12 Best Community Engagement Platforms (2026): Pricing Verified

Pick three community engagement platforms and try to find out what they cost. Go on. One will show you a price, one will show you a range, and one will ask for your work email.

We did it for twelve of them on 5 September 2026 and wrote down only what was actually published. No aggregator data, no “starting from” dressed up as a real price, no estimates. Where a vendor publishes nothing, we say so, because that’s a finding too.

The spread is wider than you would guess. For an organization with a few hundred members, entry prices run from $9 a month to $895 a month, and the transaction fee runs from 0% to 10%. Those two numbers together decide your real bill, and only one of them is on the page you’re looking at.

What a community engagement platform actually is

A community engagement platform is the system your members actually live in: where they find announcements, sign up for events, pay dues, and see each other. It’s different from a social network, where an algorithm decides who sees what, and different from an association management system, which is built around the staff workflow rather than the member experience.

That distinction matters because the twelve products below aren’t really the same category. Three of them are course and creator tools that communities happen to use. Four are enterprise platforms sold to organizations with a full-time community team. Five are built for organizations with members, dues and events. If you buy across categories you’ll pay for capability you never switch on, or you’ll discover in month three that the thing you needed most is an add-on.

If you’re still working out what you’re trying to fix, start with what community engagement actually means for a small organization before you shortlist anything.

How we checked these community engagement platform prices

Every figure below came off the vendor’s own pricing page on 5 September 2026. We didn’t use G2, Capterra, or any comparison site, because those figures are frequently years old and frequently wrong. Where a vendor publishes a range instead of a price, we quote the range. Where a vendor publishes nothing, we say nothing rather than guessing.

Three things worth knowing before you read the table. Prices change; re-check before you sign. “Unlimited members” is common on the creator-side products and rare on the membership-side products, because they’re counting different things. And a published price isn’t the same as a published cost, which is the point of the section further down on the three costs that decide your real bill.

All 12 platforms at a glance

Tool	Entry price	Priced by	Platform fee	Free trial	Publishes pricing
Kannect	$29/mo, or $276/yr	People, 500 on the entry plan	2%	7 days, card required	Yes, in full
Skool	$9/mo	Flat tiers, unlimited members	10%	14 days	Yes, in full
Join It	$29/mo	Admin seats, 3 on the entry plan	3%	Yes, no card	Yes, in full
Heartbeat	$49/mo	Members, 350 on Build	5%	14 days, no card	Yes, in full
Raklet	Free, then $59/mo	Contacts, 100 free and 500 on Essentials	4%, then 3% + $0.60	Free plan	Yes, in full
Group.app	Free, then $65/mo	Members, 100 free and 1,000 on Build	0%	14 days	Yes, in full
Wild Apricot	$66/mo	Contacts, 100 at the entry price	None charged by the platform	60 days, no card	Yes, in full
Mighty Networks	$79/mo	Flat tiers, unlimited members, 3 hosts	2%	14 days, no card	Yes, in full
Circle	$89/mo	Flat tiers, unlimited members, 3 admins	2%	14 days, no card	Monthly rates only
Bettermode	$399/mo	Members, up to 10,000, 5 collaborators	Not published	14 days, no card	Yes
Hivebrite	From $895/mo, billed annually	Flat tiers, unlimited users, 2 admins, 5 groups	Not published	None offered	Starting prices only
Glue Up	From $3,000/yr	Org size and requirements	Not published	None, demo only	Ranges only

The 12 best community engagement platforms in 2026

1. Kannect

What it’s. Kannect is our product, so treat this entry accordingly and check the pricing page yourself. It’s a community engagement platform built for organizations that have members, collect money from them, and meet in person: chambers, booster clubs, support groups, PTAs, alumni chapters, nonprofits and civic groups.

What it does. CRM, events with RSVPs and ticketing, announcements and email, dues and payments through Stripe, a branded website and a member directory, on one system. Every plan includes the whole platform. As the pricing page puts it, plans differ by how many people, admins and groups you get, not by which features are switched on.

Plan	Monthly	Billed yearly	People	Admins	Emails/mo	Platform fee
Starter	$29	$276	500	3	5,000	2%
Launch	$69	$660	2,000	5	20,000	2%
Growth	$149	$1,428	5,000	10	50,000	1.5%
Scale	$299	$2,868	15,000	25	150,000	1%

Pricing. $29 a month to 500 people, up to $299 a month to 15,000. Annual billing takes 20% off. There’s a seven day free trial and it asks for a card. Setup is self-serve at no cost; if you would rather we build the account for you, that’s an optional one time service starting at $150.

