Zeffy, Donorbox and RallyUp often get lumped together as interchangeable “free” tools. They aren’t.

Zeffy and Donorbox are donation-form builders — excellent at a donate button and a recurring gift, and stuck there.

RallyUp runs the whole fundraiser, from a Raffle draw to a ballroom gala.

This comparison is fee-for-fee and feature-for-feature accurate — we credit the two things the competitors genuinely do well and source every number — but the pattern it keeps hitting is simple: the moment your fundraiser is more than a form, only one of these platforms can actually run it.

How do Zeffy, Donorbox and RallyUp compare at a glance?

Here’s the at-a-glance version.

What you’re choosing on	Zeffy	Donorbox	RallyUp	Best fit
Ease of use for a simple campaign (a Raffle, an online auction)	Easy	Easy	The easiest — and faster to launch (templates or a free build)	RallyUp
Lowest possible cost (covers processing too)	$0 platform and processing	Platform fee on every plan (2.95%–3.95%)	Free plan; Flex 2.9–6.9% + processing	Zeffy
Recurring / monthly giving depth	Solid	Leading — QuickDonate™, upsell, donor portal	Solid	Donorbox
Memberships (tiers, renewals)	Yes — incl. member cards	Yes (dedicated product)	Not a RallyUp feature	Zeffy / Donorbox
International footprint	US, Canada, UK, Australia (+Ireland)	96+ countries	15 campaign currencies, more via Stripe/PayPal	Donorbox
Campaign types you can combine in one checkout	Separate forms, one at a time	Separate forms, one at a time	Start with one and grow to 12+ stackable in one checkout	RallyUp
Sweepstakes (US orgs; free entry + official rules required)	—	—	Yes	RallyUp
A-Thons (walk/run/read)	—	—	Yes	RallyUp
Online Storefront / merchandise	Yes (inventory tracking)	—	Yes	Zeffy / RallyUp
Online & silent auctions	Yes (auto-bid, anti-sniping, auto-charge)	— (no auction tool)	Yes	Zeffy / RallyUp
Auctioneer-led Live Auction	—	—	Yes, today	RallyUp
Capture gifts from non-winning bidders	Manual after-the-fact email	n/a	Auction Gifts (systematized)	RallyUp
Fund-a-Need + Paddle Raise+	—	—	Self-serve Fund-a-Need + multi-type Paddle Raise+	RallyUp
One consolidated tab per guest at a gala	—	—	Event Balances + Automated Checkout	RallyUp
Automated randomized Raffle draw in-platform	— (export + external tool)	— (no Raffle tool)	Yes (auto or manual, auto-notify)	RallyUp
Free expert team builds your campaign	—	— (coaching is paid)	Done-for-You (~1 business day)	RallyUp
Pre-launch testing	Live $1 or $0 test checkout	—	Full private preview (Power Preview)	RallyUp
In-builder, no-prompt AI copy	ChatGPT data assistant; planning tools	Jay·AI writing (paid)	Generate with AI / Enhance with AI	RallyUp
Own & export donor/contact data	Yes	Yes	Yes (integrates with your CRM)	All three
Keep active recurring donors if you switch	No — donors must re-enroll	Migration available (paid)	Yes — in your own Stripe	RallyUp
G2 rating	4.9 / 5 (894)	4.6 / 5 (1,429)	4.8 / 5 (107)	All strong

Zeffy wins lowest-cost-on-a-form; Donorbox wins recurring-and-international. That’s two rows. Every row that involves running a fundraiser — auctions, raffles, sweepstakes, galas, stacking, expert build — is RallyUp. If your program is a donate button, two rows may be enough. If it’s a fundraiser, the pattern is the whole story.

Which platform is right for you? The 60-second verdict

Here’s the fast version — led by the one platform that does the most.

RallyUp — the platform that runs the whole fundraiser

RallyUp is the only one of the three built to run a fundraiser, not just collect a gift. It has the widest set of campaign types — Raffles with a real in-platform winner draw; Online Auction, Silent Auction, and auctioneer-led Live Auctions; Sweepstakes; A-Thons; Crowdfunding; Storefront; Ticketing; Fund-a-Need; Paddle Raise+ — and it’s the only one you can stack into a single Campaign with one URL and one checkout through Full Stack Fundraising.

