AXL vs Teachable: Fees, Caps and Agent Access - AXL
AXL vs Teachable
The cheapest plan is rarely the cheapest bill. Every Teachable figure here was read from teachable.com/pricing.
The short answer
AXL is the better fit when your course also needs checkout, CRM, webinars, booking and automation in one account. The difference: Teachable starts smaller, but the handoffs grow once the course becomes a business.
Where it decides
| Feature | AXL | Teachable |
|---|---|---|
| Bill follows | Free start; $49 Starter, all features | Active students, from $39 |
| Cut of sales | 0%, any provider | 7.5% Starter, 0% above |
| Agent access | MCP, every account | REST API from $189 |
| CRM, webinars, booking | Same account | Not on the page we read |
Feature by feature
The comparison table
| What you are comparing | AXL | Teachable |
|---|---|---|
| Entry price | Starter $49/month, then published overage | $39 Starter · $89 Builder · $189 Growth ($29 / $69 / $139 annual) |
| What the bill is metered on | Consumption: no named tier to outgrow | Active students, products and admin seats |
| Students included | No student or contact tier | 100 · 1,000 · 5,000. Imported students are a separate allowance: 5 · 50 · 1,000 |
| Cut of your sales | 0%, on all 20+ providers and on cash and bank transfer | 7.5% on Starter; 0% on Builder, Growth and Custom |
| Card processing | Whatever your provider charges, paid to them | 2.9% + 30¢ US · 3.9% + 30¢ international · PayPal 3.49% / 4.99% · $15 chargeback |
| REST API | Included, no plan gate | Growth ($189) and above; 10,000 requests a month, 100 a minute |
| AI agent access (MCP) | Included on every account: roughly 1,100 operations, about 110 verified recipes; publishing and sending stay separate calls | We found no first-party MCP server on the pricing page we read; agent access today runs through a Zapier wrapper with two actions |
| Email marketing | Broadcasts and automations on the CRM's own filter grammar: 74 condition types, 61 usable in segments and broadcasts | Included; reviewers call it basic and report adding $50 to $200+/month of outside tools ( learningrevolution.net) |
| CRM, webinars, booking, chat | Kanban pipelines, live and evergreen webinars, booking pages, and eight messaging channels with email as the fallback | Not named on the pricing page we read |
| Assessment and certificates | Six auto-graded question types with pass thresholds, a homework queue with voice feedback, certificates with numbering and a registry | Quizzes and certificates |
The money
One business, four bills
| Scenario | Monthly | 12 months |
|---|---|---|
| Teachable Starter: $39 + 7.5% × $5,000 = $39 + $375 | $414 | $4,968 |
| Teachable Builder, with 300 of those 2,000 enrolled: $89 + 0% | $89 | $1,068 |
| Teachable Growth, with 2,000 enrolled or when you want the API: $189 + 0% | $189 | $2,268 |
| AXL: the $49 Starter plan and 0% of revenue on any provider | $49 | $588 |
Moving over
What moves and what does not
Moves cleanly
- Students and contacts by CSV, matched on email and phone.
- Products, prices and sales pages: rebuilt from their URL.
- Contacts same day; one course in half a day to two.
Does not move
- Completion history and quiz results; videos re-upload.
- Export tax and affiliate payout records before cancelling, then rebuild the ongoing payout workflow.
- Saved cards; ask us before you schedule the switch.
Count your imported students first. Teachable meters them separately from active ones, so a list held back under a cap makes the bills look closer than they are.
What people ask before they switch
Is AXL cheaper than Teachable?
AXL Starter is $49 a month with every feature included and 0% of revenue. Teachable Starter is $39 plus 7.5% of sales, while the $89 Builder plan removes the platform fee but still does not include the wider CRM, webinar, telephony and automation stack.
Does Teachable have an API for AI agents?
It has a REST API from the Growth plan at $189 a month, capped at 10,000 requests a month. We could not find a first-party MCP server on the page we read.
Can I import my Teachable courses?
Students and contacts import directly from CSV or XLSX with field mapping. Course structure and lesson text are rebuilt rather than imported, and videos are re-uploaded. Completion history does not transfer.