4.5 stars 400+ reviews

Thinkific vs Kajabi
Find out why growing teams choose Thinkific

We’ve broken down the key differences in pricing, features, and scalability so your team can make a confident decision.

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Top FeaturesThinkificKajabi
Starting price$36/mo$143/mo
Free trial30-day trial14-day free trial
Create courses with any content type
Community spacesLimited by plan
Host Coaching sessions or Webinars (free and paid)With limitations
Offer Digital Downloads (free or paid)Limited by plan
Easy to use landing pages, powered by AI
Customizable email sequences
Branded mobile app$199/mo add-on$199/month
Email and chat support
Private instructor community
Certificates for course completion
AI course outline generatorBuilt into the backendFree tool
AI quiz generatorManual
App integrations90+ in the Thinkific App StoreLimited
Built-in course reviews

Summary

Key takeaways: 

  • Kajabi is more expensive. Their cheapest plan is $143 per month, compared to Thinkific’s lowest-priced plan at $36 per month
  • Thinkific is best suited for companies, large businesses, and teams, while Kajabi is well-suited for solo creators
  • Thinkific has more integrations, making it easier for your tech stack to evolve as your business grows. Kajabi’s all-in-one platform can make it hard to leave or customize as your business grows. 

Winner by category:

  • Best for scalability: Thinkific (Unlimited courses, students, and enterprise-grade features, tools, and security)
  • Best for teaching and learning: Thinkific (advanced assessments, integrated AI features, course creation tools, student reviews, and more)
  • Best for budget: Thinkific (saves you up to 74% annually)
  • Best for solo-marketers: Kajabi (if you don’t already have an email tool)

Pricing: Kajabi is more expensive

Thinkific is cheaper than Kajabi at every comparable plan level. Across paid plans, Thinkific costs significantly less per month and per year. Both platforms offer free trials.

PlansThinkificKajabiSavings
Thinkific Basic vs. Kajabi Basic$36/mo
$432 billed annually
$143/mo
$1,716 billed annually
74.83%
Thinkific Start vs. Kajabi Growth$74/mo
$888 billed annually
$199/mo
$2,388 billed annually
62.81%
Thinkific Grow vs. Kajabi Pro$149/mo
$1,788 billed annually
$399/mo
$4,788 billed annually
62.66%

Course creation

Kajabi offers a course builder with all the core tools needed to create online courses, but new users — especially solopreneurs and teams — may need time to learn how the system works.

Thinkific’s robust course creation tools are designed for growing learning businesses, academies, and corporate teams that need simplicity, flexibility, and speed. Thinkific allows users to build complete courses with a minimal learning curve, making it easier to launch quickly and scale. As a result, Thinkific provides a more approachable course creation experience that supports stronger student engagement and long-term retention.

Course Creation CapabilitiesThinkificKajabi
No design or technical experience required
Create courses with any content type
Downloadable content
AssignmentsUp to 100 MBUp to 10 MB
Recurring live lessons with Zoom
AI course outline generatorBuilt into the course builderFree but separate tool, not built-in
Embed many types of multimedia content
AI video script generation

“We needed something that could grow with us and support diverse learner needs. Thinkific Plus offers a dynamic system that evolves with each learner’s journey.”

— Nic Knorr, 1 Million Teachers (100,000+ enrollments and 75+ courses)

Learning experience

Thinkific is designed to maximize learner engagement and course completion. Features like built-in progress pages and intermission screens guide learners through each module, helping them track progress and reducing drop-off throughout the course.

While Kajabi offers a clean, modern course design that looks polished and engaging, it focuses more on appearance than on built-in learning mechanics that actively support learner progress and completion.

Learning Experience FeaturesThinkificKajabi
Easy course navigation
Optimized for all devices
Student progress tracking
Course completion certificates
Student course reviewsNo
Student engagement surveys
Sell memberships to a learning community
Live events
Discussion spaces
Direct messaging
Mentions and threaded replies
Member profilesNo
In-app and push notifications to bring your audience back
Third-party app integrationsNone for the student experience

“We asked our clients how they enjoyed the training that we had rolled out through Thinkific, and the feedback we received was that they enjoyed the content. Another thing that was valuable to them was adjusting to different learning styles. So we had the visual content and the audible content, and then we could also produce an attachment available for download at the end for reference down the road.”

