Kajabi is without a doubt one of the best all-in-one platforms for businesses that are selling digital products, as it includes product creation, hosting, delivery as well as marketing and sales.
However, it has some drawbacks, including high prices and the inability to embed checkouts onto third-party sites and landing pages.
Therefore, we’ve broken down and reviewed a competitor platform: SamCart has many similar features to Kajabi but at a much lower price.
- Kajabi starts at $149 per month
- Kajabi is rated as the #1 platform on SupplyGem
- Kajabi has a rating of 4.6/5 on Trustpilot
- Kajabi is the winner of this comparison
- SamCart starts at $59 per month.
- is rated as the #9 platform on SupplyGem
- SamCart has a rating of 1.7/5 on Trustpilot
- SamCart is a great alternative
Key Takeaways:
- Kajabi is an all-in-one solution for creating, hosting, selling, and delivering digital products
- Both platforms can be used to sell all types of digital and physical products
- SamCart’s checkout pages can be embedded into third-party websites and pages
Main Differences Between Kajabi and SamCart
We’ve outlined five specific feature comparisons for you:
- Kajabi is an all-in-one solution that supports digital product creation, hosting, and delivery, whereas SamCart focuses more on facilitating transactions.
- SamCart’s checkout feature can be used and embedded on other platforms, such as WordPress and LeadPages, whereas Kajabi’s is native to the platform.
- The only digital product you can create and host on SamCart is courses, whereas Kajabi lets users create courses, podcasts, communities, and coaching programs.
- Kajabi’s core features limit the number of products, pages, and sites that a subscriber can create, whereas many of SamCart’s features are unlimited.
- SamCart does not have a website builder; users only have the option to create checkout pages.
| Kajabi | SamCart | |
|---|---|---|
| All-in-One Solution | ✅ | ❌ |
| Embedded Checkouts | ❌ | ✅ |
| Website Builder | ✅ | ❌ |
| Page Builder | ✅ | ✅ |
| Course Builder | ✅ | ✅ |
| Coaching, Podcasting, Community | ✅ | ❌ |
What Are SamCart and Kajabi?
SamCart is chiefly an online checkout platform that allows users to embed or redirect customers to purchase using its payment gateway.
In addition to supporting payment facilitation, the platform has a range of features, such as checkout templates, a courses app, and a range of payment options.
Given SamCart’s capabilities, users often host and deliver their digital products on another platform and use SamCart for payment processing.
In contrast, Kajabi is an all-in-one creation, hosting, delivery, and payment solution for online businesses.
Some products they support include coaching, memberships, courses, podcasts, and communities.
Moreover, to help subscribers advertise and showcase their products, the platform supports websites, funnels, and email marketing.
User Experience: Kajabi vs SamCart
When creating any product or business asset on Kajabi, the platform simplifies the process.
It does this by having easy navigation and providing prompts and pop-ups at every process stage.
This great user experience was replicated across every product we made.
SamCart also makes it easy to set up and create products by using similar navigation, prompts, and pop-ups.
The other great thing about both platforms is that any time you get stuck, you can quickly reference their blog or contact their live chat support.
Therefore, regarding user experience, we would rank SamCart and Kajabi as equal.
Websites, Landing Pages, and Funnels: Kajabi vs SamCart
Kajabi is the clear winner when it comes to building an online presence for your business.
This is because it has a comprehensive website, landing page, and funnel builder which uses a drag-and-drop editor to customize the design.
Moreover, the platform provides users with a vast array of website, page, and funnel templates to get set up quickly.
Although SamCart also has templates, they’re limited to just the checkout.
Kajabi’s website builder lets users integrate a complete blog, list a product catalog, and showcase all their digital and physical products in one place.
In contrast, SamCart has minimal features and is limited to just a checkout page.
The platform does have a funnels feature; however, this is a tool that enables users to list post-purchase upsells and downsells and isn’t a multi-step page builder.
On the other hand, Kajabi’s funnel-building tool gives users complete templates designed for generating leads, launching products, and hosting webinars. These frameworks can then be customized to produce and automate marketing and sales.
Therefore, Kajabi is the winner when building websites, landing pages, and funnels.
Courses: Kajabi vs SamCart
Both SamCart and Kajabi have native course-building tools. To help you get a better understanding of their capabilities, we’ve broken them down.
Course Builder
Kajabi has an extremely powerful course builder that lets users add multiple types of content and organize courses into modules and units.
The types of content that users can upload include video, audio, and downloadables. The platform also has a native import tool that lets you upload directly from Dropbox, Google Drive, a link embed, and your device.
SamCart has similar capabilities regarding the course builder feature: it lets users organize the content effectively and upload multimedia content.
Therefore, when it comes to building courses, both platforms are ranked evenly.
Course Delivery
Course delivery is where the platforms start to diverge, with Kajabi taking the lead.
This is because the platform has many templates for you to choose from and even lets users upload their own custom templates.
Some examples of Kajabi course designs include Aesthetic Blog, Gamification, Classic and Simple layouts.
In contrast, SamCart does not offer any customizable course delivery options; it is limited to only its basic white layout.
