Ubunya vs Maven
On Maven you're one course in a marketplace. On Ubunya you're the academy.
Maven is a marketplace for paid, live cohort courses taught by experts. It lists your course, brings some students through discovery, takes the card payment and keeps 10% of each sale. Ubunya is the opposite model: your own community under your name, with admissions, attendance, certificates and fees recorded however learners pay, and nothing taken from those fees.
The short answer
Choose Maven if
- You're an individual expert selling one live course.
- You want students to find you through a marketplace.
- You're happy to give 10% of each sale for discovery and checkout.
Choose Ubunya if
- You're an organisation running several programmes and intakes.
- You want your own brand, address and member list, not a listing.
- Learners pay by bank transfer, mobile money, cash or through an employer.
- Funders or employers need attendance records and certificates.
Maven and Ubunya at a glance
- Price
- Maven: Free to list
- Ubunya: One plan agreed with you, paid by invoice in your currency. Every feature is included.
- Fee on payments
- Maven: 10% of each sale, plus Stripe
- Ubunya: 0%
- Best for
- Maven: Individual experts selling a live course
- Ubunya: Organisations running cohort programmes
- Whose brand
- Maven: Maven's marketplace
- Ubunya: Yours
Feature by feature
| Feature | Ubunya | Maven |
|---|---|---|
| Community feed, categories and polls | Course community | |
| Courses, lessons and progress | ||
| Points, levels and leaderboards | ||
| Live sessions | Live rooms in the browser, with breakout groups and recording | Live classes |
| Admissions | Application forms with a review queue | Optional application questions |
| Cohorts | Intakes with seats, dates and class times | Cohorts per course |
| Attendance | Online and in person, with QR check-in | |
| Certificates | Issued on completion, with a public check page | Course certificates |
| Small groups | Squads inside each cohort | |
| Impact reporting | Impact reports and follow-up surveys | |
| Payments made outside a card checkout | Bank transfer, M-Pesa, UPI, Pix, card and cash recorded, with receipts and balances | Card checkout only |
| One payer for many learners | An employer or sponsor pays for several learners | Company reimbursement letters |
| WhatsApp and SMS | WhatsApp and SMS reminders and announcements | |
| Email broadcasts and automatic sequences | Course announcements | |
| Phone app | Installable app under your own name and logo | |
| Web address | ubunya.com/yourname, or your own domain | A page on maven.com |
| Developer access | Public API, MCP server and CLI | |
| Fee on what learners pay | 0% | 10% plus Stripe |
Maven details as of November 2026, from Maven: pricing your course, Maven and published reviews. Prices and fees change, so check Maven's site before you decide.
What Maven really costs
The plan price is only part of the bill. Here is what each platform costs a month when 200 learners each pay $50 ($10,000 a month), on the cheapest plan that can sell memberships, billed yearly where offered: the plan, the platform's fee, and card processing where it is charged separately.
| Platform | Monthly cost | How it adds up |
|---|---|---|
| Skool Pro | $372 | $82 plan (yearly) + 2.9% Skool fee |
| SchoolMaker | $386 | $36 plan (yearly) + 0% + Stripe |
| Thinkific | $386 | $36 plan (yearly) + 0% + Stripe |
| LearnWorlds Pro Trainer | $429 | $79 plan (yearly) + 0% + Stripe |
| Kajabi Basic | $493 | $143 plan (yearly) + 0% + Kajabi Payments |
| Mighty Networks Launch | $629 | $79 plan (yearly) + 2% + Stripe |
| Whop | $630 | $0 plan + 3% community fee + 2.7% + $0.30 |
| Circle Professional | $639 | $89 plan (yearly) + 2% + Stripe |
| Disco | $749 | About $399 plan + Stripe |
| Teachable | $889 | $39 plan + 5% Teachable fee + card processing |
| Skool Hobby | $1,008 | $7.50 plan (yearly) + 10% Skool fee |
| Maven | $1,350 | $0 to list + 10% of each sale + Stripe |
| Patreon | $1,350 | 10% platform fee + 2.9% + $0.30 |
| Discord | $1,600 | 10% fee + about 6% desktop processing |
| Ubunya | Your plan | One plan by invoice and 0% on learner payments. Learners pay you directly, by bank transfer, mobile money, card or cash, so nothing passes through Ubunya. |
Worked from each vendor's published prices in November 2026. Fees change and card rates vary by country, so check before you decide.
A marketplace listing or your own academy
Maven's strength is distribution: students browse maven.com, find a course and pay by card, and Maven handles checkout and payouts. In return it takes 10% of each sale on top of Stripe's card fee, and the course lives on Maven's site under Maven's brand.
Ubunya gives you your own community at ubunya.com/yourname or your own domain, with every programme, intake and alumni group in one place. The member list is yours, and so is every payment: Ubunya charges 0% of what learners pay.
Cohorts, not just a membership
Maven runs each course as a series of cohorts with live classes. Ubunya starts from the programme: you open an intake with a start date, seats and class times, people apply, your team admits them, and they move through the cohort together until graduation.
Every learner has a record that follows them: which intake they joined, which sessions they attended, what they paid and which certificate they earned. When a funder or board asks how the last cohort went, the answer is already there.
If you only need an open membership that anyone can join with a card, Maven may be all you need. If you admit people into programmes that start and finish, that structure is what Ubunya is for.
Getting paid the way your learners pay
Maven takes payment by card at checkout. Many of the organisations we work with are paid by bank transfer, mobile money such as M-Pesa, UPI or Pix, a company cheque, a card on their own machine (Visa, Mastercard, American Express) or cash at the first session, often in instalments.
Ubunya records each payment against the learner's fee account, issues a receipt, shows the balance and reminds people before an instalment is due, by email, WhatsApp or SMS. Nothing is taken from what your learners pay: Ubunya charges 0%.
When an employer pays for ten staff, one payer covers all ten seats and gets one invoice, while each learner still has their own place in the cohort.
Where Maven is the better choice
No platform suits everyone. Maven does these things better than Ubunya:
- A marketplace that can bring you new students.
- Nothing to pay until you sell.
- Checkout, payouts and refunds handled for you.
Moving from Maven to Ubunya
- Request a community. We set it up with your name, logo and colours, at ubunya.com/yourname or on your own domain.
- Import your members from a CSV export, with their names, emails and phone numbers.
- Recreate your programmes and courses. Lesson videos can be uploaded or embedded, and we can help with the move when we agree your plan.
- Invite members to sign in. Their history starts in Ubunya from the next intake.
Questions
How much does Maven charge?+
Listing a course on Maven is free. Maven takes 10% of each sale, and Stripe's card processing comes on top. Check maven.com for current terms.
Can I run my own academy on Maven?+
Maven is a marketplace: each course is a listing on maven.com. If you want your own branded community with several programmes, admissions and alumni, Ubunya is built for that.
Maven or Ubunya: which should I choose?+
Choose Maven if you're an individual expert who wants marketplace discovery for one live course. Choose Ubunya if you're an organisation running programmes under your own name, with offline or employer payments and attendance.
Other comparisons
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