12 Best WordPress Membership Plugins In Friendly Budget

If you are eager to know how to set up a subscription billing site using WordPress then this article helps you by covering the Best WordPress membership plugins. Mainly these plugins are very easy to set up, these plugins have much more advanced options and can be used easily with general basics. The main point is that these plugins are within the budget which maximum everyone can afford. This will be more helpful for people who are recently set up their business.

Update: We have added a paragraph of 3-4 lines at the end of each plugin section which quickly tells you why you should go for the particular plugin. If you are in rush consider this quick summary and make your decision on WordPress Membership plugins.

Why Membership Plugin?

You can use membership plugins in different scenarios according to your need.

• You can use them to restrict your website content to only logged in users.
• You can develop your website content with your users like forums.
• You can pay your subscribers to develop content. You can also charge your subscribers for accessing your website content.
• You can give special offers to your subscribers.
• These are the must-have plugins for eCommerce sites.

Tools present in this plugins makes you wonder how easy this WordPress membership is going to be.

Best WordPress Membership Plugins (PAID):

Video Tutorial:

For the reader’s convenience, we always create a video tutorial. Either you can watch and learn or simply skip the video and continue with the steps mentioned afterward.

1. MemberMouse: Best subscription plugin for WordPress

MemberMouse is one of the Best WordPress membership plugins. It is a premium membership and commerce solution for customers around the world. This membership basically allows you to sell products, subscriptions, and memberships along with setting up a password-protected Member area.

MemberMouse also allows the members to upgrade and downgrade membership themselves because this plugin is been built up with keeping in-techniques in mind. This plugin obtains a minimum time of approximately 2 minutes to set up the site. MemberMouse is one system to manage your entire business, this basically gives you everything that you need to easily manage a successful online business.

This plugin gives customers a unique ability to protect their website using Member mouse built-in password feature.

MemberMouse Essential Features:

• Free, Paid, and Subscription-based memberships can be generated.
• In MemberMouse, the import module is present which can be used to import members from CSV files, or from other email marketing tools including MailChimp, ConvertKit, etc.
• Upon installation, multiple pages are automatically created which you can also customize later. The pages are the checkout page, login page, logout page, Password reset page, etc.
• The dripping content feature is included. No need to install an extra Addon.
• Coupon codes, Gifting and reward feature is present
• The next highlighted feature is Social Login. MemberMouse allows members to register or login with their different social handles including Facebook, Twitter, Google and Linkedin.
• The members can be added or created manually
• Multiple features are available to enable automation on. Example Push Notification, Zapier integration, Automatic password reset etc.
• Taxonomies content restriction can be possible
• Customer management, protect Members area, support automation and
• Advanced reporting system is there. A complete reporting dashboard is available. Small to advanced reports can be extracted for example Member count reports, Sales reports, membership level comparisons, churn and retention reports, and much more.
• The payment methods which are supported right now are PayPal, authorize.net, Stripe, auth.net, CIM, Braintree, click bank, limelight CRM and coinbase.
• Smart tags support is there. Basically Smart tags or Shortcodes allows you to control what content should be display to the current member based on variety of access control parameters including membership level, products they purchased, the number of days they have been a member etc.
• Free staging site is available for testing purposes.
• Migration from other membership plugin without data loss is possible.

MemberMouse Pros:

• Monthly Plans are available
• Powerful reports as compared to all other plugins
• 14 day free trial period is available on all MemberMouse paid plans
• Demo is available
• Membership migration can be done

MemberMouse Cons:

• Yearly plans are costly

MemberMouse Plans and Price

Here are MemberMouse current pricing plans and features. You will get 17% discount on all annual plans.

• BUILDER
  • Supports 5,000 members
  • All Core features
  • Email support
  • $29/month or $288.96 ($24.08 a month billed annually,17% off)

• ADVANCED
  • Support 50,000 Members
  • All Core features plus additional features and advanced Reporting Suite. 
  • Priority Email Support
  • $79/month or 786.96 ($65.58 a month billed annually, 17% off)

• PREMIUM
  • Supports 100,000 members
  • All Core and Advanced features plus Sticky.io integration
  • Priority Email and Phone Support
  • $199/month or $1982.04 ($165.17 a month billed annually, 17% off)

Final Words on MemberMouse:

Go for MemberMouse when you want an advanced powerful membership plugin for your website. Staging site, advanced reports, Migration support from other membership plugins are one of the unique features of this plugin.