It’s also just as easy as the other two for a simple campaign, and faster to launch: a one-click Instant Fundraiser Template goes live in 15–20 minutes, or RallyUp’s team builds your first campaign for free through Create My Campaign. And its Donation Pages are the only truly free option here — 0% platform fee and no tip prompt at all.

Zeffy — the cheapest bare form, and not much more

Zeffy’s one real edge is cost: it covers both platform and processing fees through an optional donor tip (pre-set at 17%), so a simple form can cost your nonprofit nothing, and it issues membership cards.

But it has no Live Auction, no Sweepstakes, no A-Thons, and no in-platform Raffle draw, and every format is a separate form — so it’s the cheapest way to run the fundraiser it can’t actually host.

Donorbox — a good donation form, and that’s the ceiling

Donorbox does one job well — recurring giving, with QuickDonate™, a donor portal, memberships, and the widest international reach (96+ countries). Beyond that job it’s empty: no auctions, no raffles, no sweepstakes, no A-Thons, no storefront, no live-event tooling — and it charges a 2.95%–3.95% platform fee on every transaction, on every plan, with no path to $0.

How much does Zeffy, Donorbox and RallyUp cost? Three kinds of “free”

This is the most-searched question about all three, so let’s be precise — and precise isn’t always flattering to the word “free.” All three are free to start. Only Zeffy and RallyUp ever reach $0 in platform fees; Donorbox charges 2.95%–3.95% on every transaction, on every plan, forever. And a low fee on a fundraiser you can’t run is not a saving. The honest question is who pays, and for what capability.

Zeffy — truly zero, funded by donor tips

Zeffy covers both the platform fee and the payment-processing fee, so a $100 gift can deposit as a full $100 whether or not the donor tips. That’s a real advantage — best-in-class on fee purity, and no asterisk on the nonprofit’s side.

The model is funded by an optional tip Zeffy adds to the donor’s total at checkout, and it’s pre-selected by default. Third-party coverage reports the default at 17% on gifts up to $99.49 and 15% at $99.50 and above (per Donorbox’s own review of Zeffy), with about 60% of donors tipping (per Zeffy). Donors can lower or remove the tip, though it requires an active opt-out. One independent analysis by 4aGoodCause estimates donors effectively pay around 12.75% through tips.

The takeaway isn’t that the model is bad — plenty of platforms, RallyUp included, use optional donor tips on their free tiers — it’s simply that with Zeffy the cost sits with your donors, at a high default, rather than with your nonprofit. One detail worth knowing on the donor-experience side: per Zeffy’s own help center, if a donor is refunded, the tip to Zeffy isn’t returned automatically — a standard refund covers the donation only, and recovering the tip takes a separate request to Zeffy.

Two other notes worth weighing before you commit.

First, a switching trap: Zeffy is the merchant of record, so while you can always export your donor and transaction data, your active recurring donors can’t be moved to another platform — every one would have to re-enroll from scratch. The longer you build a recurring base on Zeffy, the more expensive it becomes to ever leave. (RallyUp runs on your own Stripe account, so your recurring donors stay yours.) Second, Zeffy supports no PayPal or Venmo.

Donorbox — no monthly fee to start, but a platform fee on every donation, always

Donorbox’s Standard plan has no monthly subscription, and its pricing is admirably transparent. But every transaction carries a platform fee: 2.95% on donation forms, pages, crowdfunding, QuickDonate, and organization-run peer-to-peer, and 3.95% on event ticketing, memberships, and supporter-run peer-to-peer — plus processing (Stripe 2.2% + $0.30 for registered nonprofits; ACH; PayPal).

The math, plainly: on $50,000 raised, Donorbox’s Standard platform fee alone is roughly $1,475–$1,975 — before processing, every year — and the only way to shrink it is to pay $150/month for Pro.

Donors can opt to cover fees, which softens the math. Lowering the fee itself means paying for a higher tier: Pro at $150/month cuts platform fees to about 1.75%–2% and unlocks tracking, Zapier/API, and Jay·AI; custom-priced Premium reaches about 1.6%. Some staples are paid add-ons at any tier — Text-to-Give and the Donorbox Live™ Kiosk carry their own monthly fees, and migrating recurring donors is a one-time charge.