— Ania Mueller, Manager, Delivery and Client Relationships, PayShepherd

Sales and marketing

Kajabi offers native email and funnel tools that work well for getting started quickly, but customization and extensibility are limited. 

Thinkific provides more flexibility, combining AI-powered landing pages, email automation, and access to 90+ integrations — including ActiveCampaign, Mailchimp, Shopify, and Salesforce — making it a stronger choice for businesses that want to scale and customize their marketing stack.

Sales featuresThinkificKajabi
Create free, paid, and time-limited courses
Customizable payment plans and offers
Instant access to your funds
Coupons and promotions
Subscriptions
Bundle multiple products
Streamlined checkout
Order bumps
Built-in payment processor
B2B selling options (group orders, invoicing, and more)
Integration with e-commerce tools
Abandoned cart emailsNo
Marketing featuresThinkificKajabi
Search engine optimization
Email automation tools
AI-powered landing pages
AI-generated email flowsNo
Bulk email students
Marketing integrations90+Limited to 10
Affiliate marketing
Branding and customization across digital products and pages
Design customization featuresThinkificKajabi
Compatible with existing websites
Customizable course landing pages
Advanced CSS/HTML editingOn $99/month plan (Thinkific Start)On $399/month plan (Kajabi Pro)

“To expand our reach, we extended access to our Academy beyond our existing customers. Strategically, we diversified our marketing channels, encompassing SEO, Paid search, Paid social, organic social and various others. Recognizing the paramount importance of a robust and reliable LMS to facilitate our substantial growth, Thinkific became the clear choice.”

— Srikar Chitturi, Full Stack Marketer, Chargebee (5,400+ students worldwide, 8+ online courses, 20+ countries reached with Thinkific) 

Mobile app

Both Thinkific and Kajabi support mobile-first learning through dedicated mobile apps. While Kajabi’s app was once a key differentiator, Thinkific now offers multiple mobile app options, giving businesses more choice based on size and branding needs.

Mobile app capabilitiesThinkificKajabi
PriceThinkific Mobile is included in Start plans and above $199/month for the Branded Mobile appBranded app included in their Pro Plan only (which costs $499 per month)
Available on iOS
Available on Android
Support for communities
White-labeled app
In-app purchasesNo

“About 45% of our users visit horse IQ [our course] through their mobile devices, and it was really easy to set up the Thinkific-branded mobile app.”

— Elizabeth Lawhorn, Director of Competition Development, American Painted Horse Association (486% revenue growth since joining Thinkific, 1000+ students across more than 59 countries)

Support

As you grow, and your learning platform becomes mission-critical, Thinkific offers more security and support options, including a G2 award-winning support team, to ensure your success. Since it offers more support options, Thinkific is better suited for growing academies, training institutions, and larger learning businesses.

Support featuresThinkificKajabi
Multiple support options
Private instructor community
Access to expertsNo
Dedicated customer support team

“When Epoch Education (119,000+ enrollments, 50+ courses with Thinkific) was planning a course that would welcome over 3500 participants at once, they turned to Pia, from Thinkific’s customer success team, to answer all their technical questions and even had her on standby for the launch, just in case.”

Security

Thinkific combines secure architecture, encryption, access management, and strong compliance practices to keep data safe while supporting privacy and regulatory requirements. Thinkific’s platform is SOC2, GDPR, CCPA, and PCI-DSS compliant, and automatically activates SSL encryption for all Thinkific sites, providing a high level of protection for both customer and learner personal data. 

While Kajabi has an official privacy policy, it is tough to find more detailed information on their security and privacy standards and certifications on their site besides the information found below.

Security featuresThinkificKajabi
99.9% uptime and 24/7 monitoring
Secure cloud hosting and daily backups
Dedicated sandbox siteNo
SOC2 compliant
GDPR/CCPA compliant
SSL encryption

Site administration

Overall, Thinkific offers more advanced site administration tools designed for scaling learning businesses. Features like learner segmentation, group management, detailed progress reporting, and admin controls make it easier to manage large or diverse student audiences while maintaining visibility and control.