2.MemberPress: Another good WordPress membership management plugin

MemberPress is an easy-to-use all-in-one membership plugin for WordPress sites. This is going to be the easiest membership site software that you will be seeing, you don’t need to be a merit in computers to operate this. Just install the plugin, complete your payment gateway, and set up some products thats’ it. It is developed with such coding that makes it stable and has high-level security.

When you are looking for the MemberMouse alternative then you should first consider MemberPress as its substitute because MemberPress has almost every feature you have seen in MemberMouse.

MemberPress Essential Features

• MemberPress gives you an option to restrict access to pages, child pages, tags, custom post types, and almost any file existing in your WordPress installation.
• Member press allows you to generate as many coupons as you want to generate and manage them (i.e) when to expire, how many times a user can use, etc.
• The setup is easy.
• It has powerful access rules.
• EasyAffiliate integration is also available, It is an amazing affiliate program plugin for WordPress which lets you create your own affiliate program.
• Coupons Never get blocked.
• It is very stable and secure.
• Management of unlimited Members is possible.
• It works with any theme.
• The MemberPress has the courses addon which included LMS features and will be helpful when users want to create a course-based membership site.
• The dripping content feature is inbuilt
• Under Payment integrations, MemberPress supports Paypal, Stripe, Authorize.net, and Paystack
• Clear and relevant reporting.
• Zapier integration is there for a seamless workflow.
• Easy to customize.
• Premium support.

MemberPress Pros:

• 3 months of free trial on OptinMonster and TrustPulse is included in all MemberPress plans as free of cost.
• Despite similar features, MemberPress is offering much cheaper plans than MemberMouse. For example, MemberPress starting plan costs you $149 annually whereas MemberMouse basic plan would cost you $288 bucks
• Lots of integrations are included.
• Better pricing structure. With a plus and pro plan, this membership plugin can be installed on up to 5 WordPress sites.

MemberPress Cons:

• Free trial is not available
• Monthly plans cannot be found. Annual billing could be a little expensive but there is an option for renewal.
• Demo is absent

MemberPress Plans and Pricing

Coming to plans, there are 3 types of annual plans MemberPress is offering:

• BASIC
  • Support 1 website only
  • Unlimited Members & content
  • Paypal & Stripe integration is available
  • The user can create as well as sell online courses
  • Updates and Support till 1 year
  • 10 Addons and integrations are available
  • OptinMonster subscription is included for 3 months without any extra charge
  • 3 Months TrustPulse Trial is included.
  • Started from $149/year.

• PLUS
  • Include all basic features plus
  • The plugin can be installed on 2 websites
  • Corporate Addon is included
  • Works with Authorize.net
  • 10 Additional integrations and Addons are available
  • Thousands of custom integration with zapier is available
  • Started from $249/year

• PRO
  • Covered all Plus features and…
  • Use on up to 5 sites
  • Affiliate Royal Program is included
  • Corporate Addon is included.
  • Pro Addons
  • Started from $349/year. No monthly plans are available.

Final Words on MemberPress:

Go for MemberPress Plugin when you are looking for a perfect MemberMouse substitute at a lesser price. Also when you want to install a single membership plugin on multiple websites.

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3.SureMembers

When it comes to creating a membership site, you can’t go wrong with SureMembers. It’s one of the best membership plugins out there and enables you to smartly manage memberships and subscriptions.

Whether you sell content, downloadables, or anything, SureMembers can set everything up in minutes.

You can create paywalls, drip feed content, design custom access rules, secure digital downloads, show or hide menus or sell online courses. SureMembers can help you in so many ways!

The plugin integrates seamlessly with SureCart and SureTriggers, making it a powerful combination to accomplish anything as an online business.

SureMembers Features:

• Easy to apply a content paywall to make it available to only an eligible audience.
• Restriction can be applied to a post, page, taxonomy, or an entire website.
• Allows you to restrict access to downloadable files
• Drip content feature allows you to release content at a specific schedule of your choice.
• SureMembers allows a huge range of payment methods by integrating SureCart.
• A dedicated user dashboard displays a history of every purchase made on your site.
• Offers the easiest way to create and manage user access groups to restrict/allow content however you want.
• Create any number of user roles and manage access accordingly.
• With SureMembers, there is no limit to the number of members you can have on your website.
• Unauthorized users can be redirected to a sign-up page or anywhere you want. You can also redirect them after login and logout to a customized location.
• With SureTriggers, SureMembers can automate processes on your website. It can be an email to a member or an entire access group.
• Customize member logins and signup forms however you want.
• Checkout pages, checkout forms, and user dashboards are available with SureCart.
• Apply a login restriction to only allow the desired number of members concurrently.
• In-depth reports and analytics to show what members are doing on your site.
• It’s simple, powerful and intuitive.