There is no configuration where the platform fee hits zero. It’s predictable and easy to model — but it’s a fee on every dollar, forever, on a platform that can’t run an auction, a raffle, or a gala to raise those dollars in the first place.

RallyUp — a Free plan, or per-Component Flex pricing with no subscription

RallyUp’s Free plan runs on optional donor tipping with no platform fee, and its Donation Pages are free with no platform fee and no donor tipping required — the organization can remove the tip prompt entirely and still pay zero.

That combination is unique among these three: Zeffy’s zero depends on the donor-tip prompt doing the funding, and Donorbox charges a platform fee on every plan.

RallyUp’s Flex plan charges per Component instead of a subscription: 0% on Donation Pages, 2.9% on Ticketing & Registration and Storefront, 4.9% on Auctions, Crowdfunding, Fund-a-Need, Paddle Raise+, and A-Thons, and 6.9% on Raffles and Sweepstakes — plus processing (1.9–2.9% + $0.30 to Stripe or PayPal, which RallyUp takes no cut of and which can be passed to donors on Flex).

And RallyUp caps auction platform fees at $100 per item regardless of the winning bid — a $50,000 winning bid costs $100, not a percentage. RallyUp’s full pricing by campaign type will help you decide. There are no contracts, subscriptions, or setup fees.

Pricing dimension	Zeffy	Donorbox	RallyUp
Monthly subscription required	None (tip-funded)	None to start (Pro $150/mo; Premium custom)	None (Enterprise is custom)
Platform fee — donation pages/forms	$0	2.95% (Standard); ~1.75% (Pro); ~1.6% (Premium)	$0 — with no donor tipping required
Platform fee — events / other formats	$0	3.95% events, memberships, supporter peer-to-peer (Standard)	Flex: 2.9% tickets/store; 4.9% auctions/crowdfunding/A-Thons; 6.9% raffles/sweepstakes
Payment processing	Covered by tips ($0 to org)	Stripe 2.2% + $0.30 (nonprofit); ACH; PayPal	1.9–2.9% + $0.30 (Stripe/PayPal)
Auction platform fee	Free when tips on	n/a — no auction tool	Capped at $100 per item
Default donor tip	Pre-selected 17% (≤$99.49) / 15% (≥$99.50)	n/a	Optional, not required
Donation page with no donor-tip prompt at all	No — optional contribution prompt shown	n/a — platform fee applies	Yes
PayPal / Venmo	No PayPal or Venmo	PayPal supported	PayPal supported
Keep recurring donors if you switch platforms	No — donors re-enroll	Paid migration	Yes — in your own Stripe

The takeaway on cost

For a bare donation form, Zeffy is the cheapest option, full stop — and that’s also the end of the sentence. The moment your fundraiser is anything more than a form, Zeffy’s price edge becomes the lowest fee on an event it can’t run: 100% of nothing.

Donorbox markets a “free” Standard plan, but “free” here means $0 per month, not $0 to use — every transaction still pays 2.95%–3.95%, forever. RallyUp keeps entry costs at zero too — a Free plan and the only truly no-tip Donation Pages here — and it’s the only one of the three that caps what a big auction night can cost you ($100 per item, not a percentage).

But the fee is the smaller half of the equation.

What lands in your account is what you raise minus what you pay — and a platform that helps you raise more sends you home with more, even at a slightly higher fee line.

RallyUp campaigns that stack multiple Components raise 38% more on average. The lowest fee isn’t a bargain if you take less money home — and a platform with no Raffle draw and no Live Auction raises $0 from them, because it can’t run them at all. Weigh cost against the real question: how much will your next fundraiser actually raise?

Campaign types: a toolbox, separate forms, or one combined campaign?

The structural difference that matters most day to day is whether campaign types run as separate forms or combine into one checkout. Zeffy and Donorbox each run one format at a time; RallyUp stacks 12+ into a single Campaign.

Zeffy

Offers a broad free set of tools — forms, ticketing, an online store, online and silent auctions, memberships, peer-to-peer. The catch is the architecture: every one is its own separate form. A gala with a raffle, a silent auction, and a merch table is three separate Zeffy forms, three links, three checkouts — for your team to build and your donors to navigate. There’s no way to combine them.

