Commission cost as billing volume scales
Same event count and rates — only monthly billing volume changes per row. Stripe and Metronome both scale linearly with volume; Lago self-hosted stays at $0 platform fee regardless (engineering/infra cost not included).
| Billing vol/mo | Stripe Billing | Metronome | Lago (self-hosted) |
|---|
A flat commission, a metered commission, and a free self-hosted core are three different bets
Stripe Billing charges a flat 0.7% of the total dollar volume you invoice through it — consolidated in mid-2024 from a prior two-tier 0.5%/0.8% split — and that 0.7% covers recurring billing, dunning, quotes, and usage metering for up to 100 million ingested events per month at no extra charge. The bill is simply billing volume × 0.7%, full stop. Metronome, which Stripe acquired for approximately $1 billion in January 2026, prices its Startup tier at 0.8% of billing volume plus $0.04 per 1,000 events ingested as a separate line item — so the bill is (volume × 0.8%) + (events ÷ 1,000 × $0.04), meaning it is structurally more expensive than Stripe's native product at identical volume and event counts. Metronome's reason to exist isn't a lower price; it's contract mechanics Stripe's native Billing doesn't model as cleanly — committed-spend agreements with draw-down balances, ramping multi-phase contract terms, and data-warehouse/BI exports aimed at enterprise finance teams, which is why AI infrastructure vendors selling large committed contracts often pick it anyway. Lago breaks from the percentage-of-revenue model entirely: its Community edition is Apache-2.0 licensed and free to self-host, so the platform-fee line in this calculator is genuinely $0 — but that excludes the server, database, and engineering time required to run and patch it yourself, and several features (progressive billing, automatic dunning, SSO, 24/7 incident support) are reserved for Lago's quote-based Cloud/Premium tier.
Because Stripe's 0.7% has no separate per-event charge below 100M events/month, it is mathematically cheaper than Metronome's 0.8%+event-fee shape at every volume in this calculator — the two aren't really competing on price, they're competing on which contract shapes you need. Lago's $0 platform fee will always look like the cheapest line in dollar terms, which is real but only part of the picture: it's a build-vs-buy decision, not a pure commission comparison, since self-hosting trades a revenue-share percentage for ongoing ops ownership. If you're also estimating what a metered-usage API spend looks like on the other side of this (the APIs you're reselling through your own billing), pair this with the API overage cost calculator or the committed-spend discount calculator.
How this calculator works
The Stripe Billing vs Metronome vs Lago Cost Calculator compares three billing-infrastructure pricing shapes at your own monthly billing volume and event count. Stripe Billing's cost is billing volume × 0.7% — a flat commission covering recurring billing, dunning, and usage metering for up to 100M events/month. Metronome's cost is (billing volume × 0.8%) + (events ÷ 1,000 × $0.04) — a higher commission plus a separate per-event ingestion fee, reflecting its focus on enterprise contract mechanics (committed-spend, draw-downs, ramps) rather than low-cost metering. Lago self-hosted shows as a flat $0 platform fee, since its Community edition is free and open-source — your actual cost is the infrastructure and engineering time to run it, which varies too much by team to model as one number. The table below scales your billing volume from a quarter of your input up to 5x while holding rates constant, so you can see the commission gap in dollar terms at your own scale.
These are representative pricing shapes based on each vendor's published self-serve rates as of October 2026 (stripe.com/billing, metronome.com/pricing, getlago.com/pricing). Stripe's 0.7% was consolidated from a prior 0.5%/0.8% two-tier structure in mid-2024. Metronome also offers a custom Enterprise tier with negotiated rates not reflected in the Startup-tier defaults used here. Lago's Cloud/Premium tier is quote-based and not published, so it isn't modeled as a dollar figure — only the confirmed-free self-hosted Community tier is. All rate fields are editable.
Frequently asked questions
Is Lago actually free, or is that just the open-source core?