Site administration featuresThinkificKajabi
Single sign-on (SSO)
Multi-factor authentication
Archive courses and bundlesNo
Student progress reports
Bulk enrollment
AnalyticsAdvanced analytics and reportingLimited

“Getting instant access to the data that’s meaningful to us is a huge benefit of working with Thinkific.”

— Philip Michieli, Keap

Migration and onboarding

Thinkific makes it easy to migrate your existing courses and content using tools like the Content Uploader, which lets you import and organize video lessons, text, and other media quickly. It also supports bulk student import and enrollment options, allowing you to bring your learners with you during your transition to Thinkific. With Thinkific Plus, you have access to a dedicated Launch Specialist who provides 1:1 onboarding and launch support. 

Kajabi does not offer free in-house migration services, but does offer paid migration options. Additionally, if you’re migrating from an existing Kajabi site to a different or new site, or from an outside platform, you will need to go through the migration process manually. 

Migration tools and supportThinkificKajabi
Single sign-on (SSO)No
Bulk Content Uploader
Enterprise API access
1:1 onboarding and launch supportNo
Import SCORM-compliant content
Dedicated customer success teamManually
Third-party app integrationsLimited

Scalable solutions to drive business growth

Thinkific plans give experts, academies, and companies the tools and features they need to grow their business end-to-end.

Basic

Foundational features and support for your learning business.

$49/mo

by billing annually

$36/mo

by billing annually

Basic includes:

Start

Advanced features to drive recurring revenue and scale up.

$99

by billing annually

$74

by billing annually

Everything in Basic, plus:

Grow

Advanced commerce features to help you sell more and professional support.

$199

by billing annually

$149

by billing annually

Everything in Start, plus:

All prices are in USD and charged per site with applicable taxes added at checkout.

Frequently asked questions

Thinkific is designed for experts, academies, and companies that want to grow a learning business and scale their learning experiences over time. It gives teams the flexibility to create multiple learning products, manage learners, and expand their offerings without strict limits. Kajabi is often chosen by those looking for a simple platform that combines content delivery with built-in marketing tools.

Yes, pricing can vary significantly between the two platforms. Thinkific plans start at $36 per month after the trial period, while Kajabi’s entry plan starts at around $143 per month. The right choice often depends on the features your business needs and how you plan to grow your learning products over time.

Both Thinkific and Kajabi offer AI-powered tools designed to help streamline content creation. Thinkific includes AI features that help customers generate course outlines, create quizzes, and support content development directly within the course-building workflow. Kajabi also offers AI tools that help with creating course outlines and other content ideas.

Both platforms provide tools designed to support learner engagement, such as video lessons, quizzes, and progress tracking. Thinkific focuses on structured learning experiences that help guide learners through courses with clear progression and feedback tools. Kajabi offers a visually polished course environment and tools that support delivering digital learning content.

Yes. Thinkific connects with a wide range of third-party applications through its app store, making it easier to integrate tools you may already use for email, analytics, ecommerce, or automation. Kajabi includes several built-in marketing features and also supports integrations with selected external tools.

Yes. Both platforms allow learners to access content through mobile apps on iOS and Android devices. Thinkific offers a branded mobile experience and a customizable white-label option for businesses that want a fully branded learning environment.

Thinkific includes reporting tools that help you track learner progress, engagement, and sales performance. These insights help businesses understand how their learning products are performing and make improvements over time. Kajabi also includes reporting tools for tracking enrollments, sales, and course activity.

Thinkific provides resources and tools to help customers move their existing learning products and learner data to the platform. Customers on higher-tier plans may also receive onboarding support to help guide the transition process. Kajabi also provides resources to support customers moving their content to the platform.

“Thinkific offers exceptional scalability, enabling businesses to grow their course offerings and student base without any limitations. It can handle unlimited courses, students, and bandwidth, ensuring businesses can expand their e-learning offerings without worrying about technical constraints.”

Chief Marketing Officer