Authorize.net has long been a trusted name in the world of online payments. It gives businesses a secure and reliable way to accept credit card transactions on their websites.
However, with so many plugins on the market, choosing the right one for your business can be tricky.
I’ve spent years integrating Authorize.net for different projects, using tools like WPForms for simple payment forms and MemberPress for full-blown membership sites.
This hands-on experience has shown me what works, what doesn’t, and how to find the right fit without the guesswork.
In this article, I’ll compare some of the best Authorize.net WordPress plugins to help you get started.
💡My Verdict: Best Authorize.net Plugins for WordPress
If you’re in a rush, here are the top picks for the best Authorize.net plugins for WordPress:
| # | Plugin | Best For | Price |
| 🥇 | WPForms | Creating online payment forms | $299.50/yr |
| 🥈 | WP Charitable | Donations and fundraising | $69/yr |
| 🥉 | MemberPress | Membership subscriptions | $399.50/yr |
| 4 | WooCommerce | Online stores | $79.99/yr+ |
| 5 | Easy Digital Downloads | Selling digital products | $219.30/yr |
| 6 | GiveWP | Charities and non-profits | $149/yr |
Why Use an Authorize.net Plugin for WordPress to Take Payments?
Using an Authorize.Net plugin makes it easy to accept credit and debit card payments directly on your WordPress site—without sending customers to a third-party checkout.
Here’s why many website owners choose Authorize.Net:
- On-site Payments for a Smoother Checkout: Customers can pay using their credit or debit cards without leaving your website, which helps reduce friction and abandoned payments.
- Trusted and Widely Used Payment Gateway: Authorize.Net is a reliable payment solution used by thousands of businesses, including online stores and service-based websites.
- Works With Your Existing Merchant Bank Account: Since Authorize.Net connects directly to your bank, it can sometimes offer lower transaction fees compared to gateways like Stripe or PayPal.
- Flexible for Different Business Types: Whether you’re selling products, services, subscriptions, or accepting one-time payments, Authorize.Net can handle it.
It’s important to note that Authorize.Net only supports businesses in the United States, Canada, Europe, the United Kingdom, and Australia.
How I Test And Review Authorize.net Plugins for WordPress
When testing Authorize.net plugins for WordPress on my demo websites, I focused on these key factors:
- Real-World Experience: I prioritized plugins that I’ve personally tested and used on my sites to ensure that I can confirm their reliability and performance.
- Ease of Use: I looked for plugins with user-friendly interfaces and clear documentation that make it easy to set up and start accepting payments.
- Security & Compliance: Security is important for online payments. I verified whether the plugins follow best practices for compliance, data encryption, and fraud protection.
- Performance: Since slow payment processing can hurt conversions, I analyzed how the plugins impact site speed and whether they cause delays during checkout.
- Varied Needs: I know that different websites have unique payment processing requirements. So, I explored plugins for a range of needs, including recurring payments, subscription management, and fundraising.
📣 Why Trust WPBeginner?
With over 16 years of experience in WordPress, our WPBeginner team brings deep knowledge to every plugin review. We believe in providing honest recommendations.
That’s why our reviews are based on real testing, not just feature lists. If a plugin doesn’t meet our quality standards, we don’t recommend it.
When it comes to Authorize.net, we have hands-on experience adding it to multiple sites using plugins like WPForms, MemberPress, and Easy Digital Downloads.
Other than that, we have also evaluated other plugins for their performance, security, compatibility, and ease of use. To learn more, see our complete editorial process.
1. WPForms
WPForms is the best WordPress form builder on the market. It comes with an Authorize.net addon that you can use to start accepting payments with your forms.
At WPBeginner, we have used the tool to create contact forms and annual surveys and have had a great experience.
I especially love that it lets you view all the form entries in one place. To learn more about our team’s experience with the tool, you can see our full WPForms review.
The plugin comes with an easy-to-use interface and 2000+ pre-made form templates to easily make any type of form, including payment forms.
Other than Authorize.net, you can also use Stripe, PayPal, and Square as payment options in your forms, with no additional transaction fees.
WPForms also lets you easily configure your form to send an email notification to more than one person. For instance, you could send a receipt to the customer and send order details to your team members.
Other powerful features include recurring subscription payments, coupon codes, digital signatures, geolocation data, and much more.
Overall, I think it’s a great option for accepting Authorize.net payments through a form.
✅Pros of WPForms
- Customizable form colors
- Surveys and polls
- Conditional logic to show or hide fields
- Built-in spam protection
- Integrations with popular email marketing services
- Form Abandonment Recovery for capturing partial entries
❌Cons of WPForms
- Authorize.Net support requires the Elite plan
Why I recommend WPForms: If you want to accept basic Authorize.net payments with a simple WordPress form, then this is the best solution for you.
