What is Beacons and how does it work?

Beacons does more than most link-in-bio tools, so it helps to take it in layers: the page first, then the store, then the plans that change both.

What is Beacons used for?

Three jobs, often at once: a link page, a store, and a set of tools for working as a creator.

The page is the starting point. Like any link-in-bio page, it sits behind the link in your social bio and holds the places you want people to go. Beacons builds a lot around that page: a media kit that updates itself, tools for brand deals, email marketing, an auto-reply for Instagram DMs and daily AI credits.

The store is the second job. The free plan can sell unlimited digital products, and the paid plans add courses with video hosting, memberships and extras at checkout. Put together, Beacons is a link-in-bio page, a website builder, a media kit, email marketing, memberships and courses in one product.

That shape is different from a store built around selling first. How Beacons compares with Stan Store goes through where each one puts its weight.

How does Beacons work?

You build one page, put its link in your bio, and add tools to it as you need them. In order, it runs like this:

1. Start on the free plan. It includes the page, the media kit, 30 AI credits a day, 50 email sends a month, the Instagram auto-reply and one course without video hosting.
2. Add your links and products. The free plan can sell unlimited digital products.
3. Connect your payment accounts. You link a Stripe account and a PayPal account of your own.
4. Put the page's link in your profiles. Followers tap it and land on the page.
5. Move up a plan when you need more. Each paid plan adds tools, and one of them removes the fee.

That last step is the one to read carefully. Creator at $10 a month adds a custom domain, free for your first year, plus 300 AI credits a day, 500 email sends a month, email automations and advanced SEO settings. It does not change the 9% fee. The fee drops to 0% from Creator Plus at $30, which is also where the Beacons branding comes off.

What can you sell on Beacons?

Digital products on every plan, with more ways to sell as you move up. Beacons' transaction fee article puts the cut at 9% on Free and Creator and 0% on Creator Plus and Creator Max.

• Digital products. Unlimited on the free plan.
• Courses. One course without video hosting on Free and Creator, and unlimited courses with video hosting from Creator Plus.
• Memberships. From Creator Plus.
• Invoices. 0% on Creator, even though other sales on that plan are 9%.
• Affiliate links. The same 9% applies on the two cheaper plans, and Creator Plus is where you keep 100% of affiliate commissions.

Creator Plus also adds buy now pay later through Klarna or Affirm, and an order bump at checkout, so a buyer can tick an add-on before paying and it joins the same order. Beacons' pricing page lists selling in more than 20 currencies.

How much does Beacons cost?

Beacons is free to start. Its paid plans are Creator at $10 a month, Creator Plus at $30, and Creator Max, which Beacons' pricing page lists at $100 a month while its plan guide in the help center still says $90. Billed yearly they are $100, $300 and $900. Free and Creator take 9% of each sale, Creator Plus and Creator Max take 0%, and card or PayPal processing applies on all four. What Beacons costs, plan by plan works out when Creator Plus pays for itself.

How do you get paid on Beacons?

Into payment accounts you connect yourself. Beacons' payments setup article has you link a Stripe account, which you view in your own Stripe dashboard, or connect PayPal, which it says pays out every day.

Processing is charged by those accounts, not by Beacons. Beacons quotes Stripe at 2.9% + $0.30 a sale and PayPal at 3.49% plus a fixed fee that depends on the currency. So the 0% plans are 0% to Beacons, not 0% in total.

On a $20 card sale on the free plan, $1.80 goes to Beacons at 9% and $0.88 to Stripe, which is $2.68 in all. The same sale on Creator Plus costs $0.88, all of it Stripe's.

Because the account is one you connected, the payout schedule is set in Stripe or PayPal, not by a cash-out button on Beacons. That is a different setup from tools that create or manage a Stripe account for you.

What does Beacons not do?

Beacons has no post-purchase upsell. Beacons' pricing page lists an order bump at checkout from Creator Plus, but no offer after the payment goes through, so any second product has to be taken before the buyer pays. Whether Beacons has order bumps covers what that means for a launch.

A few other limits are worth knowing:

• The $10 plan does not lower the fee. Creator keeps the 9% cut, so on fees it costs what Free does, plus $10.
• Courses are thin below $30. Free and Creator allow one course and no video hosting.
• Branding stays below $30. Removing the Beacons logo arrives with Creator Plus.
• Processing never goes away. Even on a 0% plan, Stripe or PayPal takes its fee on every sale.

When would I send you somewhere else?

If you want the page, the media kit or the courses, Stakk is the wrong choice and Beacons is the better fit. Stakk has no link-in-bio page builder and no media kit, and it has no tips, no memberships, no subscriptions, no course hosting and no booking. It takes US dollars only, where Beacons lists more than 20 currencies, and nothing on Stakk can be priced above $999. Beacons also beats Stakk per sale on Creator Plus once you sell enough to cover the $30: on a $20 product that happens at about 19 sales a month.

On price alone, two more beat us. Whop takes 2.7% + $0.30 a sale with no monthly costs, and Systeme.io charges 0% on its free plan. If the 9% is what you want to leave, the Beacons alternatives breakdown covers the rest of that shelf.

Want to keep Beacons for the page and sell through Stakk?

Keep your Beacons page for your links and point its buy button at a Stakk product. Stakk costs nothing a month and takes from 10% + $0.50 a sale, card processing included, and the money lands in your own Stripe account. What it adds is the part Beacons puts behind a plan or leaves out: the order bump rides the same charge as the product, so it carries one fee rather than two, and the upsell after payment is one tap against the card already on file. Both are on every account, with nothing held back for a tier.

Start selling on Stakk, free