SureMembers Pros:

• Flexible content protection.
• Drip content feature.
• Custom access roles.
• Secure digital downloads.
• Hide/show menu items based on a member’s access level.

SureMembers Cons:

• No free version available.
• Some powerful features require SureCart or SureTriggers.

SureMembers Plans and Pricing

SureMembers plans are straightforward and cost-effective. Here’s what’s on offer:

PRO

• For $99 per year, the plan is ideal for bloggers, individuals and solopreneurs.
• Available for a single site.
• First-time users can save up to $30.

BUSINESS

• For $199 per year, the plan is suitable for freelancers, businesses and professionals who run multiple sites.
• License is valid for 5 websites.
• First-time users can save up to $100.

AGENCY

• For $299, the plan is perfect for agencies and professionals with multiple clients.
• License can be used on 10 websites.
• First-time users can save up to $150.

4) aMember Pro: –

aMember is a unique platform that helps businesses manage their memberships. It is one of the premium memberships which can be used on online platforms like WordPress. This is designed for digital products and downloads such as eBooks, software, audio files, and images. aMember helps their users to manage their subscriptions, accept payments and deliver their goods to the consumers.

aMember is something different, I have never seen like this. It is more like software rather than a plugin that helps users to create a Membership site, eCommerce site, affiliate program, and also helps in enabling members subscription.

aMember Pro is not an online service, it is a PHP script you download and install to your own Webhosting server. You get a full source code when you purchase this software. However, it also has WordPress integration which allows you to manage protection from inside of WordPress. This way, this plugin is perfect for Non-WordPress users who want to create a membership site.

The main reason to purchase this membership plugin is its pricing plan. With aMember, you only need to pay once and you get this membership plugin for a lifetime. And that one-time license would cost you only $149 bucks.
The second main reason to go for AMember that it allows you to create a fully customized demo site. The user can have access to the demo site for 30 days which is enough to understand how the membership site and this plugin works. This saves you from unwanted initial expenses.

aMember is a very flexible tool which gives easy access to its users. The payments methods for aMember are PayPal, 2CheckOut, Stripe,1ShoppingCart, ClickBank, Plimus, SWARG, WorldPay, Zombaio etc., It also comes with an integrated helpdesk as well as a full-featured affiliate module. The customer support is 24×7 available for the amember user. Users can create and manage their own email lists, bulk send e-mails etc. Users can also set up autoresponders and send them on specific dates after purchase. One of the main beneficial things aMember tool offers is its own affiliate program built in. Boasting of very deep integration to its core, aMember Pro’s affiliate management module makes quick work of handling and managing recurring billing, refunds, and chargebacks.

aMember simplifies all aspects of membership management for a business that delves in digital goods and downloads. aMember is all about fast and easy membership management. This tool makes it easy for subscribers to sign up, send payments, retrieve a lost password, configure their data and cancel their subscriptions. On top of this member is well integrated and reasonably priced system, which can easily meet the needs of every company and function impeccably in any software ecosystem.

aMember features: –

• Unlimited membership levels and items.
• Incremental content delivery.
• Payment systems integration.
• Full-Featured member management.
• Automated sign-up and expirations.
• Integrated modules.
• Translated into 6 languages.
• One-Time payment.
• Membership management.
• Third-Party scripts integration.
• Built-in affiliate program.
• Email management.
• Access control.
• Drip feed content is included
• Built-in affiliate program
• Bulk emails can be sent to the members with the email throttling feature.

aMember Pricing and Plans

aMember offers a single SMB and Enterprise pricing plan for its users.

