When you connect your account with one of our payment processors, students can pay and enroll in your course, community or bundle using the Thinkific checkout!
In this article:
Opting-In to the Performance Checkout
About This Feature
The Thinkific checkout allows your students to purchase and enroll in your products seamlessly. Students can sign up with their email address, input their payment details and immediately access their product. Our built-in checkout is regularly updated in accordance with industry-wide best practices, providing an easy and secure experience for your students. We keep your checkout experience up to date, so you don't have to.
How It Works
By default, new creators in a Thinkific Payments-supported country will have access to the TCommerce suite of business tools, including Thinkific Payments, as a payment processor. To start using the Thinkific checkout, all you need to do is verify your checkout settings, and set your product pricing! Then, you can simply link any call-to-action buttons to your product checkout and students can start purchasing your product.
If you are not located in one of the supported countries, you will still be able to use Stripe or PayPal as your payment processor.
Our Performance Checkout
Recently released with TCommerce and now available to all our creators, our default Performance Checkout is built on checkout best practices and is regularly updated to ensure a smooth, secure experience for students.
Optimize your student checkout experience with TCommerce, powered by Thinkific Payments. TCommerce supports digital wallets such as Paypal, Apple Pay, and Google Pay to offer multiple payment options.
The Performance Checkout:
- Works out of the box, with no additional effort or customization required
- Prioritizes a frictionless experience for students, increasing conversions and reducing drop off
- Minimizes required fields and validates information in real-time
- Auto-populates fields for returning students, encouraging repeat business
- Includes a mobile-ready, responsive design that works on devices of any size, with a focus on accessibility and ease of use
- Is safe and secure, using a TLS encrypted connection backed by Stripe to ensure full compliance with the latest security requirements
Most importantly, our team is constantly working on optimizing the checkout, ensuring that your students will always have the most up-to-date experience — without the need for any additional effort or updates on your part.
Learn more about the Performance Checkout on our website.
Our Two-Step Checkout
Available to creators with accounts created prior to February 24, 2022, our Two-Step Checkout allows for a fully-customizable experience, providing greater control for those who want to make use of specific third-party apps or want to directly modify their student's checkout experience.
If you are currently using the Two-Step Checkout and want to switch to the Performance Checkout, please read on below or check out our detailed checkout comparison article.
After the Checkout
Once a student purchases a product, they will immediately be taken to a default Thank You page where they can click to continue straight into your product.
If you would like to customize the Thank You page or send the student to a different page after checkout, try out our After Purchase Flow feature!
Opting In to the Performance Checkout
This section only applies to creators with accounts created prior to February 24, 2022, who are not using Thinkific Payments as their payment processor. All other creators are already using the Performance Checkout by default — there's no need to opt-in!
If you are currently using our Two-Step Checkout, you now have the option to opt-in to the Performance Checkout and take advantage of the many improvements we've made to the checkout experience.
Before making the switch, we recommend reading our article comparing the features of both checkouts to make sure the transition goes smoothly for you and your students.
How to Opt-In
To switch over to the Performance Checkout, start by logging in to your Thinkific Admin Dashboard, then:
- Click on Settings, in the left navigation
- Scroll down to the Performance Checkout section (or click Performance Checkout in the menu navigation)
- Set the Activate Performance Checkout toggle to the On position
That's it! You should see a pop-up message confirming the change, and the status next to the Performance Checkout section will show it as Active.
Opting Out
It's also important to note that you can return to the Two-Step Checkout at any time by following the same instructions and turning the toggle back off. Just remember that these changes go live as soon as you flip the switch, and any students purchasing your course will use whichever checkout is currently active.
Important Considerations
- The Thinkific checkout can only be used when integrating directly with Thinkific Payments, Stripe, and/or PayPal. If you are using an external payment solution, you will need to use an external checkout page outside of Thinkific. Learn more about that here: External Payment Solution: What to Consider
- By default, only one product can be purchased at a time using the Thinkific checkout. If you would like to offer additional products to your students during the checkout experience, take a look at our guide on how to sell more with Order Bumps! You can also sell multiple products as a package. For more info check out our Product Bundles feature!
- Country and Zip/Postal Code Required Fields can't be turned off at checkout (either as a setting, or by technical support) when using Thinkific Payments.
More About Thinkific Payments
Thinkific Payments: Managing Student Payments
Migrating Subscriptions and Payment Plans from Stripe to Thinkific Payments