How to Add Stripe Donate Button in WordPress (with Recurring Option)

Do you want to add a Stripe donate button to your WordPress site? Stripe is one of the best online payment processors in the world because it allows anyone to easily accept online payments on their website including donations.

In the past, you had to use an eCommerce plugin to accept payments, but that’s not needed anymore especially if you want to collect donations or sell a few products. You can use a simple payment form to do the job.

In this article, we will show you how to easily add a Stripe donate button in WordPress.

What You Need to Accept Stripe Donations on Your Website

You’ll need to create a Stripe account. You can create an account for free and will only be charged for transactions.

You’ll also need a WordPress website with SSL enabled. SSL adds a security layer to your website making it safe for accepting payments. To learn more, see our guide on how to get a free SSL certificate for your website.

Lastly, you’ll need a WordPress extension to connect your Stripe account. We’ll show you two different options: WP Simple Pay (free) and WPForms (Pro), so you can choose the one that best suit your need.

We will also share a bonus plugin that offers full-donor management features in case you’re looking for a more advanced solution.

That being said, let’s take a look at how to add a Stripe donate button in WordPress.

• Method 1. Adding the Stripe Donate Button in WordPress with WP Simple Pay
• Method 2. Adding the Stripe Donate Button in WordPress with WPForms
• Method 3. Bonus – Full Featured WordPress Donation Plugin

Video Tutorial

Subscribe to WPBeginner

If you don’t like the video or need more instructions, then continue reading.

Method 1. Adding the Stripe Donate Button in WordPress with WP Simple Pay

WP Simple Pay is one of the best Stripe payment plugins for WordPress. You can use it to easily accept one-time or recurring donations on your website.

You can quickly get started with the free version of the plugin. But for the sake of this tutorial, we’ll be using the premium version, so we can demonstrate all the additional features.

First, you need to install and activate the WP Simple Pay plugin on your WordPress site. For more details, see our step-by-step guide on how to install a WordPress plugin.

Once the plugin is activated, you need to go to the WP Simple Pay » Settings page and click on the License tab.

Copy the license key from your account on the WP Simple Pay website, paste it into the field provided, and hit the Activate button.

Next, you need to connect your Stripe account. 

On the Settings page, click the Stripe tab and then click on the ‘Connect with Stripe’ button.

After that, you’ll see the Stripe website where you can log into your account. If you don’t have a Stripe account, you can create a new one.

When you’re finished connecting your account, you’ll be taken back to the settings page on your admin dashboard. 

Don’t forget to click on the Save Changes button to save your Stripe account connection. 

Now you can create a Stripe donation form.

Creating a Stripe Donation Form in WordPress with WP Simple Pay

To create a new donation form, go to the WP Simple Pay » Add New page. From here, you can select a template to speed up the process of making a form.

Hover over the Donate Button template option and click the ‘Use Template’ button.

Next, you’ll see the General settings tab for your donation form.

This is where you can add a form title and description, as well as choose the form type.

For this tutorial, we’ll choose the Embedded form type. This will allow you to embed the donation form directly on any WordPress post or page.

Next, click on the Payment tab. WP Simple Pay allows you to add multiple donation options so that donors can choose how much they want to give.

For example, you can create donation options for $1, $5, and $10. Simply click the ‘Add Price’ button and enter the amount. Repeat this process to add as many options as you want.

If you want to accept recurring donations, click on the dropdown arrow next to a pricing option. Then, click the Subscription button and select the billing period you want.

Next, click on the Form Fields tab. The donation form template already includes all of the fields you need including pricing options, checkout button, and payment button.

If you want to add additional form fields like name or email address, you can choose it from the dropdown menu and click the ‘Add Field’ button.

You can rearrange the form fields by dragging and dropping them into place. You can also click on any of the fields to customize the button text or choose the button style.

Adding the Stripe Donation Form in WordPress with WP Simple Pay

To add your donation form to any post or page, click the Publish button on the right side of the screen.

Next, you need to copy the simple shortcode above the Publish button. It looks like this: [[simpay id=”285″]]

Then, you can paste the shortcode into any WordPress post or page.

Once you add the shortcode into the WordPress editor, the shortcode widget will be automatically added. Then, publish the post or page.

You can now visit your website to see how your donation form looks on the frontend.

Note: WP Simple Pay is set to test mode automatically. This is to ensure no live transactions are processed on your site before the form is ready. You can read this guide to learn how to take your payment form from test mode to live mode.

Method 2. Adding the Stripe Donate Button in WordPress with WPForms

WPForms is the best WordPress form plugin that’s used by over 5 million website owners. It comes with a Stripe addon that allows you to accept donations, one-time payments, and even subscription payments on your website.

