Stripe's moat widened because it charges a small percentage of every transaction, so it grows automatically as customers grow, and it keeps adding services such as billing, tax and fraud tools that deepen switching costs. Volume rose from about $1.0 trillion in 2023 to $1.9 trillion in 2025, up 34% in the last year, and a February 2026 tender offer valued Stripe at $159 billion.
Key takeaways
- Total volume: about $1.0 trillion (2023), $1.4 trillion (2024) and $1.9 trillion (2025, up 34%).
- Valuation recovered from a reported $65 billion (2024) to $159 billion in a February 2026 tender offer.
- Transaction pricing means Stripe earns when its customers earn. It's usage-based pricing at planetary scale.
- Every service Stripe adds on the same rails makes leaving harder.
In 2010, taking payments online was harder than it needed to be. Two brothers from Ireland, Patrick and John Collison, felt the big services of the time, PayPal included, made it far too hard for start-ups.
So they built an alternative: a couple of lines of code a developer could copy and paste into a website.
That was Stripe. In Chapter 5 of The Subscription Playbook I used it as my example of a business with "several strategic moat factors," and in Chapter 2 as an example of the minimum commitment model.
In 2022 it was a "$100 billion-plus company" operating in about 40 countries. Here's what's happened since.
The numbers: volume and valuation
| Year | Total volume processed on Stripe | Valuation |
|---|---|---|
| 2021 | – | Reported peak of $95 billion |
| 2023 | About $1.0 trillion (secondary source) | – |
| 2024 | $1.4 trillion | Reported $65 billion (tender offer) |
| Feb 2025 | – | $91.5 billion (tender offer) |
| 2025 | $1.9 trillion, up 34% (about 1.6% of global GDP) | – |
| 24 Feb 2026 | – | $159 billion (tender offer) |
Volume nearly doubled in two years. Stripe is still private, so the valuations are tender-offer prices for employee and investor shares, not stock market prices. According to one secondary analysis, investors in the 2026 tender included Thrive Capital, Coatue and a16z.
What did Stripe do?
Three things, all visible in 2022 and all bigger now.
1. It made getting started absurdly easy. Copy, paste, take payments. That's still the benchmark for "time to first value."
2. It priced on transactions. In 2022 the standard US rate I quoted was 2.9% plus 30 cents per successful charge. No big upfront fee. Stripe earns when its customers earn, so as they grow, Stripe grows. That's the transaction processing model from the five pricing models, and it's usage-based pricing in its purest form.
3. It kept adding products on the same rails. Capital, corporate cards, Sigma reporting and Radar fraud tools were already there when I wrote the book. Billing, tax and more have followed. In the book I noted these carry "higher margins than the payment product they were founded on."
Could you charge a percentage instead of a flat fee?
Compare flat, tiered, usage, transaction and hybrid pricing for your business with the free Pricing Model Picker.
Why did the moat get wider?
Let's run it through MOATS.
| MOATS factor | Stripe in 2022 | Stripe in 2026 |
|---|---|---|
| Marketing supremacy | Developers chose it for ease of use | Volume nearly doubled in two years |
| One (no single point of failure) | Low customer concentration: Shopify, Amazon, Google, plus millions of small sites | Same mix of giants and small businesses |
| Audience | Millions of businesses integrated | $1.9 trillion of volume in 2025 |
| Toughness | Margins estimated above 55% (by comparison with Adyen) | More add-on services on the same rails |
| Switching | The weakest factor: "relatively easy" for a savvy business to switch | Stronger: every added product is another thing to migrate |
That last row is the real story.
In 2022 I wrote that Stripe "doesn't have the most substantial switching cost moat." For a tech-savvy small business, swapping processors wasn't too hard. Most didn't bother, but they could.
Now think about a business using Stripe for payments, subscriptions, invoices, tax calculation and fraud checks. Switching isn't one migration. It's five. Every product Stripe adds makes leaving harder. That's land and expand applied to infrastructure.
The minimum commitment twist
In Chapter 2 I described how, once your volume grows, a Stripe rep may offer a lower rate if you commit for 12 months. "Stick with us for the next year and we'll take less of your money!" It's the minimum commitment model: the merchant saves, and Stripe locks in a year of predictable volume.