• aMember Professional – $179.95(lifetime license). However, there is a spring sale is going on which offers a 17% discount and hence the final price will cut to $149.36

aMember Pros:

• A lifetime plan is available.
• The demo site is available to first create a complete membership site before deployment. The period for the demo site is for 30 days.
• 200+ payment integrations are available, which could only be seen in this Membership tool.
• Full WordPress integration.
• Free membership can be created
• Strong focus on e-commerce use.
• Built-in help desk.
• Zendesk integration.
• Can be installed on both WordPress and Non-WordPress websites
• Membership translation support is available
• From basic to advanced, varieties of reports can be extracted with this membership software

aMember Cons:

• Difficult to use. The interface is different from other membership tools. The user needs to invest some time in learning before comfortably using it.
• No event management.
• No donation functionality.
• Bare-bones admin interface.
• Not suitable for the typical association, club, or non -profit local membership management.

Final Words on AMember:

Go for the aMember membership tool when you’re ready to invest some time in learning the interface as well as in the deployment of this membership site to WordPress. Also, go for this plugin when you want to pay once for lifetime access to the membership tool and take advantage of 200+ payment integrations and 30 days of the free trial period (demo site).

Click Here to Visit aMember Official Website

5) RESTRICT CONTENT PRO:

Restrict Content Pro is a complete Membership solution for WordPress that enables you to easily restrict access to your content to logged-in user’s and design of admin user interface is done in such a way that it can easily fit into WordPress admin area , you also have the ability to restrict the content  using shortcodes, most custom post types as well as full-page restriction for post.

For guidance, there is always a helpful documentation that will be displayed throughout the setting page for helping you. This plugin gives you great features by which you can obtain complete control over how your content can be accessed. It is improving day by day by addition of new features to list.

After installing, you will receive the ability to restrict access to your content in various ways through the plugin. Restriction access is based on Membership level, using categories and tags to restrict access. Here are some features you will get with restrict content including pro content.

• Unlimited Memberships (free, trial, or subscription-based) can be done.
• Unlimited subscription package
• Easy to set up.
• Easy Member management.
• Invitation by email.
• 30 days money-back guarantee.
• Updates and email support is provided
• Easy payment options like PayPal express,Braintree,PayPal standard,stripe.com& 2checkout.
• Selling unlimited digital payments.
• Dashboard for customers.
• 23 Pro Addons included: ActiveCampaign, AvaTax, BuddyPress, Aweber Pro, BuddyPress, Group Accounts, ConvertKit, Custom Redirects, Expiration dates, Help Scout, IP Restriction, MailChimp Pro, Math Verification, Per-Level Emails, REST API, Restrict Past Content, Restriction Timelock, Restriction Timeouts, Resume Manager, Site Creation, Ultimate Member Integration, View Limit, WooCommerce Member Discounts.
• 13 Official Free and Pro Addons Included: MailChimp, Limited Quantity Available, EDD Member Downloads, EDD Wallet, EDD FES Vendor Limits, Download Monitor, WP Job Manager, BBPress, CSV User Import, MailChimp, Campaign Monitor, MailPoet Enforce Strong Passwords.
• Generation of CSV of all active members at any level can be done and you can also generate a CSV of every payment made.
• All relevant information will be provided by the admin.
• You Can easily create many subscriptions like Free trials, premium version, and many more
• It also provides printable HTML invoices

Restrict Content Pro Pricing and Plans

There are four plans that are available and the type of payment is the one-time payment

1) ULTIMATE: This is a one-time payment plan which costs you $749 and it offers 23 pro-add-ons, all future pro-add-on, 13 free official add-on, lifetime updates, lifetime support, unlimited sites, and all features included.

2) PROFESSIONAL:. It costs $249 per annum and it offers 23 pro-add-on, all future pro-add-on, plugin updates, email super, unlimited sites, and all core features included.

3) PLUS:. It costs $149 per annum and it offers 13 official free add-ons, plugin updates, email support, 5 sites, all core features included

4) PERSONAL: It costs $99 per annum and  it offers 13 official add-on, plugin updates, email support, 1 site, and all core features included

If you are thinking about plugin membership with increasing features then you should go with “Restrict content pro”.

ADVANTAGES :

• Cheapest yearly plans started from just $99
• Product tour, Use cases, and a separate help center is available for learning the plugin
• Setup is very simple.
• Easy Member management.
• You can subscribe to unlimited packages.
• Invitation through the mail is also available.
• 30 days money-back guarantee
• The user can add his own Payment gateway
• One time payment plan is also available

DISADVANTAGE :

• The dripping content feature comes with a pro addon, and pro add-ons are only available in professional and ultimate plans.
• Consumes a little bit more time.
• Basic reports only.
• No demo or free trial is available
• Monthly plans not found.