You’ll need at least their PRO plan to access the Stripe addon, but it also gives you access to advanced features like conditional logic, multi-page forms, surveys & polls, 400+ form templates, and more.

The first thing you need to do is install and activate the WPForms plugin. For more details, see our step-by-step guide on how to install a WordPress plugin.

Upon activation, you need to visit WPForms » Settings page to enter your license key. You can find this information, under your account on the WPForms website.

Next, you need to visit WPForms » Addons page and click on the ‘Install Addon’ button next to the Stripe addon.

WPForms will now install and activate the Stripe add-on for you.

Now let’s connect WPForms to your Stripe account to receive payments. To do that you need to visit WPForms » Settings page and click on the Payments tab.

You will be asked to enter your Stripe API keys, which you can find under your Stripe dashboard.

Simply log in to your Stripe account dashboard and from the left menu select Developers » API Keys.

You need two pairs of keys for the published website and for testing.

First, you’ll see the publishable keys on the screen. Copy and paste the public key and then click on ‘Reveal key token’ to copy and paste the publishable secret key.

Next, you need to add the test keys. Click on the ‘View test data’ toggle and then copy and paste the test API keys.

Now that you have pasted the API keys, you can optionally enable the test mode from payment settings.

This will allow you to test Stripe integration without actual payments. However, you must uncheck this option when your website is ready for accepting donations on your website.

Don’t forget to click on the ‘Save settings’ button to store your changes.

Now that you have set up the payments, it is time to create a Stripe donate form for your website.

Making a Stripe Donation Form in WordPress with WPForms

First, you need to visit the WPForms » Add New page to create a new form. You will be asked to provide a title for your form and choose a template. You need to select the ‘Donation Form’ template.

This will launch the WordPress forms builder interface with your selected donations form template. This template will already have the common fields required to create a donation form like name, email, donation amount, and message.

This is a drag and drop form builder. You can edit form fields by clicking on them, rearrange them, or add new fields from the left column.

Since you are creating a Stripe payments form, you need to add a credit card field to your form. You’ll find it under the ‘Payments Fields’ section on the left column.

Simply click to add the field to your form and then drag and drop to rearrange its position in the form.

Once you are satisfied with the form, click on the Payments tab in the left corner to edit the payment settings. From here you need to select Stripe as your payment method and then check the box next to the ‘Enable Stripe Payments’ option.

You can provide a description for the payment and select the email field if you want to send the donors a receipt of the payment.

WPForms also supports recurring payments. You can use this option to set up recurring donations or subscriptions.

The next step is to set up confirmation settings. This is what your users will see after they fill out the form.

Click on the Settings tab and then select the confirmation option.

From here you can select different types of confirmation options. For example, you can thank users with a simple message, or redirect them to a thank you page or any other URL.

Once done, click on the Save button and exit the form builder.

Adding The Stripe Donation Form in WordPress with WPForms

WPForms makes it super easy to add your forms anywhere on your website.

Simply edit the post or page where you want to add the donation form. Next, add the WPForms block to your content and select the donation form you created earlier.

WPForms will now fetch and embed the form for you. You can now visit your website to see it in action.

You can also add the donation form to your blog’s sidebar or any other widget-ready area. Head over to the Appearance » Widgets page and add the WPForms widget to a sidebar.

Next, you need to select your Stripe donation form in the widget settings. Don’t forget to click on the Save button to store your widget settings.

Bonus: Full-Featured WordPress Donation Plugin

While both WP Simple Pay and WPForms allow you to create a Stripe donate button, they don’t offer full donor management and other advanced features that non-profits need.

If you’re looking for a full WordPress donation plugin, then we recommend using WP Charitable. Over 10,000+ non-profit organizations and website owners across the world use Charitable to create fundraising campaigns and raise more money online. 

It comes with all the features you need including fully customizable donation forms, ability to accept one-time or recurring donations, easy donation management dashboard, GDPR compliance, annual donor receipts, gift giving in honor of someone else, fee relief which allows donors to cover payment process fees, and more.

You can also use Charitable for peer-to-peer fundraising campaigns, and it even lets you create your own crowdfunding platform like GoFundMe or Indiegogo.

Charitable has built-in payment integrations for Stripe, PayPal, Authorize.net, Braintree, Mollie, GoCardless, Paystack, Payfast, Payrexx, Windcave, and more.

You can also use the free version of Charitable to get started. 

We hope this article helped you easily add a Stripe donate button to your WordPress site. You may also want to see our guide on the must-have WordPress plugins for every website, or see our tutorial on how to improve your WordPress SEO rankings.

If you liked this article, then please subscribe to our YouTube Channel for WordPress video tutorials. You can also find us on Twitter and Facebook.