Ko-fi
Platform · this deep dive is built from the official pages of the platform itself and of the tools that support it.
Overview
Ko-fi is a page through which a creator takes one-off support ("tips"), sells memberships, accepts commissions and sells digital goods. It is built on a fundamentally different principle from Patreon or Buy Me a Coffee: Ko-fi does not hold your money at all.
The terms of use say so outright and repeat it several times: "we are not a payment service. Payments go directly from the supporter to the creator outside Ko-fi, through a third-party payment provider (for example, PayPal, Inc. and Stripe, Inc.)". And on the same page, a self-description of its role: "we are only a host and a service provider… we are not a marketplace, not a payment agent or intermediary, not a financial institution, not a seller and not a broker".
The practical consequence: money arrives in your own PayPal or Stripe account, not on a platform balance. There is no payout threshold, because there is nothing to withdraw from.
Who's here
The terms name the operator precisely: Ko-fi is run by Ko-fi Labs Limited, a limited company registered in England and Wales under number 11087704, VAT number 318563687. The agreement is governed by English law with exclusive jurisdiction of the courts of England.
Geography is outlined indirectly by the payment providers: Ko-fi works wherever PayPal and Stripe work. Australia is singled out — PayPal services there are supplied only by PayPal Australia Pty Ltd, and Ko-fi specifically clarifies that it is not its representative. For the European Union and the EEA there is a procedure for appealing moderation decisions through an EU-certified out-of-court settlement body.
Getting started
An account is required for some functions: to use certain Ko-fi features you have to create an account with a unique profile and credentials. The age threshold is named as a number: "you must be 18 years old or older to use Ko-fi and create an account".
An important feature of getting started: by agreeing to Ko-fi's terms you simultaneously agree to the terms of the third-party services you connect to your page — such as PayPal, Stripe, YouTube and Twitch. In other words, the real rules for taking money are set neither by you nor by Ko-fi.
Account deletion is via a link in the settings; the terms separately warn that simply deleting the account without cancelling a subscription will not stop recurring charges.
What you can publish
The set of things a creator can do is listed in the definition of "Creator" in the terms: design your page with images, text and video; receive payments; sell goods and commissioned work; offer memberships; send and receive messages; publish posts and other types of content. The same list is reflected in the site navigation: Tips, Memberships, Ko-fi Shop, Commissions, Discord integration, stream alerts and a WordPress plugin.
Plenty is banned, and Ko-fi's list is stricter than on comparable platforms. Adult material is banned entirely: pornography, nudity and other obscene content; literature and images (including drawn ones), video and links to external sites with such material; sexual services — prostitution, escorting, paid viewing, adult chats. Further: fraudulent and misleading content; violence and excessively graphic scenes; hate speech and harassment; financial harm to a creator through chargebacks; transactions for tax avoidance; infringement of other people's trademarks and copyright; sweepstakes and lotteries with paid entry.
Rights to content work like this: you keep all ownership rights to your content but grant Ko-fi and other users a limited licence to use, store and copy it, distribute it and make it available to third parties; Ko-fi may use your content to improve the service and the business with no liability to you. The licence is called "limited" — without the words "perpetual" and "irrevocable", which is softer than at a number of competitors.
How to grow
Ko-fi describes no promotion mechanics and promises no algorithmic feed. What is more, the terms restrict external use of the platform's material: collecting Ko-fi content automatically or by hand and republishing it without written consent is banned, as is framing Ko-fi on someone else's site, and interacting with the platform via bots and other automated means. Links to Ko-fi should be used only to promote a specific creator's page.
Of the things that help growth, the platform lists only tools outside itself: Discord integration, stream alerts, a WordPress plugin and the "Creator Academy".
Path to monetization
The commission — usually the very reason people choose Ko-fi — is not named as a figure by the platform. The terms describe only the structure: creators are charged the fees listed on Ko-fi from time to time; these may be fees for particular kinds of service (tips, memberships, commissions and shop sales), charges for subscriptions Ko-fi offers creators, and fees for the use of particular features. The same page gives the withholding mechanics: all service fees are automatically deducted from the corresponding transaction by one of our third-party payment providers.
And a direct statement that a creator's subscription affects the rate: "the type of subscription you choose may affect the service fees — for example, you may pay a lower fee or none at all as part of the subscription's benefits". The platform reserves the right to change existing fees and introduce new ones where there were none before.
How settlement works: all purchases and tips are made directly between the supporter and the creator, and the creator is fully responsible for setting prices, accepting payments, delivering goods and issuing refunds. Taxes are entirely the creator's concern: determining, withholding, collecting, declaring and paying any taxes in any jurisdiction. Ko-fi meanwhile may suspend or limit payment processing if it considers that transactions create a legal, regulatory, financial or operational risk.
Tools and automation
An official programming interface is not publicly described. It is known indirectly: the robots.txt file blocks the /api/, /Manage/ and /Administration/ paths from robots — the interface exists, but it is documented inside the service.
An official WordPress plugin and Discord integration are named by the platform itself in the navigation. Automated interaction via bots is banned by the terms, so scheduling tools that work by emulating a login contradict the rules here.
Taking payments is tied to the providers' agreements, and Ko-fi refers directly to their prohibition lists: the PayPal Acceptable Use Policy of 29 October 2022 and Stripe Prohibited & Restricted Businesses, updated 13 May 2026. What is banned there is banned for you too.
Limits and rules
- Age. 18 and over.
- Money. Ko-fi does not process or hold payments; everything goes directly through PayPal or Stripe.
- Adult content. Banned entirely, including drawn images and links to external resources.
- Automation. Bots and automated means of interaction are banned; scraping and frames only with written consent.
- Law. English law, the courts of England; a separate appeal procedure for the EU and the EEA.
