GoHighLevel vs Kajabi: Which One Fits Your Business?

GoHighLevel vs Kajabi comes down to what you sell: Kajabi is built to sell courses, coaching and memberships, while GoHighLevel is built to catch leads, text them, book calls and close the sale. If your money comes from digital products, Kajabi fits better. If it comes from calls, bookings and follow-up, GoHighLevel fits better and costs less to start.

We pay for GoHighLevel ourselves and build client systems in it, so we know that side from daily use. Every Kajabi fact below comes from Kajabi's own pages. Every price was checked on the vendor's own page on 12 October 2026.

The short answer

Pick Kajabi if you sell courses, coaching, a community or a paid newsletter, and you want buyers to have a polished place to learn. Pick GoHighLevel if you sell a service, book sales calls, need texting and a pipeline, or run more than one business. GoHighLevel starts at $97 a month. Kajabi starts at $179 a month.

What is the difference between GoHighLevel and Kajabi?

Kajabi is built around the product you sell, and GoHighLevel is built around the lead you are trying to close. Both have courses, funnels, email and a checkout. What changes is what each one does first.

Kajabi's own menu leads with products: courses, communities, newsletters, coaching, digital downloads, memberships and podcasts. Email, a website builder, funnels, payments and a contact CRM sit around them. GoHighLevel's pricing page leads with a CRM and pipelines, email and texting, inbound and outbound calling, booking calendars, workflows and reviews. Courses and communities are on that list too, near the end.

Sources: Kajabi's pricing page and help centre, GoHighLevel's pricing page and help centre, all checked 12 October 2026.

How much does GoHighLevel cost compared with Kajabi?

GoHighLevel costs $97, $297 or $497 a month, and Kajabi costs $179, $249 or $499 a month, before usage and payment fees. Both cost less if you pay for a year.

Prices in US dollars from Kajabi's pricing page and GoHighLevel's pricing page, checked 12 October 2026.

For one business, GoHighLevel's Starter plan is enough. The two bigger plans are for agencies that run many client accounts. On Kajabi, your list size picks the plan. Kajabi's FAQ says extra contacts come in blocks of 25,000 for $125 a month. So a list of 3,000 people means Basic plus a block ($304 a month) or Growth ($249 a month). Growth is the cheaper way out.

The plan is not the whole bill on GoHighLevel. Texts, calls, emails and AI are charged by use on top. We list every one of those charges in our GoHighLevel pricing guide.

Both let you leave. GoHighLevel's pricing page says it runs month to month with no long-term contract. Kajabi's FAQ says you can cancel whenever you like, and that every plan has a 30-day money-back guarantee.

Kajabi charges by list size. GoHighLevel charges by use. Which one is cheaper depends on how big your list is and how much you text.

Does Kajabi or GoHighLevel take a cut of your sales?

Neither one takes a share of your revenue, but Kajabi adds a fee if you take payments through a provider other than Kajabi Payments. Kajabi's FAQ says it "does not take a revenue share as a platform". You pay card processing either way.

Kajabi's footnotes add two things. The card rates shown are for US businesses only, and the extra fee does not apply to PayPal. Its FAQ also says that if Kajabi Payments is not offered in your country, there is no extra fee.

GoHighLevel's pricing page lists the providers it connects to, including Stripe, PayPal, Square, NMI, Authorize.net, Adyen and Razorpay. It lists no fee of its own on your sales, so you pay your provider's normal rate. Stripe's standard US rate is 2.9% + $0.30 per successful domestic card payment (checked 12 October 2026).

Here is what Kajabi's extra fee looks like on $10,000 a month of sales taken through Stripe (our maths): $200 a month on Basic, $100 on Growth and $50 on Pro. Switch to Kajabi Payments and that extra fee goes away.

What does each one cost for a real course business?

For a small course business, GoHighLevel comes out cheaper on paper, and Kajabi's bill is easier to predict. Here are two made-up examples so you can see the maths. Swap in your own numbers.

