Stripe vs. Authorize.Net: Which is Right for You?

Payment service providers like Stripe and Authorize.Net play an imperative role in keeping your payment system operating efficiently. The big decision facing your business is deciding which of these platforms can best serve your business and its payment needs. 

Making an informed choice requires a thorough understanding of both platforms and how they compare in terms of features and user benefits. 

Get to Know Stripe and Authorize.Net: Who Are They & What Do They Do?

Stripe (founded in 2010) is a well-known and well-loved payment processor among global businesses. The company has two headquarters located in San Francisco and Dublin, giving Stripe a strategic geographic position in both North America and Europe. 

From a marketing standpoint, Stripe describes itself as a complete payments platform and financial infrastructure. A recent IDC MarketScape report even named this provider as a payments leader. 

Authorize.Net  (founded 1996) is a Visa solution for payment gateway integrations and payment processing. This platform is also regarded as a leader in the payments space and was recognized as a Top 50 Commerce Product in the G2 Best Software Awards 2024. 

Examining Each Platform’s Company Philosophy & Sales Approach

Although both of these platforms serve similar purposes, several key differences set them apart — starting with their sales approach and company philosophies. 

Stripe’s business model centers around simple global payments. The platform casts a wide net when it comes to the industries it services, which include:

• Startups
• Enterprises
• E-commerce
• Marketplaces
• Embedded finance
• Crypto
• Global businesses
• Creator economy

By comparison, Authorize.Net seeks to attract a more narrow audience due to its availability being limited to the United States and Canada. Merchants are the target customers of this platform, making it a favored choice for the North American e-commerce industry. 

Platform Comparison of Stripe vs. Authorize.Net

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Stripe’s Complete Payments Platform

Stripe offers access to more than 50 global payment methods, including many modern and alternative payments. The complete list of payment methods accepted by this platform includes:

• Cards
• Wallets
• Bank debits and transfers
• Bank redirects
• Buy Now, Pay Later (BNPL)
• Cash-based vouchers

Along with its wide array of payment methods, Stripe also supports more than 135 currencies and is available in 46 countries. The company strives to be a global solution and actively works to increase availability, even offering services like Stripe Atlas to help businesses become incorporated in the U.S.

The features and capabilities of Stripe include:

• Global payments (including payment processing and payment gateways)
• Embedded finance and treasury 
• Revenue and finance automation

When setting up your payment system, this platform can help you build a highly satisfactory customer interface with embeddable UI toolkits and hundreds of third-party integrations. Pre-built integrations are also available for your most critical tasks, such as accounting and automation. 

Stripe offers both standard pricing and custom pricing. Standard pricing provides access to the complete payments platform and follows a pay-as-you-go pricing model. The payment processing rate in the standard model is 2.9% + 30¢ per successful card charge. 

The custom pricing model is designed with large transaction volumes in mind, though it can also be a suitable choice for international businesses. Custom pricing includes:

• Volume discounts
• Multi-product discounts
• Country-specific rates
• IC+ pricing. 

Stripe is also beloved by developers due to the many complimentary developer tools it offers, such as:

• SDKs and UI components
• API management and error handling
• Testing
• Webhooks
• Event destinations
• Stipe CLI (for managing Stripe resources in test mode directly using the command line)
• Stripe Shell (for managing Stripe resources in test mode from the Stripe docs site)

Overall, Stripe’s worldwide presence and accessibility make it an exceptional choice for businesses of all sizes and in almost all locations. The platform aims to simplify global payments and increase the efficiency of cross-border transactions, making it a key tool for global growth. 

Authorize.Net’s Three-Tier Solution

Authorize.Net splits its solution into three tiers, each offering different capabilities:

1. The payment gateway bundle is the most basic, allowing you to set up a payment gateway and process card payments. This model requires you to already have a merchant account and charges 10¢ per credit card transaction plus a daily batch fee 10¢.
2. The payment gateway and eCheck model offers both the payment gateway service and eCheck payment processing, which charges 0.75% per eCheck or 10¢ per credit card transaction plus a daily batch fee 10¢. Like Bundle 1, this bundle requires you to have a merchant account. 
3. The all-in-one bundle features a payment gateway set up, eCheck payment processing, and sets up a merchant account on your behalf. The processing rate for this bundle is 2.9% + 30¢ per transaction. 

All of the above bundles come with the same set of basic services beyond gateway integrations and payment processing, including:

• Digital invoicing
• Recurring payments
• Advanced Fraud Detection Suite (AFDS)
• Customer Information Manager (CIM)

As mentioned earlier, Authorize.Net does not offer the same global coverage as Stripe and is limited to businesses physically located in either the U.S. or Canada. The design of this platform is tailored for merchants in these regions and can enable you to accept payments online, over the phone, and in-person.

Test Out Different Payment Services with Spreedly

At Spreedly, our Open Payments Platform gives you the flexible integration environment you need to test out multiple different payment service providers at once. 

Spreedly supports an entire ecosystem of payment methods and services, giving you the pick of the litter when building your payment infrastructure. Through our Advanced Vault, you can capture and secure payment methods, as well as enjoy automatic updates when the payment information changes. 

Request a Spreedly demo today to get started.

Download the Payments Orchestration eBook Below

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