I’ve been reading the “PayPal Pro vs. Stripe for Woocommerce” articles for years, always interested in what perspective people are taking. Each article (I’ve read, anyway) ends up inevitably siding with PayPal Pro as the preferred payment gateway. Well, after using PayPal Pro on one website, and Stripe on another, for over five years each, here are my reasons why Stripe is far superior to PayPal Pro.
I should start by listing each site’s differences.
Site #1 is a U.S.-only website that operates using PayPay Pro for running credit cards. This site sells physical products only.
Site #2 is an international website that runs Stripe for credit cards. This site sells mostly digital downloads.
Both sites offer Basic Paypal payments and both site’s feature SSL certificates.
The error we’ve been running into for years now with PayPal Pro took some research to uncover, but it deals with the IP address. Some people will use a card from a bank that uses an “IPv6 IP Address.” Apparently PayPal Pro does not support anything that is no an IPv4 IP Address – so far. Suntrust, for instance, is a bank that uses IPv6 IP Addresses. When the IP Address is sent to PayPal for verification, if it’s v6 it is declined and the error comes back “The IP Address provided is invalid.”
The other issue, I find, with PayPal as a payment gateway is that not all transactions are immediately processed. I’ve seen up to five days go by with a transaction set to “Pending” in Woocommerce under PayPal transactions, which is why I tend to monitor transactions daily and set payments to “Completed” in Woocommerce to force PayPal to process the transaction.
It may sound like I’m not a huge PayPal fan – I am! I love PayPal. It’s convenient and I think it’s smart to offer the Basic PayPal option for people who like to use it. But Stripe is more efficient, payments are processed immediately, and there’s no monthly charge. PayPal Pro, on the other hand, charges the same Stripe fees (2.9% + $0.30 per transaction) PLUS $30.00 per month. If you’re a small company building your customer base, that extra $30 ($360 per yer) fee doesn’t seem practical when the merchant account could reject customers with a version 6 IP Address!
And because everyone loves a comparison chart!
| Stripe | PayPal Pro |
| 2.9% + $0.30/transaction | 2.9% + $0.30/transaction + $30/month |
| Payment processing can lag | Payment processing is instantaneous |
| Refunds through Woocommerce not instantaneous | Refunds through Woocommerce are instantaneous |
And as of 2021, integrating Stripe with Woocommerce is super easy! Not many people point out the IPv6 IP Address issue, and for business, that is very important!
So there! PayPal Pro vs. Stripe for Woocommerce from someone who uses both in the capacities listed, Stripe is by far the superior payment gateway for Woocommerce!