The self-hosted Community edition is genuinely free with no platform fee and no revenue share — it's Apache-2.0 licensed, you deploy it on your own infrastructure (a server, a database, your own ops time), and Lago charges nothing for the software itself. What isn't free is everything self-hosting implies: you pay for the compute/database it runs on, you're on the hook for uptime and security patches, and several features (progressive billing, automatic dunning, premium ingestion sources, SSO, 24/7 incident support) are gated behind the paid Cloud/Premium tier, which is quote-based rather than published. So "$0" is accurate for the platform license on self-hosted, not for total cost of ownership once you count engineering time.
Why did Stripe buy Metronome in January 2026 if Stripe Billing already does usage-based billing?
Stripe's native Billing product (the 0.7% flat-rate option here) is built for metering that fits its own model — a Meter object, a price attached to it, usage reported per customer — and covers up to 100 million events per month inside that 0.7%. Metronome exists for usage-based billing shapes Stripe's native product can't express cleanly: committed-spend contracts with draw-down balances, multi-dimensional pricing that ramps over a contract term, enterprise invoicing workflows, and data-warehouse exports for finance teams. Stripe reportedly paid around $1B for Metronome in January 2026 specifically to cover that complex, enterprise/AI-scale segment rather than rebuild it natively — the two products now sit side by side under one company, aimed at different customer sophistication levels.
If Stripe owns Metronome now, why would anyone pick Metronome over Stripe's own native Billing?
Price alone never favors Metronome here — its 0.8% commission plus a $0.04-per-1,000-events ingestion fee is strictly more expensive than Stripe Billing's flat 0.7% at any volume, since Stripe's 0.7% has no separate event charge up to 100M events/month. Companies pick Metronome anyway for capabilities Stripe's native Billing doesn't offer at the same maturity: committed-spend agreements with draw-down balances (prepay a block, consume it down), contract ramp schedules, Salesforce/NetSuite integrations, and BI/data-warehouse exports for finance reconciliation. If your usage-based pricing is a straightforward per-unit or tiered metered rate, Stripe Billing is cheaper and simpler. If you're running enterprise contracts with committed minimums and ramping terms — common for AI infrastructure vendors selling to large customers — Metronome's extra cost buys contract mechanics Stripe doesn't model yet.
What exactly counts as "billing volume" vs "events" in this calculator?
Billing volume is the total dollar amount you invoice your own customers through the platform each month — both Stripe Billing's 0.7% and Metronome's 0.8% commission are charged against this number, since both platforms take a cut of what flows through them. Events are the individual usage records you ingest for metering (an API call, a token processed, a compute-second) — Stripe bundles up to 100 million of these per month inside its 0.7%, while Metronome charges $0.04 per 1,000 events ingested as a separate line item on top of its 0.8% commission, which is why Metronome's bill grows faster than Stripe's as your event volume climbs even at the same billing volume.
Are these the exact 2026 Stripe, Metronome and Lago prices?
Stripe Billing's flat 0.7% (consolidated from a prior 0.5%/0.8% split in 2024) and Metronome's published Startup-tier rate (0.8% of billing volume plus $0.04/1,000 events) are both pulled from each company's public self-serve pricing pages as of October 2026. Lago's self-hosted Community tier is confirmed free and open-source directly from getlago.com; its Cloud/Premium tier pricing is not published and requires contacting sales, so it isn't modeled here as a dollar figure. Metronome also offers a custom Enterprise tier with negotiated rates not reflected in the Startup-tier numbers used as defaults. Every field is editable.
Which billing platform should I actually pick?
If you want the lowest commission with minimal setup and your metering needs are simple, Stripe Billing's flat 0.7% (no separate event fee under 100M/month) is the cheapest managed option here. If you're selling enterprise contracts with committed spend, draw-downs, or ramping terms, Metronome costs more per dollar processed but models those contract shapes natively — and since Stripe now owns both, integration between them is only getting tighter. If you have the engineering capacity to run and patch your own billing infrastructure and want to avoid a revenue-share entirely, Lago's self-hosted Community edition has zero platform fee, at the cost of owning uptime, security and the features gated behind its paid Cloud tier. Run your own billing volume and event count through the calculator above to see the commission gap in dollar terms.