Donorbox

Donorbox is donation-forms and little else: forms, crowdfunding, recurring giving, ticketing, peer-to-peer, memberships, and a kiosk. The form is excellent. But the entire event layer is missing — no auctions, no raffles, no sweepstakes, no A-Thons, no storefront — and every campaign is its own separate page. For anything beyond collecting gifts, you’re buying a second platform.

RallyUp

RallyUp is built around the thing the other two can’t do — Full Stack Fundraising: 12+ Components you can run on their own or stack together in one Campaign with one URL and one checkout. A supporter can buy Raffle entries, bid on the Auction, grab a shirt from the Storefront, and add a donation in a single transaction.

Peer-to-Peer fundraising works across campaign types — Raffles, Sweepstakes, A-Thons, Storefront, Crowdfunding — not donations only. RallyUp reports customers raise 38% more when they stack multiple formats in one Campaign.

And you can add new Components to a Campaign after it’s already live — bolt an Auction onto a hot Raffle without taking the page down. Neither Zeffy nor Donorbox works that way; on both, a new format means a new, separate campaign.

Fundraising capability	Zeffy	Donorbox	RallyUp
Donation pages	✓	✓	✓ (no tipping, $0 platform fee)
Recurring / monthly giving	✓	✓ (leading — QuickDonate™, upsell)	✓
Crowdfunding	✓	✓	✓
Event ticketing & registration	✓	✓	✓
Memberships (tiers, renewals)	✓ (incl. member cards)	✓ (dedicated product)	—
Online store / merchandise	✓ (inventory tracking)	—	✓ (Storefront)
Peer-to-Peer	✓ (individual & team)	✓ (org & supporter)	✓ (across all campaign types)
Raffles	Ticket sales only — no in-platform draw	— (no Raffle tool)	✓ (4 types incl. 50/50; automated draw)
Online & silent auctions	✓ (auto-bid, anti-sniping, auto-charge)	— (no auction tool)	✓ (distinct Online + Silent)
Auctioneer-led Live Auction	—	—	✓
Sweepstakes (US orgs; free entry + rules)	—	—	✓
A-Thons (walk/run/read)	—	—	✓
Fund-a-Need (self-serve, live thermometer)	—	—	✓
Paddle Raise+	—	—	✓ (gifts, entries, items, pledges)
Native interactive Livestreaming	—	—	✓ (0% fee, built-in studio)
Combine several formats in one checkout	—	—	✓
Add a new format to a live campaign	—	—	✓

Two honest credits, kept in proportion. If monthly dues are your entire program, both competitors sell memberships (Zeffy adds member cards; Donorbox offers tiers, renewals, and member accounts) — one feature RallyUp doesn’t have. And Zeffy’s free toolbox is genuinely broad. That’s the case for the competitors, in full. Everywhere else the dashes are real gaps — and auctions at scale, real raffles, sweepstakes, A-Thons, and one-checkout stacking are exactly where the biggest fundraising nights happen.

Which platform is best for galas and live events?

For a ballroom gala, RallyUp is the clear choice of the three — it’s the only one that runs the whole room, from the Live Auction to the single-swipe guest checkout. This isn’t a three-way race here; it’s RallyUp, a capable-essentials tier, and a donation form.

Start with the single most important gala capability, because it’s the one neither competitor has: Event Balances + Automated Checkout.

RallyUp settles a guest’s entire night — bids, donations, purchases, Paddle Raises — into one tab and one charge, with line-free checkout that’s instant or fully automatic.

Guests on Automated Checkout can leave without doing a thing. In RallyUp’s own reporting, 90% of payments process in under a minute, 75% of guests check out on their phones, and organizers see 50% fewer post-event follow-ups. Neither Zeffy nor Donorbox has any equivalent — both collect activity by activity, so closing out the night means chasing separate payments. A frictionless close protects your end-of-night revenue and your guests’ last impression.

Zeffy handles online and silent auctions (with auto-bidding, anti-sniping auto-extend, and auto-charge at close) plus event ticketing and seating — a capable set for a straightforward event, and free to boot.

