Overview
Stripe was founded in Palo Alto, California in 2010 by John and Patrick Collison, two brothers from Ireland. The company has headquarters both in California and Dublin, Ireland. By 2011, the company received $2 million in funding from venture capital firms, the PayPal co-founders, and entrepreneur Liam Casey. In 2013, the company acquired Kickoff. By 2018, Stripe was valued at $20 billion and was handling payments for large corporations such as Amazon, Facebook, and Shopify. In early 2022, Stripe signed partnerships that will see the company handle car orders for Ford and subscriptions for Spotify.
Ideal For
Businesses selling services or products online
Companies selling to an international audience
What’s on Offer
Payment processing for Mastercard, Visa, American Express, Diners Club, and Discover.
Accepts payments through wire transfer, ACH debit, credit transfers, Apple Pay, Alipay, Click to Pay, Microsoft Pay, and WeChat Pay.
Allows businesses to send invoices to other companies in the same country
Works with Klarna and Afterpay to offer buy now, pay later options.
Checkout comes with tax-rate support, coupons, and mobile wallets.
Integration with third-party payment services Drupal, WordPress, PrestaShop Magento, Shopware, and WooCommerce.
3D Secure (3DS) requires customers to enter a verification code or take another step to confirm their credit card and identity.
Stripe Elements allows businesses to create their own custom payment form without coding experience
Stripe Sigma creates reports and payment analytics.
Stripe Atlas allows you to set up a company.
Stripe Issuing allows companies to create and accept their own physical and virtual cards.
Includes Stripe Radar, a machine learning system designed to prevent fraud.
How Stripe Works
To activate your Stripe account, you’ll need to confirm your email address. Then, follow these steps:
Provide a home address, phone number, email address, legal name, and the last four digits of your social security number.
Provide details about your business website, products, the length of time it takes your customers to receive products, and your specific industry.
Provide the name customers will see on their credit card statements.
Provide an address and phone number for customer support.
Manually enter a routing or checking account number or link directly to a checking bank account.
Create two-factor authentication.
Optionally, join Stripe Climate to donate a percentage of revenues to carbon sequestration efforts.
Personalize the checkout flow.
After the onboarding process, Stripe verifies all information sent. The company may ask for a copy of your ID if they cannot verify your business or personal identity.
What’s Unique About Stripe?
Unlike a traditional merchant account, Stripe is an all-in-one payment solution, offering payment processing for credit cards and many other payment methods, including digital wallets. It can also be used:
to process invoices
for subscriptions and recurring payments
for buy now, pay later offers
to set up a company (incorporated in Delaware) in the United States
to offer a checkout and ways for customers to pay for goods and services online
for in-person transactions with Stripe Terminal
for mail and phone orders, by allowing users to enter customer information manually
Stripe automates the checkout experience for your customers, as well. A customer in China, for example, has the option of paying with that country’s popular payment option, WeChat Pay, and the total to be paid is displayed in local currency without the business needing to do any work.
Stripe claims 89% of all credit cards have been processed on its network, making it the most commonly-used credit card processor. The company is adding new features and services by investing in and acquiring new businesses and partners. The setup process is simple enough to allow even a small business to create a Stripe account. At the same time, Stripe has the features any larger business may need.
Currently, there is no other provider that offers such a wide suite of features for checkouts. Competitors like PayPal offer a way to pay online, but with fewer payment options and features.
Traditional merchant accounts with banks have a longer signup process and often require a specific minimum balance in a bank account for approval. Traditional merchant accounts offering credit card processing also require weeks for setup, while Stripe can be set up in less than an hour. With Stripe, there is also no long-term contract, and fees are relatively low when compared with other credit card processors.
Stripe App
Stripe Customer Support
Once you’re signed in, you can access chatbot, phone, and email support 24/7. Response times vary from 3 minutes to 24 hours, depending on the type of support requested. If you cannot sign in, fill out the basic contact form to request an email response from Stripe. Stripe users can also chat live with Stripe developers on Discord.
Stripe Pricing
Pricing & Special Offers
Stripe is a secure site, forcing HTTPS for all pages and running regular audits. It’s certified to PCI Service Provider Level 1. To access Stripe, you need an account, which requires you to provide verifiable personal information immediately, including your full name and address.
Stripe offers a standard processing model and custom pricing for online businesses. For businesses needing in-person credit card processing, Stripe Terminal charges 2.7% + 5¢ for every successful card transaction. They also have two options for card readers with hardware management: The BBPOS Chipper 2X BT at $59 and the BBPOS WisePOS E at $249.
Stripe credit card processing (2.9% + 30¢ for every successful card charge)
Custom pricing
All credit cards and digital cards included
Yes
Yes
International cards included with no extra charge
No
No
3D Secure authentication
Yes
No—3¢ for every 3D Secure attempt
Card account updater
Yes
No—25¢ per update
Checkout
Yes
Yes
Stripe Radar
Yes
5¢ for each transaction screened
Bottom Line
Businesses based in one of the 47 countries Stripe currently supports can sign up to receive credit card payments from all over the world. It’s mainly used for online businesses, but in-person payments are possible with Stripe Terminal.
API integration tools mean businesses can build ecommerce stores from scratch—you can buy a domain and even set up a business in Stripe. Users can also work with Stripe consultants or developers if they need customization but lack coding skills.
