Whop is a relatively new digital marketplace founded in 2021 by Steven Schwartz, Cameron Zoub, and Jack Sharkey. The trio originally met in an online sneaker reseller group. Their original business was a sneaker bots side hustle. This venture-backed company has raised over $200 million in 2026, putting its valuation at $1.6 billion. The platform has over 2.5 million sellers.
What is Whop?
Whop is a social commerce platform and marketplace where creators can sell memberships, online courses, and other digital goods. On this platform, you’ll be able to tap into an audience of 21 million customers to potentially grow your sales. This marketplace has over 2.5 million businesses, all competing for the same customers. You’ll find AI businesses, content products, prediction markets group, custom workout plans, CRM software, and a wide range of other businesses on the platform.
How does Whop work?
Whop works by giving sellers a unified storefront on their platform to sell communities, software, or content. Sellers can choose to charge either one-time or recurring subscription fees to generate sales. You can also add apps, such as a forum, chat, calendar, and more, to create a specific user experience. Buyers can choose to sign up to access specific communities or buy products. Whop accepts payment from Visa, Mastercard, American Express, Apple Pay, Cash App, and even some crypto.
What you need to know about selling on Whop
Whop is a platform known for its high fees. As most sellers get their sales from Whop’s marketplace, they’re at risk of paying 30% per sale, which eats into their profit margins. On top of that, they add a 4% fee plus $1.00 for instant payouts. Some platforms offer this feature with no additional fees. While some may like getting paid in crypto, there’s a 5% + $1.00 fee for accepting cryptocurrency online, including Venmo. You also get charged a $29.00 fee per alert for chargebacks. Overall, there are a lot of add-on fees for features, depending on the payment method.
Whop’s marketplace offers a lot of exposure if you’re featured. However, it’s a highly competitive platform. Being discovered in their marketplace isn’t guaranteed either. Many of the businesses featured on Whop have timestamps dating back 1 year or more. Thus, established businesses that were on the platform years ago are more likely to appear on the marketplace than the latest listings.
Whop also doesn’t offer native video hosting. If you’re creating video content or online courses, you’ll have to embed YouTube or Vimeo videos for your content. That makes the content feel less seamless. While you can make YouTube videos private, it adds a layer of work as some course creators might not want their video content to be as accessible to their students or viewers.
Is Whop the best platform to sell products?
No, Whop isn’t the best platform to sell products; Payhip is. Payhip is a much more affordable platform for selling memberships, software, digital downloads, courses, coaching, and physical products, with a 5% transaction fee per sale. There are no additional fees for selling on the Payhip marketplace either. You won’t need to embed videos from YouTube or Vimeo, as you’ll have access to a native video tool for online courses. You’ll also be able to customize your website any way you want with advanced customization. To start selling products, sign up for free.