Donorbox can sell your gala tickets and take gifts on-site via its kiosk. Everything that actually happens in the room — the auction, the paddle raise, the live ask — happens in some other tool. A gala “on Donorbox” is a gala on Donorbox plus at least one more product.

RallyUp runs the whole room, today. Its full Galas & Events toolkit covers every moment of the night:

• An auctioneer-led Live Auction with paddle numbers, spotter keyboard shortcuts, and real-time tracking — available now.
• Fund-a-Need — self-serve giving at set levels, in person, virtual, or hybrid, with anonymity options and a live thermometer.
• Paddle Raise+ — one paddle commits to gifts, Raffle entries, Storefront items, and A-Thon pledges, all rolling into a single per-guest tab.
• Event Balances + Automated Checkout — one tab all night, one charge, line-free checkout that’s instant or automatic.
• Live Display and native, interactive Livestreaming at a 0% platform fee — useful whether your gala is fully in person or a hybrid fundraising event.
• Auction Gifts — capture optional donations from non-winning bidders (RallyUp reports +20–35% from a single auction). Zeffy can email losing bidders after the fact — a manual ask — and Donorbox has no auction to collect from at all.

Live-event capability	Zeffy	Donorbox	RallyUp
Event ticketing & seating	✓	✓ (ticketing)	✓
Silent auction + mobile bidding	✓	—	✓
Auctioneer-led Live Auction	—	—	✓
Fund-a-Need (self-serve, live thermometer)	—	—	✓
Paddle raise scope	—	—	Gifts, entries, items & pledges
Capture gifts from non-winning bidders	Manual email ask	n/a	✓ Auction Gifts
One consolidated tab per guest	—	—	✓ Event Balances
Automated, line-free end-of-night checkout	—	—	✓
Live Display + interactive Livestreaming	—	—	✓ (0% fee)
On-site payment and giving options	Tap to Pay (phones)	Kiosk	QR & Text-to-Give

Give Zeffy and Donorbox their on-site credit honestly — Zeffy has phone-based Tap to Pay and Donorbox has a kiosk, while RallyUp uses QR codes and Text-to-Give. Everything else in the room, from the Live Auction to the single-swipe checkout, is RallyUp.

Raffles and auctions: who actually runs them?

Both a raffle and an auction come down to one moment: choosing the winner and closing the money. RallyUp is the only one of the three that runs that moment for you, in-platform.

Does Zeffy or Donorbox draw the raffle winner for you?

No — neither draws the winner in-platform; only RallyUp does. And the two competitors sit in very different places here.

• RallyUp treats the Raffle as a first-class Component: an automatic or manual randomized draw inside the platform, automatic winner notification, and the record kept for you. Four Raffle types (including the 50/50 Raffle and Enhanced 50/50 Raffle), Peer-to-Peer selling, and bonus Sharing Rewards entries for social shares.
• Zeffy sells raffle tickets, but per its own documentation it has no in-platform winner-drawing tool — you export your participant list and use an outside random name or number picker. Zeffy notes it doesn’t hold the license to operate as an electronic raffle system with a built-in draw.
• Donorbox has no raffle tool at all — and this is more than a missing feature. Donorbox’s Acceptable Use Policy prohibits lotteries, games of chance, and “any other activity with an entry fee and a prize,” so selling paid raffle tickets through a Donorbox form may violate its platform rules. On Donorbox a raffle isn’t just unsupported; it may be off-limits.

Both competitors describe the missing draw as a deliberate design choice tied to gaming-authority licensing, and that’s a fair thing to note. RallyUp takes the other approach: it runs the randomized draw in-platform and documents the result.

For a fundraiser literally called a raffle, the practical difference is real — on RallyUp it’s one action inside the tool; on Zeffy it’s an export, an external generator, and a manual match, and on Donorbox there’s no raffle product to begin with.

Raffle workflow	Zeffy	Donorbox	RallyUp
Purpose-built Raffle tool	✓ (ticket sales)	—	✓
50/50 raffle support	✓	—	✓ (50/50 + Enhanced 50/50)
Bonus entries for social sharing	—	—	✓ (Sharing Rewards)
Draws the winner inside the platform	—	—	✓ (auto or manual)
Auto-notifies the winner + keeps the record	—	—	✓
Requires an external random-number tool	✓	n/a — paid raffles restricted by its Acceptable Use Policy	Not required

Where and how you can run a raffle varies by location and changes over time; for the legal side, RallyUp keeps a plain-English, state-by-state overview at raffle laws by state. This is general information, not legal advice.