Therefore, regarding course delivery and student experience, Kajabi is the clear winner.
Gamification and LMS
Both platforms have gamification and LMS tools; we review them below for you to consider both options.
SamCart does have worksheets and quizzes that you can add to your courses. Its features let you use the following types of content to create them:
- Text
- Images
- Videos
- Audio
Course owners can also check the box that pushes a notification to their email each time a student completes a course.
Kajabi boasts extensive gamification features, which include quizzes and certificates.
Like SamCart, users can upload many media types and questions when creating a quiz or survey.
A great tool Kajabi also have is the minimum required passing score, which stops students from progressing to the next lesson until they’ve achieved a minimum understanding of the topic.
Course owners can also auto-send email notifications to customers containing their scores and answer information to review and identify gaps in their knowledge.
Another tool unique to Kajabi is the completion certificate feature that lets students receive a certificate on course completion. If you’re a business that provides corporate training, you can print out the certificate to award to your staff or file to meet compliance standards.
Although the gamification and LMS features are comparable, Kajabi has an edge due to its additional certification feature.
Additional Features
In addition to the previously mentioned features, there are also some additional ones that you should be aware of.
Kajabi-specific additional features include:
- Native Live Video Sessions – Platform subscribers can create live lessons within their courses, which can be used for weekly Q&As, coaching, and live teaching.
- Analytics and Reporting – Kajabi lets you track each student’s course progress and scores, enabling you to seek help.
- Video Statistics – Course creators can review each video’s analytics to see how students have engaged with them. This allows content adjustment to improve the retention and watch time.
As you can see, Kajabi has many more minor features that help users to improve their courses and deliver the best student experience. Therefore, we rank it more highly compared to SamCart for reporting, analytics, and live streaming features.
Other Product Tools: Kajabi vs SamCart
Kajabi has far more extensive product tools, which include coaching, podcasting, and communities.
Although users can easily sell these products and services through SamCart, they are unable to host or deliver them.
Coaching
The platform lets subscribers book and schedule sessions, process payments, and track client goals.
Kajabi’s coaching features include the following:
- Live video conferencing
- Calendar integration
- Video content
- Audio content
- Exclusive downloads
- Shared motes
Coaches can utilize these tools to create tailored programs and track clients’ progress.
Podcasting
This feature is incredibly versatile; subscribers can create both a paid members-only podcast or publish it for free.
Moreover, Kajabi allows users to design a dedicated podcasting homepage where users can access all the episodes.
Another great feature that helps users distribute the content is the publishing tool. After a podcast episode has been uploaded, users can push the content to all the major podcasting platforms with one click – they don’t have to waste time uploading to each.
Community
Another advantage of using Kajabi over SamCart is that you can create a community on the platform without redirecting them to a third-party platform.
The platform’s community features include live recordings, different payment models, meetups, challenges, post feeds, and access via the mobile app.
Because Kajabi is the only platform with a community feature, it wins this head-to-head.
Marketing Features: Kajabi vs SamCart
Email and SMS
Kajabi has a fantastic native email feature that lets users schedule emails, create sequences, and send broadcasts.
The platform has a range of sequence and content templates that let users create the best-performing campaign.
Moreover, Kajabi lets users host a variety of products on the platform; users can market and sell these through their email sequences.
Although SamCart does have an email feature, its tools are more limited to automation. For example, sending order confirmations and thank you messages.
Most SamCart will likely need a third-party email provider that enables more advanced sequences and split testing.
It should also be noted that both platforms do not have a native SMS solution; to send SMS marketing campaigns, users will need to integrate a third-party platform.
Automation
All SamCart’s automation features are clumped together with their integration tools. This is because the platform is most commonly used with many other third-party platforms.
In contrast, Kajabi has a standalone automation tool for subscribers, which uses ‘When’ and ‘Then’ rules to create them.
Some examples of how you can automate aspects of your business on Kajabi include welcome emails, certificates and coupons, students enrollment into products, and event registration.
In summary, it should come as no surprise that when comparing the platforms’ automation tools, Kajabi is the clear winner.
Integrations: Kajabi vs SamCart
SamCart splits its integration tools into four separate features, which we explain below:
- The Integration Engine – A core feature that lets users connect to a wide range of platforms.
- Advanced Integrations – Users can set triggers and actions to automate processes.
- CRM Integration – Connect a CRM to store contact information and leads.
- Custom API Integrations – For the most advanced users, they can request data directly from the API.
Although Kajabi is an all-in-one platform, which means users don’t have to integrate other platforms, they do offer over 15 native integrations:
- Payment Processing
- Stripe
- PayPal
- Email Marketing
- Active Campaign
- Aweber
- Drip
- ConvertKit
- MailChimp
- Analytics
- Google Tag Manager
- Google Analytics
- Segment
- Meta Pixel
- Other
- Zapier
- Typeform
- Calendly
- Acuity
As Kajabi integrates with Zapier, it means users can access hundreds of more integrations.
Both Kajabi and SamCart offer extensive native integrations that allow users to connect with third-party platforms.
