How to accept donations on Ghost

Ghost has a built-in Tips & Donations link for one-time payments, and paid tiers for recurring support.

Short answerGhost has a built-in Tips & Donations feature under Settings → Growth. It gives you a payment link for one-time payments through your own Stripe account, and Ghost takes no transaction fee. It fits a newsletter or publication whose readers want to chip in. A charity raising money for its mission should read Stripe's rules first, and if you need recurring gifts, donor records or tax receipts, link your Ghost navigation to a separate donation page.

Donor Merchant is a WordPress plugin, so it cannot be installed on Ghost. This guide covers what Ghost does by itself, the Stripe policy that applies to it, and the setup for a separate donation page.

What does Ghost's Tips & Donations feature do?

Ghost added Tips & Donations in September 2024. Ghost's help center describes it this way:

  • It lets readers support you "with a one-off payment, without needing to sign up as a member".
  • It needs an active Stripe connection on your publication.
  • You set it up in Ghost Admin under Settings → Growth → Tips & Donations, where you choose a suggested amount and a currency.
  • You get a payment link to use in a button card, a custom header, an email call to action, or your site navigation.
  • Members and non-members can both give, and the owner (plus administrators who turn the notification on) gets an email for each payment.
  • It "may not be available for every site, due to jurisdiction-specific prohibitions" in Stripe's rules.

Payments are one-time only. On Ghost(Pro), the pricing page lists Tips/donations on the Publisher, Business and Custom plans, not Starter. As published in October 2026, Publisher starts at $29 USD a month billed yearly; verify current prices with Ghost. These plans apply to Ghost(Pro) hosting; Ghost's changelog says self-hosted sites get the feature by updating to the latest version.

What does it cost?

Ghost says it "charges 0% transaction fees": your site connects to your own Stripe account and the only fees are Stripe's processing fees, which Ghost quotes as 2.9% + 30¢ (Stripe's standard US card rate; check Stripe's pricing for your country).

Is Ghost's tip jar right for a charity?

Read this part before you rely on it. Ghost's own help page says that when you create tip jars or payment links in Ghost, "you are subject to Stripe's tipping policy and prohibited and restricted business policy". It lists what Stripe requires, among other things:

  • "Tips are given in exchange for goods or services."
  • "Tip buttons must be displayed next to or following content."

That fits a writer or publication whose readers pay what they like for the work. A charity asking for gifts toward its mission is collecting donations, not tips, and Stripe treats those separately. Stripe's support page says "a donation must be tied to a specific charitable purpose that you're committing to accomplish", that you may not accept donations on behalf of someone else, and that donations "must be used for the charitable purpose described to the donor". It also lists regional limits; for example, Stripe says it cannot support donations in Hong Kong or Thailand, and in Singapore only for registered charitable or religious organisations.

Ghost also notes that payment policies are between you and Stripe, and that Ghost is not a party to the transactions. If your organization is a charity, check with Stripe that your use fits its donation requirements before you promote the link.

Can Ghost take recurring gifts?

Not through Tips & Donations. The recurring option in Ghost is paid membership. With Stripe connected, you create tiers under Settings → Membership → Tiers, each with its own monthly and yearly price, and offer them through Ghost's Portal. Some publications call a tier "Supporter". It is still a membership: a fixed price per tier, tied to content access and newsletters, managed in Ghost's member tools.

When is Ghost enough?

Ghost is enough when you are a publication and support comes from readers: a newsletter with a tip link at the end of each post, or a paid "Supporter" tier. Payments go straight to your Stripe account and you get an email for each tip.

When do you need more than Ghost?

  • Donations rather than tips, for an organization raising money for its mission.
  • Recurring gifts at an amount the donor chooses, weekly to yearly, without a membership tier.
  • Donor records with giving history, campaigns and funds.
  • Tax receipts and annual statements. In the US, a gift of $250 or more needs a written acknowledgment stating the amount and whether goods or services were provided.
  • Fee recovery, offline gifts (checks, bank transfers) and Gift Aid for UK charities.

How do I add a separate donation page to a Ghost site?

Run a small WordPress site on a subdomain such as give.yourdomain.org with Donor Merchant, and link to it from Ghost. Ghost(Pro) custom domains point at Ghost with a CNAME record wherever your domain's DNS is managed, so you add the donation subdomain in the same place. Our guide to adding a donation page to any website builder covers the setup in plain steps.

  1. Add a DNS record for give at your registrar, pointing at your WordPress host.
  2. Install WordPress and Donor Merchant there, with HTTPS on, and connect Stripe or PayPal (Getting started). You can reuse the Stripe account Ghost uses.
  3. Create a Donate page with the Donation Form block or [donor_merchant].
  4. Match Ghost's accent color. Ghost's is under Settings → Site → Design & branding (click Customize). Use the same hex code in Donor Merchant under Settings > Forms > Form style, and pick the button shape closest to your theme.
  5. Link to it from Ghost: in Settings → Site → Navigation, click Customize and add a "Donate" item with the full address. Ghost's Button card and Call to action card can both link to any URL, so add one at the end of posts and in newsletters.

Can I put the form in a Ghost HTML card instead?

Ghost's HTML card accepts embed code, but we recommend a link. A payment form framed from another domain loses Apple Pay unless the frame allows payments and both domains are registered with Stripe. PayPal opens a popup window, which a frame can block. Safari and some other browsers block third-party cookies inside frames. A link avoids those problems, and it works in emails, where forms do not.

What does the separate page give you?

One-time and recurring gifts on Stripe and PayPal, including Apple Pay, Google Pay and US bank debit. Printable receipts with your tax ID and your own statement, and annual statements. A donor portal where donors see their history and, for Stripe gifts, update a card or cancel. Campaigns with goal thermometers, designations, fee recovery, offline gifts, Gift Aid for UK charities, CSV export and Mailchimp. Every feature is free. For recurring gifts, set up webhooks so renewals are recorded.

Checked against Ghost's documentation in October 2026. Ghost Admin changes between versions; if a label differs in yours, look for the equivalent setting.

Sources

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