Both examples assume products sold at $200 each to US card holders, monthly billing, 4 emails a month to the whole list, Kajabi Payments on Kajabi and Stripe on GoHighLevel. No texting.

Our maths from each vendor's prices, checked 12 October 2026. Email on GoHighLevel is $0.675 per 1,000 sent, from GoHighLevel's LC Email help page.

The tables leave a few things out. GoHighLevel's number grows if you text leads, buy a phone number or turn on AI, and those are often the reasons people pick it in the first place. Paying yearly lowers both: Kajabi Growth drops to $199 a month, and GoHighLevel Starter works out at about $80.83 a month.

Then there is time. GoHighLevel takes longer to set up, because it does more. That cost never shows up on an invoice.

On paper, GoHighLevel is cheaper for a course business. In practice you pay the difference in setup time, unless someone builds it for you.

Which is better for courses and memberships?

Kajabi is better for courses and memberships, because selling digital products is what the whole platform is built around. GoHighLevel can host a course, but it is one feature among many.

From Kajabi's pricing page, every plan includes the Kajabi Customer App, video transcriptions and translations, checkout pages and a custom domain. Growth adds cohort courses, affiliate programs, advanced automations and the option to remove Kajabi branding. Pro adds a branded mobile app, which Kajabi lists as included and worth $199 a month.

GoHighLevel lists courses and communities as core features on every plan. If you want your own app for members, its pricing page lists a Branded Client Portal App at $49 a month per sub-account, and its changelog says that app covers courses and communities. We show how courses run inside GoHighLevel in our post on GoHighLevel membership sites.

If a community is the main thing you sell, compare Kajabi with Skool too. We did that in Skool vs Kajabi, so we will not repeat it here.

Which is better for a CRM, texting and booking calls?

GoHighLevel is better for a CRM, texting and booking calls, because all three are built in on every plan. This is where it pulls ahead.

Its pricing page lists CRM and pipelines, email and SMS marketing, inbound and outbound calling, one inbox for every conversation, booking calendars and workflow automation. So one tool can text a new lead as soon as they sign up, book them onto your calendar, remind them before the call and move them along a sales pipeline when they buy.

Kajabi has a contact CRM, and advanced automations on Growth and Pro. Texting and calling are not on its pricing page. If you sell a $3,000 coaching program on sales calls, that gap matters. In that business the money is made on the phone, not on the checkout page.

If a sale needs a conversation first, you want the tool that runs the conversation. That is GoHighLevel.

Which is better for email marketing?

Kajabi is simpler for email, because marketing emails are unlimited on every plan and you never see a per-email charge. GoHighLevel charges $0.675 per 1,000 emails sent, and its help page says incoming emails are billed too.

For most small lists that charge is small. It is the ramp-up that catches people out. GoHighLevel's help page says a new sub-account can send 250 emails on day 1, rising to 10,000 on day 7, then 25,000 a day on a shared domain from day 8. If you plan to move a big list across and email it the same week, plan around that.

On Kajabi the limit is your contact count, not your sends. Go over it and you move up a plan or buy another block of contacts.

Kajabi never bills you per email. GoHighLevel does, but at $0.675 per 1,000, the bigger catch is how slowly a new account is allowed to send.

When is Kajabi the better pick?

Kajabi is the better pick when the product is the business. You sell courses, a membership, a paid community, coaching packages or a newsletter, mostly online and mostly without a sales call. You want one tool that looks good to students on day one, and a bill you can predict. Nobody on your team wants to build automations.

If that is you, GoHighLevel is the wrong choice. You would pay for a CRM, a phone system and a pipeline you will not use, and spend time setting up what Kajabi hands you ready-made.

Buy the tool that matches how your customers buy. Product first, pick Kajabi. Conversation first, pick GoHighLevel.

When is GoHighLevel the better pick?

GoHighLevel is the better pick when leads come in and someone has to follow them up. That looks like this:

• You sell coaching, consulting or a service on a sales call.
• You want to text leads, not just email them.
• You book appointments and want reminders sent for you.
• Your list is big and growing, and you do not want to pay by contact.
• You run more than one business, or you manage clients.

