Coaches · by delivery shape · USD

Best course platform for coaches (1:1 → group → recorded)

Updated August 29, 2026 · Official product and pricing pages fetched this evening. If a number is missing below, we could not cite it.

You already coach. The calendar is full. The question is not how to coach — it is where the next shape of the work lives: a recorded bonus next to 1:1, a dated group, or a library that sells while you sleep.

Who this page is for

Coaches with a method that already works in the room, who are outgrowing one-to-one and Google a host. The search looks like “best course platform for coaches.” The real fork is delivery shape, not brand logos.

This page does not tell you how to productize coaching, how to get clients, or how to write a curriculum. It names which host matches the shape you already intend to run.

Pick by shape, not by homepage price

What each host actually is, for a coach

Kajabi — the coaching business OS

Kajabi’s own coaching page is built for 1:1 and group programs: structured timelines, a client dashboard, built-in scheduling, checkout, and recorded resources attached to the coaching product. Official FAQ: 1:1 and group coaching; built-in live video (Zoom/Meet optional); group live room up to 200 participants plus up to 20 breakout rooms of 10. Coaching is not currently in the Kajabi mobile app — mobile web only.

You pay for the bundle. Public starting price is the highest of the three course hosts: Basic $179/mo month-to-month, $143/mo billed annually. Five products and 2,500 contacts on Basic; “Cohorts Courses” sits on the public feature grid as a platform feature, not a paid add-on on that grid. One community on Basic and Growth, three on Pro.

Honest fit: the coach who will run sales page, email, checkout, 1:1 or group, and a recorded bonus in one place. Not a cheap first experiment.

Teachable — the school, including coaching as a product

Teachable sells coaching as a first-class product type: one-on-one or small group, next to courses and downloads. A published coaching offering counts as one product toward the plan cap (5 / 10 / 50). Memberships and bundles do not count. Unpublished drafts do not count.

Starter is $39/mo ($29/mo annual, 22% off) with a 7.5% platform cut on every sale. Builder is $89/mo ($69/mo annual) and drops that cut to 0% if you stay on teachable:pay or Monthly Payment Gateway. US card processing is 2.9% + $0.30 on top. Active-student caps are 100 / 1,000 / 5,000 until $10k USD/year in sales on Teachable; then the caps lift.

Honest fit: a coach whose next shape is a school — several published products, students in a catalog — and who will start on Builder, not Starter, once money moves. Weaker public framing for a dated live cohort than Thinkific Start.

Thinkific — course LMS that grew live cohorts

Thinkific’s public plan cards put live cohorts and coaching on Start, not Basic: unlimited Zoom sessions, bookable calendars, attendance tracking. Basic still includes unlimited courses, 1 community, and 5 coaching/webinar products. Start and Grow: unlimited coaching and webinars. Paid memberships are not on Basic.

Coaching and Webinars is a sellable product (free or paid). Official FAQ: you need your own video-conference tool — Thinkific does not host the live video. That is the opposite of Kajabi’s “built-in live video, Zoom optional.”

Public prices after the August 13, 2026 increase: Basic $54/mo / $40 annual; Start $109/mo / $82 annual; Grow $219/mo / $164 annual. 10,000 current students on those named plans. 30-day trial. No free plan on the public page.

Honest fit: recorded library on Basic; dated group or serious live coaching on Start. Course-first, not funnel-first. Keep Stripe only after you have priced the third-party gateway fee (5% / 2% / 1% on Basic / Start / Grow in the US, Canada, UK, and EU, first $1M/year).

Skool — only if the group is a room

Community is a section of this site, not a second site. Skool belongs on this page for one fork: the coach leaving 1:1 into a group that lives in a feed, with courses and live calls attached to the community, not a school with a community bolted on.

Official pricing: Hobby $9/month with a 10% transaction fee; Pro $99/month with a 2.9% transaction fee. Both list unlimited members, courses, videos, and live calls. Yearly toggle advertises “2 months free”; this fetch did not extract yearly dollar amounts as text, so they are omitted. Payments FAQ (updated August 18, 2026): Hobby is 10% + 30¢ on every transaction; Pro is 2.9% + 30¢ up to $899, and 3.9% + 30¢ above $900. You cannot use your existing Stripe — Skool is merchant of record. Prices are USD.

Honest fit: the group is the product. Not a fully recorded catalog, and a poor home for a high-ticket 1:1 package once you cross $900 per charge on Pro. Circle is a community platform too (official Professional $89/mo* / Business $199/mo*, 2% / 1% transaction fees). The asterisk on Circle’s public page did not resolve to a clear monthly-vs-annual breakdown this fetch, so Circle stays in the community section — it is not a fourth course host here.

Cited numbers, August 29, 2026

USD. Monthly is month-to-month. Annual is the advertised per-month rate when you pay yearly, except Skool yearly dollars (omitted). Platform fee is the vendor’s cut, not card processing.

Sources: kajabi.com/pricing, Kajabi coaching, teachable.com/pricing, Teachable coaching, thinkific.com/pricing, Thinkific Coaching and Webinars, skool.com/pricing, Skool Payments FAQ. Full list at the bottom.

What the fees do to a coaching invoice

Card processing sits on almost every stack. The extra question is the vendor’s own cut. Two invoices a coach actually writes:

• $97 recorded bonus (or a small course next to 1:1). Teachable Starter takes 7.5% of the transaction (price including taxes, per Teachable Pay help) before the card network is paid — $7.28 on $97, plus 2.9%+$0.30 on a US card. Kajabi Payments and Thinkific Payments do not add that extra percentage. Skool Hobby takes 10%+$0.30 ($10.00 on $97). Builder is the Teachable plan that drops the 7.5%. Full dollar tables: Teachable transaction fees.
• $2,000 package (common 1:1 or small-group ticket). Teachable Starter’s 7.5% is $150 before cards. Skool Pro’s rate above $900 is 3.9%+$0.30 = $78.30. Kajabi Payments: no extra platform percentage; US card on Basic is 2.9%+$0.30. Thinkific Payments: no third-party gateway fee; public native headline is 2.9%. We are not publishing a break-even month here — refunds, tax-inclusive bases, and payout reserves change the dollar.

If the next twelve months are still mostly 1:1 invoices north of $900, Skool Pro’s $900 threshold is the number that matters, not “2.9%.” If the next twelve months are a $97 library, Teachable Starter’s 7.5% is the number that matters, not “$39/mo.”

Who should not pick which

Skip Kajabi if

You want the cheapest player for a recording and you will keep calendar, email, and checkout somewhere else. Public Basic is $179/mo. Also skip if you need coaching inside Kajabi’s native mobile app — official FAQ says that is not available; mobile web only.

Skip Teachable if

You will sit on Starter while paid coaching sells. The 7.5% is the product. Also skip if the work is a dated live cohort and you expected Thinkific-style cohort tooling on the public page — it is not advertised that way. Unlimited published products are Custom, not Growth (Growth stops at 50).

Skip Thinkific if

You need Kajabi-style native live video, funnels, and email as the marketing system. Thinkific’s live events need your own conference tool. Also skip Basic if the program is a live cohort — that starts on Start. Skip keeping Stripe unless you have priced 5/2/1%.

Skip Skool if

The offer is a recorded catalog or a high-ticket checkout you want on your own Stripe. Skool is a community with courses inside it. A $2,000 charge on Pro is billed at the 3.9% tier. Affiliate discovery (“Growth Boost”) is a separate 30% on members Skool brings; it is default ON per the payments FAQ — turn it off if you did not ask for that deal.

Visit the hosts

Teachable affiliate slot — not live Thinkific affiliate slot — not live

Kajabi’s trial box and visit button use the 30-day trial affiliate, justinwise.net/kajabi. Official Kajabi pricing remains the source for numbers. Teachable and Thinkific buttons are official product URLs only. Visit Skool uses the Skool signup affiliate. Official skool.com/pricing remains the source for Skool numbers.

Omitted on purpose

• Kajabi legacy dollar table and Kickstarter as a buyable public price. Same omission as page one: not on kajabi.com/pricing as a current card. JSON-LD on a product page still exposes a $69 lowPrice; that is not a public plan card and is not in the table.
• Kajabi Payments help-page plan discounts beyond the pricing-page 2.9 / 2.8 / 2.7 split. The US fees article now headlines 2.9%+$0.30 and says you “may qualify for discounted card rates based on your plan.” Table uses the pricing-page grid.
• Skool yearly dollar amounts ($7.50 / $82-style recaps). Official page: “2 months free.” No yearly dollar extracted this fetch.
• Skool trial length. Pricing page says try for free. Third-party recaps say 14 days. Not on the pricing page as a number this fetch.
• Circle as a fourth course host. Official Professional $89/mo* / Business $199/mo*, transaction fees 2% / 1% / 0.5% Plus, 14-day trial. Asterisk on $/mo did not resolve to monthly vs annual on the public page this fetch. Community section (day 13), not this page’s pick list.
• Teachable Custom Payment Gateway extra percentage, and Teachable coaching-page copy that still says “0% … on Pro and Business plans.” Live public cards are Starter / Builder / Growth / Custom. Fees in the table come from the pricing page and the June 22, 2026 Teachable Pay article.
• Exact Thinkific Payments US schedule beyond the public 2.9% FAQ line. Country fee table was Cloudflare-blocked last fetch; still not used here.
• How to get coaching clients, how to price your hours, or anything that documents your method for you.

Sources

1. Kajabi pricing — public plans, JSON-LD prices ($143/$179 Basic, $199/$249 Growth, $399/$499 Pro), product/contact/community limits, Kajabi Payments rates, 3rd-party 2%/1%/0.5%, 30-day trial, Cohorts Courses on the feature grid. Fetched August 29, 2026.
2. Kajabi coaching (same FAQ on /product/coaching) — 1:1 and group; built-in live video; group room up to 200 + 20 breakout rooms of 10; scheduler; recorded resources on the coaching product; coaching not in the Kajabi mobile app.
3. Kajabi Payments fees: United States — 2.9%+$0.30 cards, +1.5% international, +0.7% subscriptions and payment plans; plan discounts referenced back to billing / pricing.
4. Upcoming changes to your Kajabi plan — first increase in ~10 years; existing Heroes, first billing date on or after January 13, 2026.
5. Teachable pricing — Starter/Builder/Growth/Custom, 7.5% vs 0%, 5/10/50 products, 100/1,000/5,000 students, 22% annual, $10k/year cap lift, memberships included, community on Builder/Growth grid, 7-day trial. Fetched August 29, 2026.
6. Teachable coaching — 1:1 and group coaching products; milestones, video calls, messages, files. Plan-name drift on that page (Pro/Business) is flagged in omitted, not used for fees.
7. Teachable Pay (updated June 22, 2026) — US card 2.9%+$0.30; Starter 7.5%; Builder/Growth/Advanced/Business 0% on Teachable Payments. 7.5% described on the public pricing FAQ as applying to the transaction.
8. Thinkific pricing — Basic $54/$40, Start $109/$82, Grow $219/$164, unlimited courses, 1 community on Basic/Start, live cohorts and coaching on Start, 5 vs unlimited coaching/webinar products, paid memberships not on Basic, 10,000 current students, 30-day trial, 2.9% native FAQ. HTML fetched August 29, 2026 (WebFetch timed out; curl from this machine returned 200).
9. Thinkific Coaching and Webinars — sellable 1:1 or group live product; requires your own video-conference tool.
10. Thinkific’s 2026 plan pricing update — ~10% increase August 13, 2026; Expand unchanged at $499/mo in that article (Expand is not a current public plan card).
11. How much does Thinkific cost? — third-party gateway 5% / 2% / 1% / 0.5%; $1M/year cap; Thinkific Payments avoids the fee. Third-party FAQ page was Cloudflare-blocked this fetch; the cost article loaded.
12. Skool pricing — Hobby $9/mo, Pro $99/mo, 10% vs 2.9% on the cards, unlimited members/courses/videos/live calls, “2 months free” yearly toggle. Fetched August 29, 2026.
13. Skool Payments FAQ (updated August 18, 2026) — Hobby 10%+30¢; Pro 2.9%+30¢ to $899 / 3.9%+30¢ above $900; cannot use existing Stripe; Growth Boost 30% default ON.
14. Circle pricing — Professional $89/mo*, Business $199/mo*, 2% / 1% / 0.5% fees, 14-day trial. Cited only to explain why Circle is not in the pick table.