Given that most SamCart users utilize multiple other platforms to run their business, the platform does have more advanced integrations, which are unnecessary for Kajabi subscribers.
Therefore, SamCart wins the integration comparison.
Reporting and Analytics: Kajabi vs SamCart
Kajabi has a range of reporting and analytics features that give business owners a high-level overview and detailed information.
For example, the platform displays sales statistics, monthly recurring revenue, and offers purchased.
Moreover, they provide specific information about the user’s engagement and learning progress for your review.
Other additional reporting and analytics include affiliate statistics, opt-in rates, and page views.
In contrast, SamCart offers very few reporting and analytics tools.
In fact, the only reporting tools they have are sales reports and A/B testing data. The sales reports do give key data points such as revenue, churn rates, and refund – but the platform really lacks additional native analytics that Kajabi has.
Therefore we would say that Kajabi, without a doubt, has superior reporting and analytics tools.
Support and Migration: Kajabi vs SamCart
Both platforms offer similar levels of support and help for users. For example, they each have a live chat tool, email support, and article guides.
SamCart VIP subscribers also have access to a dedicated account manager.
When we compare the support features of both platforms, we consider them even.
If you’re running an existing membership site, subscription service, or have many users enrolled in your programs, migrating to a new platform is daunting.
Fortunately, both SamCart and Kajabi offer migration support and help.
SamCart advertises that it offers subscription migration support to VIP plan subscribers, whereas Kajabi is limited to written guides to help users through the process.
Therefore, when comparing the migration support, SamCart is the winner.
Affordability: Kajabi vs SamCart
SamCart has three subscription plans that start at $59 per month, which makes the platform very affordable.
Moreover, users can subscribe to the platform’s annual plan to receive a discount of up to $1,200.
When we break down the three subscriptions, the key differences between them are:
- Upsells
- App access
- Access to integrations
- Split testing
- Support
Core SamCart features include unlimited products, pages, members, video hosting, and courses.
Kajabi also has three subscription plans, and with each price increase, users gain access to an increased capacity of features and some smaller tools.
The features that are limited by subscriptions include the number of:
- Products
- Funnels
- Contacts
- Active customers
- Websites
- Admin users
The additional tools users can access include:
- Affiliate program
- 24/7 chat support
- Advanced automation
- White labeling
- Custom code editor
The three Kajabi subscription plans and their pricing:
- The Basic plan – $149/month
- The Growth plan – $199/month
- The Pro plan – $399/month
What we like about Kajabi’s pricing model is that Basic plan subscribers can create all product types and are charged 0% in fees, and only once they outgrow the number of products do they have to upgrade.
Therefore, although more expensive, Kajabi offers users better value for money, as SamCart users would need subscriptions to multiple platforms to have similar capabilities.
Bottom Line
After comparing the two platforms, it’s clear that Kajabi has far more features and tools available for online businesses. These include coaching, podcasting, a community, and better reporting.
Although both platforms are straightforward to use, Kajabi is an all-in-one platform that makes it easier to set up marketing automation and manage a business.
The two main benefits of using SamCart are that users can integrate its checkout feature with an existing website or traffic source to enable the sale of products and the low starting price.
Therefore, if you’re price-sensitive and only require a checkout solution, we suggest using SamCart.
However, we believe Kajabi is the more comprehensive and recommended platform for online businesses.
Frequently Asked Questions
Does SamCart Have the Same Features as Kajabi?
SamCart and Kajabi have many overlapping features, including landing pages, an online checkout, subscriptions, course creation, hosting, and delivery. However, Kajabi also has podcasting, coaching, and community features, whereas SamCart does not.
Is Kajabi Better than SamCart?
Kajabi is an all-in-one platform; therefore it has many more features and tools for online businesses than SamCart. These include more in-depth analytics and reporting tools, a wider range of products that can be created, as well as native marketing automation.
Is SamCart Cheaper than Kajabi?
Yes, SamCart is cheaper than Kajabi; the platform’s plans start at $59 and $149 respectively. However, it should be noted that often SamCart customers will either be using or will require additional software such as content delivery and email marketing; therefore, the final cost is often higher than Kajabi.
Should I Use Kajabi or SamCart?
Kajabi is a great all-in-one platform that allows users to create, sell, and deliver digital and physics products. SamCart is primarily a checkout solution for online businesses and can be embedded into existing websites and blogs. Although SamCart does let users create, host, and sell courses, Kajabi’s features are much more extensive and highly rated.
Is Kajabi Easier to Use than SamCart?
Both SamCart and Kajabi are easy-to-use platforms. SamCart is primarily used by businesses with an existing website or online presence, so it will likely need to be integrated with the website and existing marketing automation. For these reasons, we would say Kajabi is easier to use than SamCart.
Can I Use Kajabi or SamCart for Free?
Kajabi and SamCart have free trials lasting 14 days and seven days, respectively. Moreover, Kajabi offers a 30-day money-back guarantee for all customers. In contrast, SamCart only extends the 30-day money-back guarantee to its annual plan holders.