If that is you, try it before you decide. Our special link gets you a 30-day free trial of GoHighLevel (we may earn a commission from this link) plus a free live bootcamp. Sign up on GoHighLevel's own site and you get the standard 14 days, with no bootcamp.

Can you use GoHighLevel and Kajabi together?

Yes, some businesses run both: Kajabi for the course, GoHighLevel for leads, texts and calls. It works, but you pay for two tools and you have two contact lists to keep in step.

Kajabi lists webhooks on Growth and Pro, which is one way to pass a new buyer to another tool. Basic does not include them. Before you set this up, ask whether one tool could do the whole job. Two tools that each half-run the business tend to leave gaps between them.

How do the free trials compare?

Both have a 14-day standard free trial, and our special link gets you 30 days of GoHighLevel. Kajabi's trial help page says the standard trial runs 14 days. If you enter a card at sign-up, Kajabi charges it for your first plan period on the day the trial ends.

GoHighLevel's pricing page offers 14 days and bills the card on file when the trial ends. Usage fees, like texts and emails, can be charged during the trial. Start a 30-day GoHighLevel trial with our special link and you get the free live bootcamp as well. We cover the trial step by step in our GoHighLevel free trial guide.

FAQ

Is GoHighLevel cheaper than Kajabi?

Usually, yes, on paper. GoHighLevel starts at $97 a month with unlimited contacts. Kajabi starts at $179 a month with 2,500 contacts. But GoHighLevel charges for emails, texts, calls and AI by use, and Kajabi does not charge per email. Run your own numbers through the worked example above before you decide.

Does Kajabi have texting like GoHighLevel?

Texting is not on Kajabi's pricing page, so do not plan on it. GoHighLevel has texting built in on every plan, charged per message. If texting leads is a big part of how you sell, that alone points to GoHighLevel. If you only ever email your buyers, it will not matter much.

Can GoHighLevel host online courses?

Yes. Courses and communities are core features on every GoHighLevel plan, according to its pricing page. A branded member app is an add-on at $49 a month per sub-account. Kajabi puts more of its effort into the course side, so if courses are your whole business, look at Kajabi first.

Does Kajabi charge transaction fees?

Kajabi takes no revenue share. On Kajabi Payments you pay a card fee, from 2.9% + $0.30 on Basic down to 2.7% + $0.30 on Pro, for US businesses. Use another provider instead and Kajabi adds 2%, 1% or 0.5% by plan, on top of that provider's own fee.

Which is easier to learn, Kajabi or GoHighLevel?

Kajabi, for most course creators, because it does fewer things. GoHighLevel has a CRM, a phone system, calendars, workflows, websites and more, and the menus show it. That is also why it can do more. If you want GoHighLevel without the learning curve, you can have someone build it for you.

Which one should a coach use?

It depends on how the coach sells. If clients buy from a sales page or a webinar without talking to you, Kajabi fits. If clients book a call first, GoHighLevel fits, because texting, booking and the pipeline are built in. If you sell a small course that leads to a call, GoHighLevel can run both parts.

Is there a cheaper option than both?

Yes, if you only need part of what these tools do. Our list of GoHighLevel alternatives compares six tools with their prices, including lower-cost options for courses and funnels. If your business is mainly a paid community, Skool is worth a look too. Pick by the one job you need done most.

Do you need a different tool, or someone to run it?

Picking the tool is the easy part. Neither one writes the sales page, the emails or the follow-up texts, and neither one answers your leads. GoHighLevel is the tool. Someone still has to do the work. If you would rather hand that part over, see how Havstock Unlimited works. If you sell courses, our page on course launch marketing for creators shows what we build for a launch.

If you would rather do it yourself, build one thing first, not everything. You can try GoHighLevel free for 30 days and see if the follow-up side is worth it to you. For GoHighLevel vs Kajabi, the rule is simple: pick Kajabi when the product is the business, and GoHighLevel when the follow-up is.