BillaBear vs FOSSBilling

BillaBear is a subscription management and billing system with Stripe integration, a REST API, and web, API, and self-hosted deployment options. It manages subscriptions, custom plans, add-ons, invoices, quotes, hosted checkouts, paylinks, vouchers, credit notes, dunning, and reports. Pricing models include fixed, usage-based, volume and graduated tiers, fixed-plus-unit, and per-seat charges. The system supports multiple brands and currencies, tax management, country and state rules, configurable thresholds, EU reverse charge, one-stop-shop, and VAT Sense integration. Workflows can retry failed tasks, including API requests. Invoice, quote, PDF, and email templates use Twig or email-service-provider templates. Integrations listed include Stripe, Slack, Freshbooks, Xero, Mailchimp, EmailOctopus, SendGrid, MailGun, and Postmark; Zendesk and Freshdesk integrations help agents find customer profiles. SDKs are listed for PHP, Java, Go, JavaScript, Ruby, and Python. The Starter plan is $1 a month, with $50,000 of revenue free. Managed cloud hosting is currently unavailable.

FOSSBilling is free, open-source billing and client-management software for hosting and other online service businesses. It can issue invoices automatically, send payment reminders, handle recurring or one-time pricing, support multiple currencies and apply promo codes. Hosting products can create and manage accounts through cPanel/WHM, DirectAdmin, HestiaCP, CWP and Plesk. Domain functions cover registration, renewal, transfers and WHOIS checks through registrar integrations, though domain prices are entered manually rather than retrieved live. A REST API provides admin, authenticated-client and public guest endpoints. Documented protections include HTTPS enforcement, session fingerprinting, CSRF protection, rate limiting, IP blocking, CAPTCHA and activity logs. It is self-hosted, requiring PHP 8.3, 8.4 or 8.5 and a MySQL-compatible database, with Apache, LiteSpeed/OpenLiteSpeed or NGINX. The project is beta, under active development, and notes rough edges and limited support.