Final Words on Restrict Content Pro:

Go for this plugin when you do not want to spend huge money on membership yearly plans and happy with basic features. Also, go for this plugin when you want to set up your membership site quickly with the available guidance support.

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6) PAID MEMBERSHIPS PRO:

Paid Membership Pro is a membership plugin that you can use for free. It is used to put a limit on access for your content on WordPress to selected users. if you want additional features then you can go with premium options that are available, only 2 additional features are provided in premium options.

They will give you access to things like pro documentation and some premium content these are the only differences and remaining everything is the same.

If you are searching for a free membership plugin then this is your destination.

Paid Memberships Pro Plans & Pricing

• Apart from a free plan, 2 paid plans are available: Plus ($297/year) and Unlimited ($597/year)

Some features that paid membership pro consists are

• Unlimited levels with flexible membership
• Excellent options for content restriction. Pages, Posts, Blocks, and categories can be restricted.
• Membership levels and Member Roles can be synced.
• Payment Integrations: Stripe, PayPal, Authorize.net, Braintree, 2Checkout
• An excerpt feature is available to show partial content to non-members.
• Easy management of membership dashboard
• Accepts recurring payments
• Amazing discount coupons
• emails can be customized
• Frontend user profiles
• Members directory can be created
• It is 100 percentage GPL
• Different types of reports can be extracted including Sales & Revenue, Members Signups, Cancellation and Expiration reports, Custom reports by integrating Google Analytics, Most valuable member reports, etc.
• Members can be added manually or with the help of the import feature.
• AffiliatesWP Integration is there to create and manage its own affiliate program within the membership
• Popular page builders integration like Elementor, Beaver, etc are available for designing a professional membership site

ADVANTAGES :

• Excerpt feature is available
• You can use as many sites you want to use freely
• Third-party add-ons are available
• Free plugin is available for testing

DISADVANTAGES :

• To access some standard features you have to install extra plugins and add-ons.
• Dripping content support is absent in the free plugin.
• Paid Plans are costly

Final Words on Paid Memberships Pro:

Go for this plugin when you first want to try the free membership plugin and upgrade later for extra features accordingly.

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7) WooCommerce Memberships:-

WooCommerce is one of the most popular eCommerce platforms worldwide. This plugin for WordPress will enable your website into a very powerful online store and allows their customers to rate and review their products right on their Ecommerce website. WooCommerce is free for both personal and commercial uses.

 This plugin can be easily installed and used but this doesn’t include a domain, hosting, email, theme, support, etc., In other terms, you’ll have to consider additional expenses. However, most of these features are included at no extra cost in proprietary solutions like Shopify.

WooCommerce membership is an extension that can easily be integrated with the native WooCommerce plugin. However, you need to purchase this extension separately which costs you $199 annually.

With this extension, you can create independent memberships by restricting the content and sell WooCommerce products within the memberships. Also, you can grant access to a membership as part of a product purchase. This is the best membership extension for those who already using WooCommerce and want to sell eCommerce products within the membership.

When you create a membership with this extension, By default memberships are valid for an unlimited time or fixed time. However, if you want to create recurring or subscription-based membership then you require to install and integrate another extension and that is a WooCommerce subscription for which you have to pay an extra $199 manually.

With the WooCommerce membership extension, you can lock posts, pages, and WooCommerce products as well. You can take full advantage of the content dripping feature and control when members should have access to the membership content.

WooCommerce Memberships Features:-

• Supports Dripping content
• Products can be added to Membership content easily
• Discounts and Free shipping can be added to the membership products
• The membership data can be easily export into CSV format. Also, you can import members via CSV as well.
• Expiration and renewal emails can be sent to inform members about their membership plan ending date.
• Allows customers to rate and review products.
• Rich snippets to display reviews and ratting in google results.
• Facilitate customers to submit files with reviews.
• Posts a reply to customer reviews.
• Edit, approve, or delete customers’ reviews.
• Customize reviews block.

Advantages: –

• Advanced features for the larger online store.
• Customer and store administrator accounts.
• Designs.

Disadvantages: –

• Importing and exporting members from other email marketing tools is not possible
• Easy of use ( setup process is quite a pain).
• Lack of support.
• Only a few basics features are available
• Recurring or Subscription-based memberships cannot be created directly.

