SoloStore → ThriveCart alternative
ThriveCart pioneered paying once instead of monthly — then stopped publishing what once costs. SoloStore prints the number on the page, and gives you the courses and community alongside the cart.
Short answer: ThriveCart still has the better cart. Its bumps, upsells and affiliate centre are more mature than anything here. But as of 5 August 2026 it does not publish a price — you start a trial to find out — and its course product is an add-on to a checkout. SoloStore is $497 once, printed on the page, with courses and community built in.
As of August 2026 thrivecart.com lists Standard, Pro+ and Enterprise with no dollar figures. You start a trial to learn what it costs.
What began as a flat lifetime licence now sits alongside monthly plans and a separate Enterprise tier.
Learn+ bolts courses onto a checkout. If courses and community are the product, you are paying for the wrong centre of gravity.
Every number below came off the vendor's own pricing page, checked 5 August 2026.
| ThriveCart Pro+ | SoloStore | |
|---|---|---|
| Published price | no — trial required | $497, on the page |
| Payment model | monthly plans, plus a lifetime option | one-time licence |
| Year one | unpublished | $581 |
| Platform cut of each sale | 0% | 0% — always |
| Payments run through | Your own Stripe or PayPal | Your own Stripe account |
| You can host it yourself | No | Yes |
| Courses included | as an add-on tier | built in |
| Community included | No | Yes |
| Cart bumps & one-click upsells | yes — best in class | Yes |
| Affiliate centre | Yes | No |
| Runs on infrastructure you control | No | Yes |
ThriveCart figures are public list prices from thrivecart.com, checked 5 August 2026. SoloStore's total is the one-time licence plus about $7 a month of self-hosting (Railway and Bunny, paid direct). Stripe's processing fee applies on both sides and is excluded.
A comparison page that only flatters itself is an advert. Here is where ThriveCart wins.
Stay with ThriveCart if the checkout is the product — high-volume offers, deep upsell flows, an affiliate army. SoloStore is for the creator whose product is the course and the community, and who wants the cart to simply work.
Two services, no markup, nothing paid to us — and a five-minute setup with no code and no terminal.
Not sure what self-hosting means in practice? Watch the five-minute setup video — it is the entire process, start to finish.
Other questions? Shoot me an email — matt@mattgiaro.com