Best for. Membership organizations that collect dues, run events and need announcements to actually land. Chambers, nonprofits, churches, schools, booster clubs, alumni chapters, support groups and clubs, staffed or volunteer-run. Most organizations start Kannect for one job, usually events, the member directory or payments, and move the rest of their system across as they need it.

2. Mighty Networks

What it’s. The best known community platform in the creator category, with a strong mobile app and a large template and course layer.

Pricing. Launch is $79 a month, or $950 a year, which the page describes as two months free. Scale is $179 a month and Growth is $354 a month; annual prices for those two aren’t published. Mighty Pro is custom. Transaction fees are 2%, 1% and 0.5% by tier. The trial is 14 days on the Growth plan with no card required. There’s no free plan.

The drawback. Member counts are unlimited, which sounds generous until you notice you’re paying $79 a month at 40 members and $79 a month at 4,000. For a small organization that’s the wrong end of the curve. Mighty’s own content is also written for large associations and creators, which tells you who it’s designed around.

Best for. Creators and cohort programs selling access to content.

3. Circle

What it’s. A clean, modern community product that has become the default for paid memberships built around content and discussion.

Pricing. Professional is $89 a month with 3 admins and 10 moderators. Business is $199 a month with 5 admins and 15 moderators. Circle Plus is custom. Transaction fees are 2%, 1% and 0.5%. The trial is 14 days with no card. Members are unlimited on every tier. Annual prices aren’t shown on the page.

The drawback. Email is a separate product. The Email Hub add-on is priced by contact count and starts at $99 a month at 10,000 contacts, so if reaching your members by email is the actual job, the real monthly cost isn’t $89. Check that before you compare it to anything else.

Best for. Paid communities where the product is discussion and content rather than dues and events.

4. Bettermode

What it’s. A customizable community layer aimed at software companies building a customer community next to their product.

Pricing. Starter is $399 a month or $4,788 a year, for up to 10,000 members and 5 collaborators. Growth is $1,500 a month or $18,000 a year, for up to 25,000 members and 10 collaborators. Premium is contact sales. The trial is 14 days with no card.

Worth noting. The page advertises “save up to 16%” on yearly billing, but the yearly totals shown are exactly twelve times the monthly prices. We’re quoting both as published, because we would rather show you the contradiction than pick one. Ask them which is right before you buy.

Best for. Software companies with a budget line for community and someone whose job it’s.

5. Hivebrite

What it’s. An enterprise community platform with deep roots in alumni networks and professional associations.

Pricing. Core starts at $895 a month billed annually, with 2 administrators and 5 groups. Flex starts at $1,995 a month billed annually, with 5 administrators, 5 community managers and 10 groups. Prime is priced after a discovery call and Custom Fit is custom. Users are unlimited on all plans. There’s no free trial and no free plan.

The drawback. No trial means you can’t see the product working with your own data before you commit to an annual contract. The seat limits are also tight at the entry tier: two administrators is fine for a staffed team and awkward for a volunteer board of eight.

Best for. University alumni offices and national associations with staff.

6. Wild Apricot

What it’s. The long standing membership management option for small associations and clubs, now part of Personify.

Pricing. There are no feature tiers. Every package has the same features and the price is set by contact count, with steps at 100, 250, 500, 2,000, 5,000, 15,000 and 50,000 contacts. The 100 contact package is $66 a month, or $59.40 a month prepaid for a year, or $56.10 a month prepaid for two. Wild Apricot charges no per-transaction fee of its own, and publishes a $0 setup fee. The trial is 60 days with no card, which is the most generous on this list.

The drawback. Contact based pricing punishes exactly the thing you want to do, which is grow your list. Every lapsed member, past attendee and newsletter signup counts against the tier, so the bill climbs for reasons that have nothing to do with how active your community is. The interface also shows its age next to the newer products here.

Best for. Small associations that want a long trial and no transaction fee, and can keep their contact list tidy.

7. Raklet

What it’s. A membership and community tool with an unusually complete free tier.

Pricing. Free covers 100 contacts and 1 admin. Essentials is $59 a month, or $49 a month billed annually, for 500 contacts. Professional is $119 or $99 annually for 1,000 contacts and 2 admins. Premium is $499 or $399 annually for 10,000 contacts and 3 admins. Transaction fees run 4%, 3%, 2% and 1% plus $0.60 by tier. Extra contacts are $29 a month per thousand. A branded mobile app is $299 a month on annual billing. No setup fee.

The drawback. Admin seats are the pinch point. One admin on Essentials and two on Professional is difficult for a volunteer board where four people need access. The $0.60 flat component on every transaction also lands hard on small payments: on a $15 event ticket at the Essentials rate that’s roughly 7%.

Best for. Very small organizations that want to start free and have one person running everything.

8. Group.app

What it’s. A community platform with a genuinely free tier and, unusually, no transaction fee at all.