What the book said in 2022
I called Stripe "a fantastic example of a company that has managed to build a powerful moat," with a few caveats. It was more expensive than many competitors. Its switching costs were modest. And it only let businesses in about 40 countries accept payments.
I said that last point was either a weakness or "a sign that Stripe still has the potential to become an even stronger company."
What's happened since
The second reading won.
Volume went from about $1.0 trillion in 2023 to $1.4 trillion in 2024 to $1.9 trillion in 2025. The valuation wobbled after the reported 2021 peak of $95 billion, fell to a reported $65 billion in 2024, then recovered to $91.5 billion in February 2025 and $159 billion in February 2026.
The transaction model did what it always does. When customers grew, Stripe grew with them, without having to win a single new account.
What you can steal from Stripe
- Charge a small share of the value you move or create. A percentage of sales, bookings, rent collected or savings delivered, instead of a flat fee. You grow as your customers grow.
- Make onboarding absurdly easy. Ask: what's my version of "a couple of lines of code"? A one-page sign-up, a same-day start, no paperwork.
- Add adjacent services on the same rails. Invoicing, reminders, reporting, insurance, maintenance. Each one deepens the account.
- Offer a better rate for a commitment. Once a client's volume justifies it, trade a lower rate for a 12-month agreement.
- Keep customer concentration low. No single client over 10% of revenue, top five under 25%. Stripe can survive losing a giant because of its millions of small customers.
Worked example: flat fee vs percentage
An events platform charges organizers either $200 a month flat or 3% of ticket sales. An organizer selling $5,000 of tickets a month pays $150 on the percentage plan. When they grow to $20,000 a month, they pay $600, and they don't resent it, because they're selling four times as much. On the flat plan, the platform would still be earning $200. (Illustrative numbers.)
Your next step
Look at what your customers measure their own success by: sales, bookings, projects, savings. Could your price move with that number?
If it could, test a percentage-based option with your next three new clients. For the bigger picture on Stripe's current fees, see the Stripe pricing teardown, and score your own position with the MOATS Scorecard.
Frequently asked questions
How much volume does Stripe process?
Businesses on Stripe processed $1.9 trillion in total volume in 2025, up 34%, according to Stripe's 2025 annual letter. That's about 1.6% of global GDP. The comparable figures were $1.4 trillion in 2024 and, per secondary sources, about $1.0 trillion in 2023.
What is Stripe valued at in 2026?
A tender offer announced on 24 February 2026 valued Stripe at $159 billion. That followed a $91.5 billion tender in February 2025 and a reported $65 billion valuation in 2024. Its 2021 peak was reported at $95 billion. Stripe is still privately held, so these are tender-offer prices, not market prices.
Is Stripe a subscription business?
Mostly not. Stripe's core model is transaction processing: it takes a percentage plus a small fixed fee on each payment. It does sell some subscription products, and as I described in the book, larger merchants may be offered a lower rate for committing for a set period. That's the minimum commitment model.
What are Stripe's fees?
When I wrote the book in 2022, Stripe's standard US rate was 2.9% plus 30 cents per successful card transaction. Rates differ by country, card type and payment method, and large businesses can negotiate. Check Stripe's own pricing page for your country before modeling your costs.
Why don't more businesses switch away from Stripe?
For a small, technical business, swapping payment processors isn't that hard. Most don't bother because the hassle outweighs the saving, and because each extra Stripe product they use (billing, invoicing, tax, fraud tools, reporting) adds another thing to migrate. The switching cost grows with every product.
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Robert Coorey, MBA
Robert is the author of The Subscription Playbook and Feed a Starving Crowd and a Director at BPAG Accountants in Sydney. More about Robert.
Sources
- Stripe, 2025 update and $159B tender offer (24 Feb 2026)
- Stripe, 2025 annual letter
- Stripe, 2024 update, $1.4T volume (Feb 2025)
- CNBC, Stripe valuation climbs to $91.5 billion in secondary stock sale (27 Feb 2025)
- Chargeflow, Stripe statistics, incl. ~$1.0T 2023 volume (secondary, Oct 2026)
- Okara, Stripe valuation history (secondary, Oct 2026)
Facts and prices checked 27 October 2026. Spotted something out of date? Tell us.