2. WP Charitable
WP Charitable is the best donation and fundraising plugin on the market. Trusted by over 10,000 non-profits, it allows you to accept one-time and recurring payments using Authorize.net.
When testing the tool on my demo website, I found it really easy to build donation forms and collect payments. You can leave your campaigns open-ended or set fundraising goals.
To learn more abouts its features and performance, you can take a look at our detailed WP Charitable review.
The Charitable Authorize.Net integration supports credit card payments and ACH bank transfers.
With direct ACH payments, donors can make contributions directly from their bank account without using their debit or credit card at all.
The transactions for these eCheck payments are only 0.75%, so your organization receives more of the donor’s contribution.
Additionally, WP Charitable lets you view, track, and manage donor details right from the WordPress dashboard. You can even add live progress bars to motivate more donations.
✅Pros of WP Charitable
- Supporter-created fundraising pages
- Authorize.Net, Stripe, and PayPal support
- Automatic donation receipts and thank-you emails
- One-time and recurring donations
- No additional transaction fees
❌Cons of WP Charitable
- Authorize.Net requires the Pro plan
- Bank transfers limited to U.S.-based Authorize.Net customers
Why I recommend WP Charitable: If you want to accept Authorize.net payments for your donation or fundraising forms, then I recommend this plugin.
3. MemberPress
In my opinion, MemberPress is the best WordPress membership plugin out there. It allows you to easily build a membership website and restrict any content to paid subscribers and members.
With its ‘Developer’ plan, you can use Authorize.net as your payment gateway, which is a great option if you process a lot of credit card transactions.
We’ve used MemberPress to build and manage our own online courses, and its powerful content restriction and subscription features are second to none.
If you want in-depth details about our experience, then I recommend checking our complete MemberPress review.
The tool even lets you protect just part of a post or page by using a shortcode. This way, you can provide a teaser for your content before encouraging your site’s visitors to subscribe.
You can then charge a one-off fee or set up a recurring subscription with Authorize.net. Plus, you can set up a cheap or free trial period to encourage new users to join.
MemberPress also gives you content-dripping features. These let you restrict content, so it’s only shown once someone has been a member for a certain period of time.
This makes MemberPress a great tool for running online courses.
✅Pros of MemberPress
- Automatic renewals, cancellations, and refunds
- Discount codes with expiration dates and usage limits
- Sales, revenue, and member reports
- PayPal and Stripe support
❌Cons of MemberPress
- No free plan
Why I recommend MemberPress: If you want to accept recurring Authorize.net payments for your membership site, online courses, or exclusive content, then this is your ideal plugin.
4. WooCommerce
WooCommerce is the most popular eCommerce plugin for WordPress. It is the ideal choice for accepting Authorize.net payments for selling physical products.
In my experience, it’s the easiest solution for creating an online store. Our team has worked with it extensively over the years, and our insights are shared in our detailed WooCommerce review.
To accept payments in your online store using Authorize.net, you will need to use an extension like WooCommerce Authorize.net or YITH’s WooCommerce Authorize.net.
If you’re looking to build a complete eCommerce store with all the powerful features like shipping, taxes, and inventory management, then I recommend using WooCommerce.
To get started, see our guide on how to start an online store.
✅Pros of WooCommerce
- Express checkout support
- Free and open-source
- Multi-currency support
- Instant and partial refunds via supported gateways
❌Cons of WooCommerce
- Requires an extension for Authorize.Net payments
Why I recommend WooCommerce: It is the best option for accepting Authorize.net payments when selling physical products.
5. Easy Digital Downloads
Easy Digital Downloads (EDD) is the best plugin for selling digital products from your WordPress site. It has an Authorize.net addon that you can access via the Extended Pass plan.
Several of our partner brands are currently using EDD to sell their plugins and have created a rapidly growing business with its help. I have also thoroughly tested it to discover all its powerful features.
You can check our complete Easy Digital Downloads review to find out more about its features.
The plugin easily accepts recurring payments and charges customers automatically. You can also offer free trials, prorated payments, and flexible billing cycles.
EDD can even be used to sell subscription-based products like memberships, courses, and SaaS.
Additionally, you can create a separate record for each customer to track their purchase activity and customer lifetime value.
You’ll also get detailed data reporting so you can view earnings by date range or category, track collected taxes by year, monitor download sales, and more.
For more instructions, see our guide on how to sell digital downloads on WordPress for step-by-step instructions.
✅Pros of Easy Digital Downloads
- Download limits and file expiration controls
- Coupons and discount codes
- Secure file links to prevent unauthorized sharing
- AffiliateWP integration for affiliate programs
❌Cons of Easy Digital Downloads
- Authorize.Net addon not available in the free version
Why I recommend Easy Digital Downloads: If you want a straightforward way to sell digital products and accept payments through Authorize.net, then EDD is an excellent choice.