WooCommerce & WooCommerce Memberships Pricing and Plans

• $15.95 ~ Standard [webspace limited to 100GB]
• $32.95 ~ Premium [Includes an advanced backup solution]
• $199/year – WooCommerce Membership Extension (Needs to buy separately)

These are prices per year. Domain and email will be included. Bluehost offers discounts for the 1st year.

Final Words on WooCommerce Memberships

Go for the WooCommerce membership extension when you have already been using WooCommerce on WordPress and sell products within the membership. We do not recommend this membership extension if you want to create recurring or subscription-based membership.

Click Here To Visit WooCommerce Official Website

Best Free WordPress Subscription Plugins

Video Tutorial:

For the reader’s convenience, we always create a video tutorial. Either you can watch and learn or simply skip the video and continue with the steps mentioned afterward.

Have your pocket is tight right now? Don’t want to spend any money on membership-based plugins? Don’t worry, we got you covered. In this section, you will find the best free WordPress subscription plugins that you can install today directly from the WordPress plugin repository and learn how subscription or membership based plugins work.

The plugins we are going to discuss in a moment are currently ranking in the top 5 at the WordPress plugin repository.

8. Restrict User Access

Restrict user access is one of the powerful yet free WordPress Subscription plugins that allows you to create an unlimited number of access level-based memberships without any cost. This tool almost has every essential feature that we are mainly looking for in the Paid membership plugins. However, the only issue we found in this plugin is support for payment gateway is absent.

Restrict User Access Features:

• The dripping content feature is available. You can attract users by unlocking access to restricted content after a specific period of time.
• With the capabilities manager, you can have full control over a user’s capabilities within each access level membership.
• You can set multiple conditions and restrict any type of content including posts, pages, categories, tags, etc.
• The user can have access to different membership access levels at the same time.
• The duration can be set easily to each membership level.
• You can also restrict nav menu items from unregistered users.
• Supports “extending a level” feature to grant the user access to hierarchical membership levels
• You can define a custom URL to redirect non-registered users when they will try to access the protected content. Restrict User Access has a special feature of showing an excerpt of restricted content to non-registered users. Instead of redirecting them to a specific URL, you can use the “Tease and Include” feature and attract users with the excerpt of premium content.
• With their content restriction shortcodes, you can restrict even a single block inside any post of a particular category. This is a very useful feature when you don’t want to restrict a whole post but only want to lock specific blocks inside it.
• Regardless of the absence of payment gateways, you can still create monetized membership by integrating WooCommerce products or easy digital downloads in your restricted content.
• Other integrations that can be found inside this plugin are bbPress, BuddyPress, qTranslate X, Pods, Polylang, TranslatePress, and WPML.
• Extra premium addons including Date restriction, URL restriction, Timelock, Visibility Control, and ACF Restriction are available to extend the plugin functionalities.

Restrict User Access Pros

• Advanced membership plugins features can be seen in this free plugin including dripping content, unlimited membership access levels, etc.
• No limit on the number of members to be joined.
• Support Multiple conditions and rules to restrict any type of content available on the website.

Restrict User Access Cons

• Stripe, Payoneer integration is not available.
• Login form or Registration form cannot be customized
• Coupons and Discounts cannot be added.

9. Ultimate Member – Trending Free WordPress Subscriptions Plugins

Ultimate Member is the free trending membership plugin with having more than 200,000 active installations on WordPress. It can automatically restrict your whole website content in a single click. It is known for its speed and front-end customization capabilities. As soon as you install the plugin, this plugin will automatically create multiple pages for your membership website including account, log in, logout, registration, and much more. With their form builder and live preview, you can design interactive forms and add them to any membership page with the shortcode functionality. However, the main concern with this plugin that you cannot create multiple memberships or access level-based membership.

