COMPARISON

MemberPress vs Paid Memberships Pro – Which is the Better Membership Plugin?

Last Updated: 6 mins By: Akriti Pant

MemberPress vs Paid Memberships Pro: These two stand out as top contenders among WordPress membership plugins, offering powerful features for managing memberships and subscriptions.

In this comparison, we’ll explore their key differences in features, pricing, and usability to help you decide which is the better fit for your website.

Have you tried the User Registration plugin? It combines user registration, profiles, and member management in one versatile solution, often surpassing MemberPress or Paid Memberships Pro.

MemberPress vs Paid Memberships Pro At a Glance

Before we start comparing these two membership plugins, let’s have a quick glance:

MemberPress

MemberPress is a premium membership plugin designed to help creators, educators, and businesses easily monetize their websites.

It enables you to build membership sites, sell online courses, offer digital downloads, and control access to your content—all while securely accepting payments via credit cards and digital wallets.

Paid Memberships Pro

Paid Memberships Pro is a freemium membership plugin that offers a robust solution for setting up your unique membership program.

It’s flexible for managing members with features like content restriction, recurring payments, custom profile fields, and more.


Plans and Pricing

Memberpress is a premium plugin, while Paid Memberships Pro offers free and premium versions. Let’s look at their pricing differences.

MemberPress

MemberPress offers three flexible pricing plans backed by their risk-free 14-day money-back guarantee.

PlansMemberPressBenefit
Basic$179.50/year1 site license
Basic LMS features and Membership features
Standard Support
Plus$299.50/year2 sites license
Standard LMS and membership features
Priority Support
Pro$399.50/year3 sites licenses
Premium LMS and membership features
Premium Support

Paid Memberships Pro

Paid Memberships Pro has a free plan that gives you basic features with free add-ons.

As you upgrade to their higher plans, you’ll get additional add-ons, features, and site licenses for up to 50 sites. It also offers a 100-day money-back guarantee.

PlansPaid Memberships ProBenefit
Free

$0Entire plugin with 29 free addons
Standard$174/year50+ Sites
Phone Support
Other Plus + Enterprise features
Plus$299/year2 sites license
Priority support
30 Plus Addons
Other plus + Standard features
Enterprise$5000/year50+ Sites
Phone Support
Other Plus + Enterprise features

What’s more interesting is that User Registration also has a free plan, while the premium version starts at just $69.10/year. That’s a huge difference!!


Top Features: MemberPress vs Paid Memberships Pro

Let’s compare the top features that are critical for membership plugins:

Ease of Use

After installing each plugin, a unique setup wizard guides you through the initial configuration process.

The setup wizard of Paid Memberships Pro helps you configure your site, payment gateways, membership levels, and advanced settings.

MemberPress’s setup wizard covers basic settings and emphasizes configuring content security to protect your membership site effectively.

FeaturesMemberPressPaid Memberships Pro
Setup ProcessQuick & Easy to SetupDetailed Process
User InterfaceIntuitive Dashboard & Easy NavigationComprehensive, Can Make New Users Easy

Members Management

Membership plugin is not only about registering members but also serving them effectively. Assigning user roles and growing the membership base becomes difficult without robust member management.

Let’s look at the features offered by both the plugin.

FeaturesMemberPressPaid Memberships Pro
Unlimited Levels
User Roles & Permissions✅ ✅ 
Member Profiles✅ ✅ 
Reporting Tools✅ (Advanced)✅ (Basic)
Member Email Communication✅ ✅ 

Content Protection

Content protection is the core foundation of any membership business – if you can’t effectively control who sees what content, there’s no point in having a membership site at all.

FeaturesMemberPressPaid Memberships Pro
Access Control Levels✅ ✅ 
Custom Post Types✅ ✅ 
Content Drip✅ ✅ Limited
Post/Page Restriction✅ ✅ 

Note: Know more about content restriction and how it works.


Admin Capabilities

For a smooth, secure experience, admins must have full control over user approvals, memberships, and content.

FeaturesMemberPressPaid Memberships Pro
Member Listing✅ ✅ 
Sales Report✅ ✅ 
Signup & Cancellation✅ ✅ 
Order Management

Member Experience

Member Experience features shape how your users interact with and navigate through your membership site, directly influencing their satisfaction and likelihood of staying subscribed.

FeaturesMemberPressPaid Memberships Pro
Login and Password Reset✅ ✅ 
User Profile✅ ✅ 
Account Dashboard✅ ✅ 
Limit Post Views
Social Login

Integration Capabilities

Let’s look at the other integration capabilities for the plugins:

FeaturesMemberPressPaid Memberships Pro
LMS Features✅ 
Email Marketing✅ ✅ 
WooCommerce✅ ✅ 
Affiliate Systems✅ (Built-in)✅ (Add-on)

Payment

Both MemberPress and Paid Memberships Pro offer an extensive set of payment gateways.

FeaturesMemberPressPaid Memberships Pro
Supported GatewaysApple Pay, Google Wallet, Stripe, Authorize.net, Cash App, and Integration with other payment platforms.PayPal, Stripe, Authorize.Net, Braintree, Payfast, Paystack, TakBull, and Integration with other payment platforms.
Recurring Payments✅ ✅ 
Discount or Invite Codes✅ ✅ 
Trial Membership✅ ✅ 

Support and Documentation

Both MemberPress and Paid Memberships Pro offer similar core support features.

Meanwhile, the Paid Memberships Pro’s Slack community indicates a more developer-focused, professional environment where technical issues can be discussed more effectively.

FeaturesMemberPressPaid Memberships Pro
Support Ticket✅ ✅ 
Documentation✅ ✅ 
Live Chat
Video Tutorials✅ ✅ 
CommunitySlack Community

Before You Make a Decision

The decision on the best membership plugin should also be considered based on various aspects like search engine visibility controls, user data privacy, backup and restore, and more.

Hence, choose MemberPress if you need a built-in LMS feature with robust content protection. You can go with Paid Memberships Pro for the free start and developer-friendly option.

Not convinced yet? Dive into this comparison table to see how these three plugins stack against each other.

FeaturesMemberPressPaid Memberships ProUser Registration
Ease of Use4.5⭐4.5⭐5⭐
Members Management4.5⭐4.5⭐4.5⭐
Content Protection5⭐4.5⭐5⭐
Admin Capabilities4.5⭐4.5⭐5⭐
Member Experience4.5⭐5⭐5⭐
Integration Capabilities5⭐4.5⭐5⭐
Payment 5⭐5⭐5⭐
Support and Documentation4⭐4⭐4.5⭐
Pricing4⭐4.5⭐5⭐

Want to see User Registration in action? Give it a try with its free demo—see the powerful feature and member registration experience yourself.

MemberPress vs Paid Memberships Pro – Which is the Better Membership Plugin?
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