On a contribution OpenGiving keeps nothing. On a sale it charges 5% of the price of a physical item or a service, billed to the buyer on top of the price, and nothing at all on a digital one — the buyer pays a flat $1 fee there instead.
The comparison below is against two platforms that do one half each of what this does: GoFundMe for the fundraising, eBay for the selling. The figures for both are theirs, quoted from their own pricing pages, checked on 19 September 2026. Fees change. If you're reading this much later, check the sources at the bottom before relying on the numbers.
Raising money
| OpenGiving | GoFundMe | |
|---|---|---|
| Platform fee | none | none |
| Payment processing | a flat 4%, paid by the contributor on top | 2.9% + $0.30, taken from the donation |
| How the platform earns | 5% of marketplace sales, paid by the buyer | optional contributions from donors |
On OpenGiving a contribution arrives whole, because the processing fee is added to what the contributor pays rather than taken out of what the campaign gets. On GoFundMe the 2.9% + $0.30 comes out of the donation, so a $100 donation reaches the campaign as $96.80.
That's the difference in mechanics. It's worth being plain about what it isn't: GoFundMe has run since 2010, has a support and trust operation this doesn't, and a campaign there reaches a far larger audience. Cheaper per transaction is one thing to weigh, not the only one.
Selling something
| OpenGiving | eBay | |
|---|---|---|
| Platform fee on a sale | 5% of a physical item or a service, added to what the buyer pays | 13.6% up to $7,500, taken out of what the seller gets |
| Per-order fee | none | $0.40 over $10, $0.30 at $10 or under |
| Digital items | no percentage; the buyer pays a flat $1 | same final value fee |
| Where the rest goes | split between the seller and a campaign, in the share the seller picked | all to the seller |
The last row is the whole point and the reason this isn't really a like-for-like table. An eBay sale pays the seller. An OpenGiving sale pays the seller and a campaign: the seller chooses which cause and what share, from 5% of the price to all of it. On a digital item the floor is 0%, so a seller can keep all of it if they want to.
The two percentages are not the same kind of number, so putting 5% beside 13.6% flatters us. eBay's 13.6% comes out of what the seller is paid. OpenGiving's 5% is added to what the buyer pays, so the seller's price arrives whole — and then the seller gives away the share they chose, which is the part eBay has no equivalent of. A seller keeping 95% of an eBay sale and a seller keeping half an OpenGiving sale are not comparing fees, they are comparing what they meant to do with the money.
What OpenGiving doesn't do
Worth knowing before you compare anything else:
- Nobody reviews a campaign before it goes live. No identity check, no verification of the story. See Does OpenGiving check campaigns?
- It isn't a charity, and a contribution isn't tax-deductible unless the campaign itself is run by a qualifying organisation. See Is my contribution tax-deductible?
- Shipping is between the buyer and the seller. See Do you handle shipping?
Sources
- OpenGiving's own figures come from the platform's configuration and are the same ones stated in What fees does OpenGiving charge?.
- GoFundMe: Pricing and Fees, read 19 September 2026. US individual fundraiser.
- eBay: Seller fees, read 19 September 2026. Standard rate for most categories, without a store subscription. Some categories differ, and store subscribers pay 12.7%.