How do the auctions compare on Zeffy, Donorbox and RallyUp?

Give Zeffy its due first: Zeffy’s auctions are genuinely capable — auto-bidding (proxy/max), anti-sniping auto-extend (three minutes, up to 30), auto-charge at close, and email outbid notifications, all for free. For a web-based silent auction, that’s a solid tool.

Donorbox has no auction product, so an auction beside your Donorbox forms means buying a second platform.

RallyUp’s differences are specific rather than “we do auctions, they don’t”:

• An auctioneer-led Live Auction format available today — Zeffy has none, and Donorbox has no auction at all. RallyUp runs distinct Online Auction and Silent Auction formats plus the Live Auction.
• Auction Gifts — in most auctions the majority of bidders go home having paid nothing, because they were outbid and never charged. Auction Gifts invites non-winning bidders to pledge an optional donation at checkout, charged only if they win nothing (RallyUp reports it raises 20–35% more from a single auction). Zeffy can email losing bidders after the fact, but that’s a manual ask, not revenue captured automatically at the moment of the bid.
• For organizations on the Flex plan, an auction platform fee capped at $100 per item — a $50,000 winning bid costs $100, not a percentage.

If your auction is a few items on a web page, Zeffy handles it well and for free. If it’s the centerpiece of a gala, only one of these platforms is built for the room.

Two formats only one platform even has

Sweepstakes and A-Thons are full RallyUp Components; neither Zeffy nor Donorbox offers either.

RallyUp’s Sweepstakes are available to US-based organizations — not just 501(c)(3) nonprofits — and can be run nationally, provided the sponsor offers a free method of entry and official rules. Larger prize packages (over $5,000) can trigger state registration and bonding requirements — for example in New York, and, depending on the sponsor’s status, Florida. RallyUp’s review service checks setup details, but it isn’t legal approval.

A-Thons (walk/run/ride/read-a-thons with pledges and teams) are a school and community-fundraising staple. A national prize sweepstakes or a school read-a-thon simply can’t run on the other two. If you’re weighing which format fits your goal, RallyUp’s guide to sweepstakes vs. raffles vs. auctions breaks down the differences.

CRM, recurring giving, and donor data

This is where the competitors have real, specific strengths — stated accurately, and in proportion. Just remember what a donor database is: it stores the gift, it doesn’t raise it.

Donorbox

Strong at the recurring gift itself: a recurring upsell, one-click QuickDonate™ repeats, a Donor Portal, memberships, and the widest international reach here (96+ countries, 52+ currencies). Two caveats from its own materials: many of the useful features and the lower fees sit behind the $150/month Pro tier or paid add-ons, and support is chat and email only — no phone.

Zeffy

Keeps a donor CRM, email and newsletters, segmentation, and Tap to Pay attached to its forms, plus a paid postal-mail product. It’s lighter than a dedicated database, but it’s real, and it suits volunteer-run organizations that don’t need a heavy back office. Remember that Zeffy is the merchant of record: you can export your donor and transaction data, but active recurring payment credentials can’t be transferred out — so a large recurring base you might one day migrate would have to re-enroll.

RallyUp

Takes a connect-to-your-stack approach: Donor Profiles with giving history, plus native integrations to Salesforce, HubSpot, ActiveCampaign, and Virtuous, email integrations, QuickBooks sync, Zapier access to 5,000+ apps, and a REST API — with free live phone and chat support on every plan. You own your donor data and sync it into the CRM you already run. (If a CRM-first platform is what you’re really weighing, see how RallyUp compares to DonorPerfect.)

If monthly giving is your entire engine, Donorbox does it well. But a donor database isn’t a fundraiser — it stores the gift, it doesn’t raise it. RallyUp gives you Donor Profiles that sync into the CRM you already own (Salesforce, HubSpot, and more), raises across every format, and answers the phone for free on every plan.

