Houdini vs Raisely

Houdini is free, open-source fundraising infrastructure for nonprofits and NGOs. It provides crowdfunding campaigns, fundraising events, donation forms, a donate-widget page and generator, plus simple donor management. Nonprofit dashboards cover payment history, payouts, recurring donations, metrics, supporter relationships through a CRM and organizational user accounts. Campaign reporting is listed as advanced. Payment processing is separate and requires Stripe API keys during setup. Houdini runs as a self-hosted Rails application, with production instructions for Linux using SystemD and Nginx. Supported systems include Ubuntu 18.04, 20.04, 22.04 or an equivalent. Prerequisites include Node.js 16, Yarn, PostgreSQL 12 (PostgreSQL 10 may work) and Ruby 2.7. The project describes its latest version as pre-2.0 and in heavy development, recommending v1 instead. Building JavaScript assets needs about 3 GB free RAM, while the deployment guide suggests at least 4 GB for the server. Security reports go by email; GitHub Discussions hosts project chat.

Raisely provides online fundraising tools for charities and nonprofits. Organizations can run donation appeals, peer-to-peer and DIY fundraising, ticketing, and physical-event campaigns. Its donation forms are designed for any device and can support regular giving. Customizable fundraising websites offer templates, a visual page builder, custom branding, and hosting. Raisely lists donations in 130+ currencies and multilingual campaigns, with PayPal, Apple Pay, and Google Pay among its payment options. Integrations include Aplos, Keela, Raiser’s Edge NXT, Salesforce, Facebook Fundraising, and Zapier. Developers can use a JSON-based REST API, webhooks, and custom React components. Raisely states that it is SOC 2 compliant and includes free support. The free plan offers unlimited fundraising websites and campaigns, with no monthly or setup fees and optional donor tips. Raisely Pro is $119 a month, billed billed monthly, or $714 a year, billed billed annually. Card processing fees go to the payment gateway; the listed 4% flat fee option applies when optional tips are turned off, excluding applicable tax.