6. GiveWP
GiveWP is a great donations plugin for charities and nonprofits who want to raise money online. It’s really easy to use and has lots of powerful features to help you reach your fundraising goals.
Plus, it easily integrates with Authorize.net in the ‘Basic’ plan. This makes it really affordable for you to accept credit and debit cards directly on your site.
With GiveWP, you can tweak every aspect of the donation process. You can accept multi-level donations, set campaign-level donation goals, offer different currency options, provide tax-deductible donation receipts, and much more.
You also get detailed reports, where you can view how your different campaigns are performing. You can easily see who your top donors are, and you can even add notes about them for internal use by your team.
✅Pros of GiveWP
- One-time and recurring donations
- Branded donation receipts
- Fraud prevention with reCAPTCHA and Stripe Radar
❌Cons of GiveWP
- Authorize.Net requires the Pro plan
- Learning curve for beginners
Why I recommend GiveWP: If you are looking for an affordable way to use Authorize.net for accepting donations, then GiveWP is worth checking out.
Bonus: Restrict Content Pro
Restrict Content Pro is another great option if you want to create members-only content on your site.
You can use Authorize.net with its cheapest ‘Personal’ license, as the Authorize.net addon itself is free. This makes it a good alternative to MemberPress if you’re on a tight budget.
During my evaluation, I found it works really well with the WordPress interface, and beginners find it easy to get started with.
You can easily send welcome emails to your members, create different subscription packages with multiple levels, offer discount codes, and much more.
Restrict Content Pro is a fully-featured plugin that lets you do everything you need to run a membership site.
✅Pros of Restrict Content Pro
- Content restriction using shortcodes
- Easy Digital Downloads integration
- Free trials and recurring memberships
❌Cons of Restrict Content Pro
- Authorize.Net not available in the free version
Why I recommend Restrict Content Pro: To sell exclusive content with Authorize.net, I recommend Restrict Content Pro.
Which Is the Best Authorize.net plugin for WordPress?
After reviewing all the options, I believe the best Authorize.net plugin for WordPress really depends on your specific needs.
In my expert opinion, WPForms is the best overall choice for most businesses. It’s the easiest way to create simple payment forms for any purpose.
However, if you’re looking to create a membership site or sell online courses, then MemberPress is the best solution.
For building a full-featured eCommerce store to sell physical products, I recommend WooCommerce.
And for selling digital products exclusively, my top recommendation is Easy Digital Downloads.
Frequently Asked Questions About Authorize.net Plugins
Having helped thousands of users set up WordPress payment solutions, I’ve answered a lot of questions. Here are the answers to some of the most common questions about Authorize.net.
What is Authorize.net?
Authorize.net is a payment gateway that allows businesses to accept credit card and e-check payments online.
It acts as a secure bridge between your website and the payment processing networks.
Do I need an Authorize.net account to use these plugins?
Yes, you will need an active Authorize.net merchant account to use any of these plugins. The plugin’s job is to connect your WordPress site to your Authorize.net account so you can process payments.
Is Authorize.net better than Stripe or PayPal?
It depends on your business. Authorize.net often has lower transaction fees if you process a high volume of sales because it works with your existing merchant bank account.
However, Stripe and PayPal can sometimes be easier to set up for new businesses.
Are there any free Authorize.net plugins for WordPress?
Most high-quality Authorize.net plugins are premium. This is because processing payments requires a high level of security, support, and maintenance.
While some plugins might offer a free version, the Authorize.net integration is almost always a paid feature.
Can I accept recurring payments with Authorize.net?
Yes, you can. Authorize.net fully supports recurring payments and subscriptions.
Plugins like MemberPress, Easy Digital Downloads, and GiveWP are excellent for setting up automated subscription billing through Authorize.net.
Related Guides to Payments in WordPress
Looking for more information on accepting payments in WordPress? Check out these beginner’s guides:
- WordPress Payment Processing: The Ultimate Guide for Beginners
- How to Collect Taxes for Stripe Payments in WordPress (Easy Ways)
- How to Accept Deposit Payments in WordPress (Easy Methods)
- PayPal Alternatives for Freelancers to Collect Payments in WordPress
- Best WooCommerce Payment Gateways for WordPress
- Important Online Payment Statistics, Data, and Trends
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Dennis Muthomi
I’ve implemented alot of payment solutions across numerous client sites, and found WPForms to be incredibly versatile. Seriously
One valuable tip I’d add: always set up a test transaction flow before going live. WPForms makes this particularly easy with their sandbox mode, which has saved me countless hours of troubleshooting.
Their pre-built templates are also excellent for quickly customizing payment forms for different business needs. This article’s recommendation of WPForms as the top choice definitely aligns with my real-world experience.