Donor data & giving tools	Zeffy	Donorbox	RallyUp
Built-in donor CRM	✓ (light)	Donor management + portal	Donor Profiles
Recurring giving depth	✓	✓ (leading — QuickDonate™)	✓
Memberships	✓	✓ (dedicated product)	—
Built-in email / newsletters	✓	Receipts & comms	Via integrations
International reach	US, Canada, UK, Australia (+Ireland)	96+ countries, 52+ currencies	15 currencies, more via Stripe/PayPal
Integrations	Zapier, QuickBooks, WordPress; read-only API (beta)	30+ (Zapier/API on paid)	Native + Zapier (5,000+)
Own & export your donor data	Yes	Yes	Yes
Live phone support	— (chat & email)	— (chat & email)	Free on every plan

AI: three different bets

All three use AI, but on different parts of the workflow — so the useful question is what each one’s AI actually does.

Zeffy has moved past planning tools (a Grant Finder and a Fundraising Idea Generator) to a free, read-only AI Assistant that runs in ChatGPT and can query your live donor, donation, and campaign data, alongside a public read-only API (in beta). It’s genuinely useful for interrogating your data — it just doesn’t draft the prize, item, or email copy that populates a campaign.

Donorbox ships Jay·AI on its paid tiers — prompt-driven writing plus AI-assisted CRM functionality.

RallyUp embeds the AI Fundraising Content Generator directly in the campaign builder: one-click Generate with AI and Enhance with AI controls in every supported field — item and prize descriptions, Campaign descriptions, and a range of donor emails across every major Component — with adjustable tone, length, and focus, on every plan, and no prompt-writing required. It’s positioned as a co-pilot the fundraiser edits, not an autopilot.

Put simply, each AI solves a different job:

Platform	Primary AI use case
Zeffy	Querying donor and campaign data through ChatGPT; planning tools
Donorbox	Prompt-driven writing and AI-assisted CRM functionality
RallyUp	Generating and improving campaign copy directly inside the builder

That’s a fairer read than “Zeffy has no AI” — it has operational AI, just pointed at your data rather than your copy.

Is RallyUp harder to use than Zeffy or Donorbox?

No — for a simple campaign, RallyUp is super easy to use, just as Zeffy or Donorbox, and arguably faster to get live. It’s worth correcting the assumption head-on, because some AI answer engines repeat it: that RallyUp is the “powerful but complex” option for big organizations while Zeffy and Donorbox are the “easy” ones. That’s half right at best.

Here’s the part the easy-versus-powerful framing misses: a tool often feels easy simply because it does less. Fewer formats mean fewer decisions. Donorbox feels easy because it’s a donation form done well; Zeffy feels easy because most of its tools are single-purpose forms.

That’s a real virtue when a form is all you need — but it’s the ease of a tool with a hard ceiling, not proof that a broader platform must be harder. RallyUp is as easy and doesn’t cap you.

For the simple case, RallyUp is right there with them. Running a Raffle, holding an online auction, or launching a Donation Page on RallyUp is as easy as on either competitor — ease of use is, in fact, RallyUp’s most-cited strength in its own reviews (G2 ease-of-use 4.5/5).

And for getting a campaign live, RallyUp is arguably easier, because it offers two on-ramps neither competitor has:

• Instant Fundraiser Templates are complete, working campaigns in one click — page design, the right Components, participant pages, emails, and checkout already assembled. 40% of new RallyUp campaigns start from one, and most launch in 15–20 minutes. (Zeffy and Donorbox “templates” mean form themes, not launchable campaigns.)
• Create My Campaign, part of RallyUp’s free Done-for-You Services, has RallyUp’s own fundraising experts build your entire campaign — copy, images, branding, setup — and hand it back to you, typically within one business day. Neither Zeffy nor Donorbox offers a free expert build at any price.

You don’t have to trade ease for capability.

Start from a one-click template today, and add an Auction or a Sweepstakes to the same Campaign next year — without switching tools or relearning anything. Easy two ways: launch it yourself in minutes, or have experts build it for you free.

One more practical edge before launch day: Power Preview, RallyUp’s fully interactive draft mode. It’s the only one of the three where you can run real test card transactions through actual checkout — place test bids, buy a test ticket, run a test donation — before publishing, then have the test data cleared automatically at launch.