- Subscriptions. Deleting an account does not cancel recurring charges.
- Robots. The platform's robots.txt bans crawling of the site by ClaudeBot and a number of other data collectors.
Who it's for
It suits you if it matters that money goes into your own account rather than sitting on an intermediary's balance: Ko-fi neither processes nor holds payments, so there is no payout threshold, no payout schedule and no risk of a stuck balance. It suits streamers — alerts and the Discord link-up are made for them.
It does not suit creators of adult material: the ban is unconditional and extends even to drawings and links. It does not suit you if PayPal and Stripe are unavailable in your country — the platform names no other way of taking money. And it does not suit external automation: bots are banned by the terms.
Tools for this platform
The list is built from the tools' own facts: every line is a tool's statement that it supports the platform, with the source named. A tool missing from the list only means we have no such statement.
Automation:
Verified data
The checked data this deep dive rests on.
About the platform
the platform describes itself like this: «Accept tips with 0-5% fees! Ko-fi also lets you sell Memberships, Commissions and Shop items»
Self-description: this is the platform's claim about itself, not an independent assessment
source, checked 2026-07-28
Ko-fi is run by Ko-fi Labs Limited, a limited company registered in England and Wales under number 11087704, VAT number 318563687; the agreement is governed by English law with exclusive jurisdiction of the courts of England · the source is dated 2026-07-13
Matches the registry link to the United Kingdom. The terms are dated 13 July 2026
source, checked 2026-07-28
the platform describes its role like this: "we are only a host and a service provider"; not a marketplace, not a payment agent or intermediary, not a financial institution, not a seller and not a broker; it is not responsible for prices, payment, delivery, refunds, chargebacks and disputes
source, checked 2026-07-28
Account and access
to use Ko-fi and create an account you must be 18 years old or older
source, checked 2026-07-28
Content
what a creator can do under the terms: design their page with images, text and video; receive tips; sell goods and commissioned work; offer memberships; send and receive messages; publish posts and other content. The site navigation lists Tips, Memberships, Ko-fi Shop, Commissions, Discord integration, stream alerts and a WordPress plugin
The list of features is also confirmed at https://more.ko-fi.com/
source, checked 2026-07-28
How the money works here
the creator is charged the fees listed on Ko-fi from time to time: for particular kinds of service (tips, memberships, commissions, shop sales), charges for creator subscriptions and fees for the use of particular features; all service fees are automatically deducted from the transaction by one of the third-party payment providers
The type of subscription chosen affects the rate: a creator "may pay a lower fee or none at all"; the platform may change fees and introduce new ones
source, checked 2026-07-28
Ko-fi does not process or hold payments: money goes directly from the supporter to the creator outside Ko-fi through a third-party provider (PayPal, Inc. and Stripe, Inc.) chosen by the creator
The practical consequence: there is no payout threshold and no payout schedule on Ko-fi's side — there is nothing to withdraw from
source, checked 2026-07-28
Paid subscriptions
the paid Ko-fi Gold creator subscription exists (it is named in the navigation and implied by the terms clause on Creator Subscriptions), but its price and contents are not published on the accessible pages
The ko-fi.com/gold page is closed by a browser check
source, checked 2026-07-28
Limits and restrictions
collecting Ko-fi content automatically or by hand and republishing it without written consent is banned, as is framing Ko-fi on someone else's site, and interacting with the platform via bots and other automated means
Scheduling tools that work by emulating a login contradict the rules
source, checked 2026-07-28
during the check the ko-fi.com pages served a browser check ("Just a moment... Enable JavaScript and cookies to continue") and HTTP code 403; on top of that, robots.txt bans crawling of the entire site by the ClaudeBot agent in a separate line (the same list includes GPTBot, CCBot, Amazonbot, Bytespider, Google-Extended, meta-externalagent and others)
OUR measurement on the check date. The protection was not bypassed. Only the more.ko-fi.com subdomain remained open
source, checked 2026-07-28
Restrictions
adult material is banned entirely: pornography, nudity and other obscene content; literature and images (including drawn ones), video and links to external sites with such material; sexual services — prostitution, escorting, paid viewing, adult chats
The ban is stricter than at a number of comparable platforms and extends to drawings and external links
source, checked 2026-07-28
also banned are fraudulent and misleading content, violence and excessively graphic scenes, hate speech and harassment, financial harm to a creator through chargebacks, transactions for tax avoidance, infringement of other people's trademarks and copyright, sweepstakes and lotteries with paid entry
The payment providers' prohibitions apply additionally: https://stripe.com/gb/prohibited-businesses and https://www.paypal.com/en/webapps/mpp/ua/acceptableuse-full
source, checked 2026-07-28
Legal
the creator keeps all ownership rights to their content but grants Ko-fi and other users a limited licence to use, store and copy it, distribute it and make it available to third parties; Ko-fi may use the content to improve the service and the business with no liability to the creator
The licence is called "limited", without the words "perpetual" and "irrevocable"
source, checked 2026-07-28
taxes are entirely on the creator: determining, withholding, collecting, declaring and paying any taxes (income tax, VAT, GST, sales tax) in any jurisdiction; Ko-fi neither collects nor pays taxes for the creator
source, checked 2026-07-28
for users in the EU and the EEA there is a procedure for appealing moderation decisions: an internal appeal, then out-of-court settlement through an EU-certified body, or a court at the place of residence
source, checked 2026-07-28
API access
there is no public documentation of a programming interface on the accessible pages; robots.txt blocks the /api/, /Manage/ and /Administration/ paths
The interface exists, but it is documented inside the service
source, checked 2026-07-28
Languages
the interface language of the home page: en
The language is taken from the markup attribute, the versions from hreflang
source, checked 2026-07-28
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