Pricing. Free covers 100 members, 3 channels and 1 admin. Build is $65 a month, or $57 a month billed annually at $684, for 1,000 members, 20 channels and 2 admins. Scale is $145 or $127 annually at $1,524, for 5,000 members, 50 channels and 5 admins. Branded App is $485 or $427 annually at $5,124, for 20,000 members with unlimited channels and admins. Transaction fee is 0% on every plan. Paid plans have a 14 day trial.

The drawback. A 0% transaction fee is real and worth having, but it only helps if you’re moving money through the platform. Two admins on Build is the same volunteer board problem Raklet has.

Best for. Communities that take payments and want the platform to take none of it.

9. Heartbeat

What it’s. A community product built around live events, threads and courses, with unlimited admins on every plan.

Pricing. Build is $49 a month or $490 a year, for 350 members. Grow is $149 a month or $1,490 a year, for 5,000 members. Scale is $849 a month or $9,200 a year, unlimited. Transaction fees are 5%, 2.5% and 1.25%. Trial is 14 days with no card on every plan.

The drawback. The 5% fee on the entry plan is high. On $20,000 of annual dues that’s $1,000 a year, which is twice the subscription.

Best for. Cohort based groups and communities with a lot of live sessions and a lot of volunteer admins.

10. Skool

What it’s. A deliberately minimal community and course product with the lowest entry price on this list.

Pricing. Hobby is $9 a month with a 10% transaction fee. Pro is $99 a month with a 2.9% transaction fee. Both are unlimited on members, courses and calls. A yearly toggle advertises two months free but doesn’t display the yearly figures. Fourteen day free trial.

The drawback. That 10% fee is the highest here by a distance, and it’s charged on everything you collect. At $9 a month plus 10%, an organization collecting $30,000 a year in dues pays $3,108 a year. The Pro plan at $99 plus 2.9% costs $2,058 on the same revenue. The cheap plan is the expensive one.

Best for. Individual creators testing an idea before there’s real money moving.

11. Join It

What it’s. A focused membership management tool that sits alongside tools you already use rather than replacing them.

Pricing. Starter is $29 a month with 3 admin seats and a 3% service fee. Total is $99 a month with 5 seats and 2%. Extra is $199 a month with 10 seats and 1.5%. Enterprise is custom with a negotiated fee. Annual billing takes 10% off, and nonprofits get a further 10%. Free trial with no card required. No setup cost.

The drawback. Join It’s memberships, not a community. There’s no member-facing space, so you’ll still be running your events, your announcements and your website somewhere else. Note also that the annual figure shown for the Extra plan doesn’t reconcile with its monthly price, so confirm that one on the live billing toggle.

Best for. Organizations that only want dues and renewals solved and are happy with a stack.

12. Glue Up

What it’s. An all in one association platform covering membership, events, email, a CRM and a mobile app, strongest in Asia Pacific and the Middle East.

Pricing. Essential and Professional start from $3,000 to $6,500 a year. Advanced starts from $8,000 to $18,500 a year. Enterprise is custom. All plans are billed annually. No contact limits, seat counts, transaction fees or trial terms are published.

The drawback. A range this wide isn’t a price. The gap between $8,000 and $18,500 on one plan means the number you get depends on the conversation, and you can’t compare it to anything until you have had that conversation.

Best for. Staffed associations with a five figure software budget.

Also worth knowing: the ones that publish nothing

Higher Logic and Tradewing publish no pricing at all; every path is a demo request. MemberClicks publishes a floor of $4,500 a year for MC Professional and $3,500 a year for MC Trade, with typical contracts running a year. Neon One publishes starting figures of $99 a month for its CRM and $69 a month for websites, without limits or fees attached. Memberful is $49 a month plus a 4.9% transaction fee. Discourse has a genuinely free self-serve tier and then $100 and $500 a month plans priced on page views and staff seats rather than members.

None of that’s a criticism. It does mean that shortlisting three of these vendors commits you to three sales cycles before you can put three numbers side by side. We wrote about the same pattern in the chamber market in our comparison of chamber of commerce software.

The three costs that decide your real bill

Comparing subscription prices across a community engagement platform shortlist is the easy part and rarely the deciding one. Three other numbers move the total more.

What the platform counts

Some of these products count members, some count contacts, some count admins, and one counts page views. Wild Apricot counts every contact in the database, including people who lapsed four years ago. Circle counts email contacts separately from members. Mighty and Circle don’t count members at all and instead limit hosts and admins. Work out which unit your organization grows in, then look at what the vendor charges for that unit.

The transaction fee, which is usually the biggest number

On this list the platform fee ranges from 0% to 10%, on top of whatever your payment processor charges. If you collect $40,000 a year in dues, tickets and donations, the difference between a 1% platform and a 5% platform is $1,600 a year, which will dwarf the difference in subscription price.

