Stripe vs Wise
Both are finance tools. Here is what separates them.
What Stripe is
Stripe is a payments platform that businesses use to take card payments online and in person, and to run the billing, invoicing, tax and payout work that sits around them. It accepts payments in more than 135 currencies and supports more than 125 payment methods, including Apple Pay, Google Pay, PayPal, Klarna, Affirm, iDEAL, Pix, UPI, Boleto and OXXO. Its prebuilt payment surfaces are named Checkout, Payment Links, Elements and the Payment Element. The rates that follow are taken from Stripe's UK pricing pages and are quoted in pounds, so they are UK figures rather than global ones. A standard UK-issued card costs 1.5% plus 20p per successful charge. A premium UK card costs 2.8% plus 20p, a card issued elsewhere in the European Economic Area 2.5% plus 20p, and a card issued outside it 3.15% plus 20p. Currency conversion adds 2%. A dispute costs 20.00 GBP and the fee is returned if the merchant wins, while Smart Disputes charges 30% of the disputed amount for each dispute won. Around the core payment, Stripe sells a set of separate products. Billing is 0.7% of billing volume on pay as you go pricing, or from 450.00 GBP a month on an annual plan. Invoicing is 0.4% per paid invoice. Tax calculates for more than 100 countries and every US state across more than 600 product tax categories, and files returns through TaxJar in the US and through Taxually, HOST and Marosa elsewhere. Radar, the fraud screening layer, has four tiers named Lite, Standard, Plus and Pro, with Lite carrying no extra charge for businesses on standard payments pricing and the paid tiers starting at 8 GBP a month. Connect is the part built for platforms and marketplaces that pay out to other people. Its onboarding flow covers more than 46 countries in 14 languages, payouts cost 0.25% plus 10p, and instant payouts cost 1% of the amount sent. Issuing creates cards, at 10p for a virtual card and 3.50 GBP for a standard physical one, with no per-transaction fee on the first 500,000 GBP of card transactions. Terminal covers payments taken in person, at 1.4% plus 10p on EEA cards and 2.9% plus 10p on non-EEA cards, with readers priced from 49 GBP for a BBPOS WisePad 3 to 229 GBP for a Stripe Reader S700 or S710, excluding VAT.
What Wise is
Wise is an account for holding, sending and receiving money in several currencies at once. It converts money at the mid-market exchange rate and charges a separate, stated fee on top. Transfer and conversion fees start from 0.23% and vary by currency, with a volume discount once a customer sends more than 25,000 USD or the equivalent. Registering an account is free, holding money in it is free, and there is no subscription fee. The figures below come from Wise's US pages and are quoted in dollars. An account holds and manages 40 currencies and provides local account details for receiving money in 20 of them. Domestic incoming payments in AUD, CAD, EUR, GBP, HUF, NZD, PHP, SGD and USD are free, while receiving by SWIFT costs 6.11 USD for dollars, 2.16 GBP for sterling and 2.39 EUR for euros. Sending money to another Wise user in the same currency is free. Transfers can be funded by debit card, credit card, bank transfer, direct debit or an existing Wise balance, and Wise states that 74% of its transfers arrive in under 20 seconds and 95% in less than a day. The Wise card costs a one-time fee of 9 USD and can be spent across 150 countries and territories. Purchases made in a currency already held in the account are free. ATM withdrawals are free up to a total of 250 USD per calendar month, after which each further withdrawal costs 1.95 USD plus 1.95%. Topping up an e-wallet with the card costs 2%. Digital cards are issued alongside physical ones, and a card can be frozen and unfrozen from the app. The business account has a one-time setup fee of 31 USD and comes with account details for receiving in 22 currencies. BatchTransfer pays up to 1,000 recipients in a single action, there is a public API documented at docs.wise.com, and team members can be given physical or digital cards with per-card spending controls. Wise states that 96% of its international business payments take less than 24 hours. An opt-in feature called Wise Interest pays a return on GBP, EUR and USD balances at rates that differ by currency, with passthrough FDIC insurance up to a total of 250,000 USD through its program bank, though it is not available to residents of New York or Alaska.
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