Ultimate Member Features:

• The user has the option to restrict any post, media, page, category, and tag from non-subscribers.
• Email notification support for members on various actions is available including account activation, account approval, account deactivation, password changed email, etc.
• For avoiding spammy registrations, you can use the blacklist words feature which blocks any entries that include words that you have mentioned into the blacklist category.
• The user has the option to lock or restrict any post, page, etc. directly from the post editor.
• You have full control to prevent user profiles get indexed into search engines.
• With the Ultimate member dashboard, you can find out the total number of users who have subscribed to your membership.
• The members have full control to customize their profile picture, cover picture, bio, etc.
• You can customize the restrict access message to notify unsubscribers that they have to register or join a membership before accessing the content.
• The form builder is available to create beautifully designed forms that can be added to any page or post of the website.
• There is no restriction on the number of user roles. You can create an unlimited number of users, for example, subscriber, manager, customer, etc, and control their access easily.
• The membership directory feature allows members to connect with other members and you have full control to create unlimited directories. Also, you can specify which member should be included in the directory or not based on certain rules.
• Both free and paid extensions are available. The interesting fact is that paid extensions can be purchased separately without upgrading to the Ultimate Member premium version.
• Job Board WP, Forum WP, Online users, Google reCaptcha, and terms & conditions are included in the free extensions list.
• WooCommerce paid extension is available and it can be used to monetize the membership website.

Ultimate Member Pros

• Taxonomies content restriction option is available.
• WooCommerce integration is available.
• This plugin is compatible with all popular WordPress themes and doesn’t impact the site’s performance and speed.
• No restriction on the number of subscribers to be joined in a membership.
• Paid extensions can be purchased independently
• All major features are available in the free plan except paid extensions and dripping content.
• Instant email notifications feature for members is available.

Ultimate Member Cons

• Payment gateway support cannot be found.
• You cannot create multiple-level access memberships.
• No dripping content feature is available
• Post Excerpt Teaser feature is absent

10. WP-Members Membership Plugin

WP-Members is another 4.5 start-rated free WordPress subscription plugin that turns your normal website into a membership website in a single click. Similar to Ultimate members, this plugin enables user registration on your website. The plugin allows you to restrict all content of the website directly from the WP-Members settings or you can also use post editor to simply block, unblock, or hidden selected posts or pages. When you lock a post, non-registered users only able to see an excerpt with a login or registration form. The main advantage of this plugin over ultimate members that this plugin has a Paypal extension that you can use to sell restricted content. However, there is no support for multiple membership access levels which means you cannot be able to create multiple membership levels with this plugin.

WP-Members Features

• Individual Posts/Pages or the entire website can be restricted
• Menu items can be restricted
• The login and registration form can be automatically blended into the theme style. Also, you can customize the fields of both the login and registration forms.
• Notification support is available both for members and admin
• Post excerpt teaser feature is available.
• Password reset feature is available for all members.
• hCaptcha or reCaptcha can be enabled on the registration form.
• The new emails can be held for admin approval
• The text messages for email dialogs and errors are fully customized.
• Email notification for members is enabled in various situations. For example account activation etc. All emails are sent by the plugin itself.
• Shortcodes are available to embed login forms, registration forms into custom pages. Also, you can restrict any block within the article by using content restriction shortcodes.
• 2 free extensions are available: Stop Spam registrations and Send test emails.
• Several premium extensions are available which can be purchased individually. The premium extensions including MailChimp, Paypal, Membership for WooCommerce, Download Protect, User tracking, etc.

WP-Members Pros

• Paypal Integration and WooCommerce integration is available to create monetized memberships.
• No limit on the number of subscribers
• Post Excerpt Teaser feature is present

WP-Members Cons

• Taxonomies content restriction feature is not available
• Dripping content cannot be enabled
• The user cannot create multiple membership levels
• Only premium users have access to customer email support
• The custom URL cannot be set to redirect non-registered users.
• There is no separate dashboard available to visualize membership stats.

11. Paid Membership Pro (Free version)

Paid Membership Pro is the next free WordPress subscription plugin on our list. As we already discussed the premium version in the paid membership plugins section. Now it’s time to explore its free version. According to our research, the only thing a free plugin lacks as compared to the paid version is the 65 plus addons and priority support.

Apart from that, all premium features can be found in the Paid Membership Pro free version. Paid Membership Pro is one of the robust tools that allow you to create 3 types of membership-based websites including Free, Paid, and Subscription-based. Websites with having different models such as eLearning, communities, directories can easily be created without any cost.

Further the main benefit of using this free plugin that you don’t require to purchase an external extension for enabling payment gateways on the membership site. Multiple Payment gateways are already included within the free plugin.

