

The Pro plan includes everything that the Basic and Growth plan includes (just in greater numbers), and additionally, you’ll be able to use Kajabi’s code editor.

Kajabi Access is a new addition to the software that is specifically designed to help you maximize your success on their platform.

This feature is available as an add-on for all payment plans at an extra cost of $99/month.

With Kajabi Access, you get:

You can also save 20% of the fees if you choose to make payments annually.

Additionally, Kajabi offers a 30-day money-back guarantee for you to test their platform.

Kajabi doesn’t charge transaction fees when you use the built-in payments software, however, if you choose to make use of Stripe, you’re charged a processing fee of 2.9% + 30¢ per transaction.

With Kajabi, there are no long-term commitments or complex contracts — you can cancel your Kajabi account from the dashboard at any time.

The Free plan features include:

There are too many features that aren’t included in the Free plan to name, however, here are some core features you won’t have access to:

With Thinkific’s Free plan no credit card information is required at sign-up.

The Basic plan includesall the Free plan features, and additionally you get unlimited courses, students, and content.

This plan also includes features such as live chat support, coupons and promotions, and drip content.

The Pro plan includes all the Basic plan features and also features like priority support, private and hidden courses, and completion certificates.

If you’d like to scale your business, but you’re not sure whether you’re ready to commit to the Premier plan, Kajabi offers a Growth add-on to the Pro Plan.

With the Pro + Growth package plan, you get all Pro features and access to groups and communities, the ability to remove Thinkific branding, and finally advanced segmentation.

The Premier plan includes all the additional Free, Basic, and Pro features, as well as some other high-powered features, such as onboarding packages and unlimited communities.

The Plus plan is available for big companies and high-volume customers.

There are no limitations with this subscription plan — in other words, you have unlimited access to all of Thinkific’s features.

With the Plus plan (costs determined by Kajabi), you get:

And more!

Thinkific offers a 20% discount on your subscription plan if you choose to make payments annually.

You’re also capable of upgrading or downgrading to any of their other payment plans, and if you feel like the platform isn’t for you and your business, you can cancel your account at any time.

Finding the best all-in-one online course platform that fits both your needs and wallet can be difficult.

We make that decision easy with our intuitive all-in-one business-building tool — systeme.io!

Our Free plan features include:

Additionally, you’ll be able to make use of other features such as automation, workflows, A/B tests, and receive 24/7 customer support.

Systeme.io’s Startup plan includes all Free plan features (in greater amounts) and is essentially an upgrade for when your business starts to grow.

When your online business reaches 10,000 contacts, you’d ideally upgrade to our Webinar plan.

Not only will you receive access to all features included in the Startup plan at a bigger scale, but you’ll also be capable of exploring our webinar features.

With the Unlimited plan, you get full access to the entire systeme.io platform’s features!

Systeme.io offers a 30% discount on your subscription plan if you choose to make payments annually, as well as free website migration.

When compared to other platforms, systeme.io offers more tools at a better price.

As mentioned above, this post was not to determine which platform is best, but rather which platform is best for you!

Kajabi made sure that they included all the necessary tools to successfully create, market, and launch courses online, however, their prices are on the expensive side and definitely not beginner-business-friendly.

Thus, if you’re new to the online course business, we would not recommend Kajabi as a first-time course creation platform.

Thinkific’s prices are less expensive, but their features are extremely limited — you can only do that much to grow your business, before needing to spend more!

However, for the best all-in-one solution that combines both cost efficiency with comprehensive features — we recommend systeme.io.

The only tool you’ll ever need to get your online course business started — sign up to systeme.io today and put us to the test!