Platform fee	Cost on $40,000 collected
0%	$0
1%	$400
2%	$800
3%	$1,200
5%	$2,000
10%	$4,000

What it costs to get started

Wild Apricot, Raklet, Join It and Kannect all publish that there’s no setup fee. Hivebrite and Glue Up bundle professional services into the package without publishing a figure. Most of the enterprise vendors in this category don’t publish onboarding costs anywhere, which is the single most common source of a budget surprise. Ask for it in writing before you sign, and ask what it covers.

If you want to work out what you’re currently paying across the tools you already have, our free Stack Audit Calculator does that without asking for an email address.

How to choose a community engagement platform

Skip the feature matrix. Every platform on this list has events, a directory and messaging. The four questions below separate them.

1. Do your members actually receive things? This is the question most shortlists never ask. If your announcements go out through a Facebook group, an algorithm decides who sees them. If they go out by email, roughly half your list never opens it. Ask each vendor what percentage of an opted-in membership receives a given announcement, and how they know.
2. How many people need admin access? Volunteer run organizations usually need four to eight. Several products on this list cap you at one or two on the entry plan, and the jump to more admins is a whole tier.
3. What happens to the fee as you grow? A 10% transaction fee at $2,000 collected is trivial. At $50,000 it’s a part time salary.
4. Can you get your data out? Ask before you migrate in, not after. Every vendor says yes; ask what format and whether it includes payment history.

If engagement rather than software is the real problem, why community engagement fails and community engagement strategies for organizations without a marketing team are the better starting points. A platform won’t fix a community that has nothing to show up for.

Where Kannect fits

Kannect is our product, so read this entry with that in mind and go check the pricing page yourself. It’s a community engagement platform for membership organizations: chambers, nonprofits, churches, schools and PTAs, alumni chapters, booster clubs, support groups, clubs and civic groups. Staffed or volunteer-run, 80 members or 8,000.

Memberships, properly. One membership type with multiple pricing tiers on every plan, or multiple membership types each with their own tiers on the higher plans. Custom application forms, manual or automatic approval, and a welcome flow that drops a new member straight into the conversation. Discounts and renewals are built in, so nobody’s tracking who gets the early-bird rate in a spreadsheet.

And the rest of the organization. A member directory with unlimited listings on every plan, and multiple directories side by side on the higher plans for sponsors, alumni, partners or your team. Groups and programs for chapters, committees and cohorts, each with its own conversation and analytics. A people database with statuses for member, alumni, donor, staff, parent and student, which members keep current themselves from the app. Events, broadcast email, a community website and a member app.

Plan	Monthly	Billed yearly	People	Admins	Emails/mo	Platform fee
Starter	$29	$276	500	3	5,000	2%
Launch	$69	$660	2,000	5	20,000	2%
Growth	$149	$1,428	5,000	10	50,000	1.5%
Scale	$299	$2,868	15,000	25	150,000	1%

The part that matters most day to day is reach. Every opted-in member receives every announcement. No algorithm decides who sees it, and there’s no per-contact overage bill for sending it. Payments run on Stripe. You connect your bank once, and money from events, memberships, programs and donations lands in your own account, usually within three business days. Kannect never holds your money. Registered nonprofits pay 0% Kannect fee on donations.

What makes it different from most of this list is that it doesn’t ask you to choose between a membership system and a community. The dues, the directory, the events and the announcements are the same product, on every plan, from the first day. Nothing is a module you unlock later.

Most organizations start with one job, usually events, payments or the directory, and bring the rest across as they need it. Setup is self-serve at no cost. If you’d rather we build the account for you, that’s an optional one time service starting at $150.

We write separately for chambers, nonprofits, churches, K-12 and PTAs, higher education and support groups.

Frequently asked questions

Where these community engagement platform prices came from

Every community engagement platform price in this article came off the vendor’s own pricing page on 5 September 2026. They change, so check before you buy.

• Mighty Networks pricing
• Circle pricing
• Bettermode pricing
• Hivebrite pricing
• Wild Apricot pricing
• Raklet pricing
• Group.app pricing
• Heartbeat pricing
• Skool pricing
• Glue Up pricing
• Join It pricing
• Memberful pricing
• MemberClicks pricing
• Neon One pricing
• Discourse pricing

Related reading

• What membership management software costs for nonprofits
• How to increase community engagement
• How to build a community
• Why members join and then go quiet
• Member onboarding in the first 30 days
• What community software actually costs
• The 5-tool community stack costing you a weekend a month
• The hidden cost of running your community on Facebook Groups
• How to reach every member without paying to boost your post
• Membership tiers that renew
• Free guides and templates