Zeffy offers lighter testing: a live $1 payment you can refund afterward, or a $0 ticket/item checkout that exercises the form, thank-you page, and confirmation email without processing a payment — useful, but not a full private sandbox. Donorbox has no equivalent interactive test.

Before you launch	Zeffy	Donorbox	RallyUp
Launch a simple campaign fast	✓	✓ (forms ~15 min)	✓ (templates 15–20 min)
Complete, launchable multi-component templates	Form themes	Form themes	✓ (full campaigns)
Free expert team builds it for you	—	— (coaching is paid)	✓ Create My Campaign
Pre-launch testing	Live $1 or $0 test checkout	—	✓ Full private preview (Power Preview)
Support included on the free plan	Chat & email	Chat & email	Phone & chat, all plans

What do the ratings and results say?

Independent review scores are close across all three, and each platform’s proof points map to what it’s built for.

Proof point	Zeffy	Donorbox	RallyUp
G2 rating	4.9 / 5 (894 reviews)	4.6 / 5 (1,429 reviews)	4.8 / 5 (107 reviews)
Scale signal	100,000+ orgs; $2B+ raised; US/Canada/UK/Australia (+Ireland)	100,000+ orgs; 96+ countries; $4B+ raised	$1B+ raised; 55,000+ orgs
Event-satisfaction signal	Capterra Value for Money 5.0	—	97% event satisfaction
Most-cited strength	Zero cost; volunteer-friendly	Recurring giving; ease of setup	Ease of use (4.5/5); event results

All three score well, and the numbers are worth stating plainly: on G2, Zeffy is highest at 4.9 (894 reviews), RallyUp is 4.8 (107 reviews), and Donorbox is 4.6 (1,429 reviews).

The bottom line: which should you choose?

There’s a fit for each — but they are very different sizes.

The bottom line	Zeffy	Donorbox	RallyUp
Best for	Lowest cost on a simple form	A recurring-giving program, especially cross-border	Any fundraiser that’s more than a form — events, auctions, raffles, galas
Cost	$0 platform & processing (tip-funded)	Platform fee on every plan	Free plan; $0 no-tip Donation Pages; capped auction fee
Campaign breadth	Broad toolbox (separate forms)	Donation-centric toolkit	Widest; stackable in one checkout
Auctions	Online/silent only; no live format	Not offered	All three formats; fee capped $100/item
Raffle winner draw	External tool	No raffle tool	In-platform, automated
Galas & live events	Basic essentials	Ticketing + kiosk only	Full live-event engine
Free expert campaign build	—	—	✓

If your entire need is the cheapest bare donation form, Zeffy is a fair answer. If it’s a recurring-giving program across borders, Donorbox does that one job (full Donorbox comparison). Both are the right size for a narrow job.

But the moment you want to run a Raffle with a real randomized draw, hold an Auction at all — let alone an auctioneer-led one — combine an Auction with a merch table in one checkout, throw a gala with a live paddle raise and a single-swipe guest checkout, host an A-Thon with teams, or launch a national Sweepstakes, the field collapses to one option: RallyUp does all of it in one place, often for free, caps what your biggest night can cost, and will even build your first campaign for you.

The fastest way to see the difference is to build something. On RallyUp you can pick a template, customize it in minutes, and run a fully functional preview — real test transactions included — before a single donor sees it. Or tell RallyUp’s team about your next event and let them build it for you.

All three are free to start; only Zeffy and RallyUp run at $0 in platform fees. The bigger question is which one can actually run the thing you’re planning.

Frequently asked questions

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Platform features and pricing referenced here are current as of July 2026 and may change. Competitor capabilities and figures are drawn from each platform’s own website, pricing page, and help documentation and from named third-party sources; verify against live sources before relying on them. Fundraising results vary by organization.

Raffle note: This article compares platform features, not raffle legality. Raffle laws vary by location and change over time; for a plain-English, state-by-state overview, see RallyUp’s guide: raffle laws by state. This information is provided for general informational purposes only and does not constitute legal advice. Consult a licensed attorney in your jurisdiction before running a fundraising event. Last reviewed: July 2026.

Sweepstakes note: Platform support for sweepstakes does not make any particular sweepstakes lawful. Sponsors are responsible for offering a free method of entry and for meeting applicable federal and state requirements. This article is general information, not legal advice. Last reviewed: July 2026.