Paid Membership Pro (Free version) Features:

• The Paid Membership Pro dashboard gives you a detailed report about your membership site. It shows the total number of members, visits, views and login numbers, weekly/daily signups, cancellations, and much more.
• The content can be lock in different ways including by page, by post, by block, by shortcode, and by PHP function.
• Giveaway, discount codes can be added to the membership
• An excerpt teasing feature is available.
• The recurring subscription option is available under billings to create subscription-based memberships.
• Expiration duration can be set under each membership level.
• No limit on the number of membership levels to be created
• Multiple pages including the Billing page, Login page, Checkout page, Members profile page can be generated in a single click. Further with the help of a shortcode, the user can embed these blocks into any page or post manually.
• Members, Orders data can be export into CSV format.
• Email alerts are available.
• Multiple payment gateways are available including Pay by check, Stripe, Paypal, Authorize.net, 2Checkout, Cybersource, and Credit cards.
• The reCaptcha functionality can be added to the checkout page.
• WooCommerce products can be locked
• 21 Free addons are included in the Paid Memberships Pro free version. Some of them are Aweber, bbPress, BuddyPress, ConvertKit, MailChimp, Kissmetrics, Zapier, WooCommerce, etc.

Paid Membership Pro (Free Version) Pros:

• Payment integration support is available without installing an extra addon
• Discounts and Giveaways is plus
• A separate reporting dashboard is available.
• Unlimited membership levels can be created.

Paid Membership Pro (Free Version) Cons:

• Dripping content can be possible only in the Premium version.
• The entire website content cannot be locked with a single click.
• The custom URL cannot be set to redirect non-registered users.
• Content cannot be restricted by applying multiple conditions
• Lack of customer support in free version

12. Simple Membership

Simple membership is the last plugin in our best free WordPress Subscription plugin list. As the name states, this membership plugin is the simplest in terms of usability. Instructions are mentioned under most of the options so that you don’t have to open up the tutorials and documentation during configuration time. Despite the free plugin, it has almost every essential feature that you will require to create a membership website. Free, Paid, or even subscription-based membership can easily be built with the help of this plugin. Further, it supports more than 30 international languages which automatically translate your membership content to the user’s native language.

Simple Membership Features

• Content can be protected in multiple ways including through WordPress editor, by bulk protection, membership access levels or if you want to protect any specific section within the page you can use Partial Protection free addon.
• Paypal, Stripe, and Braintree payment gateways supported. Both one-time and subscription/recurring payments can be handled through Paypal or Stripe.
• With the help of a shortcode, the member login widget can be placed over the website sidebar.
• Media and attachment pages can be protected.
• An excerpt teaser feature is present.
• Comments can also be included in the content protection
• The admin has control to manually review the emails before approval
• Both users and membership admin can delete the membership account.
• Email notification support for members is there.
• This plugin also restricts the commenting feature on your site for members only.
• You can control the redirection when user’s login, logout, and signup on to your site.
• Terms and Conditions, Privacy Policy can be added to the registration form.
• From the member dashboard, you can easily filter between active members, pending members, etc.
• You can change members’ membership manually or use the bulk update membership feature to change the membership level of all users in one click.
• An email activation feature is available that required members to click the activation link to activate the account.
• Posts Categories can be protected with a single click
• Admin toolbar can be enabled or disabled for login users
• Automated emails can be customized. For example, you can customize the email text that will send to members as soon as they registered.
• The list of Simple Membership Free Addons is Google reCaptcha, After Login redirection, MailChimp, Full page protection, Partial protection, etc.
• Premium Addons can be purchased individually. The list of Premium Addons is ConvertKit integration, Aweber integration, bbPress, WooCommerce, Member data exporter, Member directory listing addon, 2-Factor authentication addon etc.

Simple Membership Pros

• Payment gateways are included
• Multiple ways to protect content are available
• Translation support is there.
• Bulk protection is available
• Members access can easily be reconfigured

Simple Membership Cons

• Dripping content cannot be possible
• Discounts and Gateways support is absent
• WooCommerce integration is possible by purchasing the premium addon

Conclusion: Best WordPress Membership Plugins

As you can see there are too many membership plugins available in the market, choosing a perfect one is still challenging. In a nutshell, if you want to go with free plugins, the only problem you might face is customer support and regular updates. For testing purposes free plugins are good, but for professional membership website experience, we highly recommend premium WordPress membership plugins like MemberMouse or MemberPress.

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These are the Best WordPress Membership Plugins you can use for your WordPress on a friendly budget. If you have any queries do let us know in the comment section below. Want more blogging tips, follow BlogVwant on Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube.