See your net monthly income from Patreon, Substack, or beehiiv after platform fees and payment processing — across up to three tiers, with a 12-month churn projection. Free, multi-currency, no sign-up.
Calculator
Net monthly revenue
$415.50per month
After fees on Patreon with 100 total subscribers.
Gross monthly
$500.00
Annual net
$4,986.00
Take-home rate
83.1%
Net revenue by tier
Tier 1: $415.50
Tier 1$415.50
Show data table
Net revenue by tier
Net revenue by tier
Tier 1
$415.50
Platform comparison
Net monthly revenue on your inputs across all three platforms.
Platform
Platform fee
Net / month
Patreon
8%
$415.50
Substack
10%
$405.50
beehiiv
0%
$455.50
How membership revenue is calculated
Every membership platform keeps a share of what your members pay you. Patreon's Pro plan takes 8%, Substack takes 10%, and beehiiv charges nothing at the platform level. On top of that, Stripe (or an equivalent payment processor) charges roughly 2.9% + $0.30 per transaction. This calculator computes your net per subscriber as: price × (1 − platform% − 2.9%) − $0.30, then multiplies by subscriber count.
Tier-level results are summed for your total gross and net monthly revenue. The effective take-home rate — net ÷ gross — tells you what fraction of each dollar actually reaches you. The platform comparison table applies the same calculation to all three platforms so you can see the fee difference in real money, not just percentages.
The 12-month churn projection decays your subscriber count by the monthly churn percentage each month. Even modest churn compresses annual income significantly over time. A 5% monthly churn means roughly 46% of your current base will have cancelled by month 12.
Frequently asked questions
How much does Patreon take from my earnings?
Patreon's Pro plan takes 8% of your revenue, and payment processing adds roughly 2.9% + $0.30 per patron per month. So a $10-per-month patron nets you about $8.61 — an effective take-home rate of about 86%. The Lite plan (5%) and Premium plan (12%) differ; this calculator uses the Pro rate as the most common tier.
How is beehiiv different from Substack for paid newsletters?
Substack takes 10% of subscription revenue, making it the most expensive of the three platforms modelled here. beehiiv charges 0% platform fee on paid subscriptions (on their Scale and Max plans), leaving only the Stripe payment processing fee (~2.9% + $0.30). That difference adds up quickly at scale — on $10,000 in monthly revenue, beehiiv nets you roughly $1,000 more than Substack.
What is churn and why does it matter so much?
Churn is the percentage of subscribers who cancel each month. Even a low rate compounds against you: at 5% monthly churn, after 12 months you have only 54% of your starting subscribers. At 2% churn you keep roughly 79%. Growing your total subscribers while keeping churn low is the core lever for long-term membership revenue.
Can I use multiple tiers to earn more?
Yes — platforms like Patreon and beehiiv support multiple price tiers. This calculator lets you model up to three tiers simultaneously. Offering a lower-priced entry tier alongside a premium tier is a well-documented strategy to increase total subscriber count while still capturing high-value supporters at a higher price point.
12-month projection
Net monthly revenue as subscribers churn at 2%/month.
Show data table
12-month projection
Net monthly revenue
Mo 0
$415.50
Mo 1
$407.19
Mo 2
$399.05
Mo 3
$391.07
Mo 4
$383.24
Mo 5
$375.58
Mo 6
$368.07
Mo 7
$360.71
Mo 8
$353.49
Mo 9
$346.42
Mo 10
$339.49
Mo 11
$332.70
Results are estimates. Verify with a professional for important decisions.
About this calculator
This calculator estimates your monthly and annual net revenue from a paid membership programme, after platform fees and payment processing. Enter your subscriber tiers and pricing, choose a platform, and set your expected monthly churn rate to see both your current take-home and how it decays over 12 months.
How to read your results
The headline figures are your gross monthly revenue, net monthly revenue, and the projected annual net. The platform comparison bar shows what you would earn on Patreon, Substack, or beehiiv with the same subscriber numbers, so you can make an apples-to-apples cost decision. The churn projection chart traces how net revenue falls month by month as subscribers leave — the steeper the slope, the more urgent your retention strategy.
Worked example
200 members paying 10 per month on Patreon (Pro plan), with a 5 % monthly churn rate.
Gross is 2,000 per month. After Patreon's 8 % platform fee plus Stripe's 2.9 % + 0.30 per subscriber, net is 1,722 per month (86.1 % effective rate), or 20,664 annualised. At 5 % monthly churn, 114 members remain by month 12, reducing net monthly revenue to roughly 979.
Frequently asked questions
What are platform fees and why do they differ?
Each platform charges a percentage of gross revenue for hosting, discovery, and support (Patreon Pro 8 %, Substack 10 %, beehiiv 0 % on paid plans), plus a payment-processor cut of roughly 2.9 % + a small fixed fee per transaction. beehiiv passes all platform revenue to you but still charges the Stripe processing fee, making it the highest-net option when subscriber prices are above a few dollars.
How is monthly churn factored in?
Churn is modelled as a constant monthly percentage of the current subscriber pool. If you start with 200 subscribers and churn is 5 %, you lose about 10 in month 1, then about 9.5 of the remaining 190 in month 2, and so on. The projection uses exponential decay: subscribers in month m = starting subscribers × (1 − churn rate) ^ m. Real churn is never perfectly constant, but this gives a useful worst-case benchmark.
What counts as a "tier" in this calculator?
A tier is a single price point with a set number of active subscribers. You can model up to three tiers simultaneously — for example a basic tier at a lower price and a premium tier at a higher price. Leave subscriber count at zero to disable a tier. Each tier is costed independently using the selected platform's fee schedule.
Does the calculator account for free trials or annual subscriptions?
No. The model assumes all subscribers pay the monthly price every month, with no trial periods, annual discounts, or mid-month cancellations. Annual plans typically reduce per-subscriber payment fees (because there are fewer transactions) and often correlate with lower churn — factor these differences in manually if they apply to your programme.
Why might my actual payout be lower than the estimated net?
The fixed processing fee (0.30 per transaction) is applied once per subscriber per month — the worst-case model. Some platforms batch charges or issue weekly payouts, which can reduce transaction overhead. Currency conversion fees, refunds, and failed payments are also not modelled. Treat the figure as an optimistic upper bound for your net.
How it's calculated
Gross monthly revenue equals the sum of subscribers × price across all active tiers. For each tier, net revenue per subscriber is price × (1 − platformFee − processingPct) − processingFixed, where platformFee, processingPct, and processingFixed come from the published fee schedule of the selected platform. Tier net monthly is then subscribers × net per subscriber. Total net monthly is the sum across tiers, and annual net is net monthly × 12. The effective percentage is net monthly ÷ gross monthly × 100. For the churn projection, net revenue in month m is the current-month net × (1 − monthlyChurnRate) ^ m, giving a 12-month exponential decay curve. Platform comparison applies the same tier inputs to each platform's fee schedule in turn.
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