Best Purplepass Alternative: TicketingHub

Keep the 99 cents — on every single ticket

Purplepass is event ticketing software, strongest for one-off festivals, fairs and concerts — and its dollar-per-ticket fee model shows it. If you sell £10 and £25 admissions day in, day out, that 99-cent charge quietly takes a bigger share of your revenue than any headline percentage. And if your business is tours, activities, or a visitor attraction, you need things event software isn't built around: OTA distribution, walk-up sales, and self-serve rebooking. TicketingHub gives you all of it at a simple 3% per online booking, no per-ticket surcharge, no setup fee, no monthly fee. It's rated 5.0 on Capterra, and getting started is free — you pay as you earn.

What is Purplepass?

Purplepass was founded in 2008 by Gabriel Afana and is headquartered in San Diego, California, as a privately held company. It's a cloud-based event ticketing platform used for festivals, fairs, concerts and venue events, covering online ticket sales, box-office hardware, assigned seating maps and event marketing tools, and it lets organisers either pass service fees to buyers or absorb them.

Purplepass markets itself on having no signup fees, no contracts, no map-building fees and no box-office fees — its revenue comes from per-ticket service and card-processing charges instead.

What Purplepass's fees cost you at your ticket prices

Purplepass's published rates are 2.5% plus $0.99 per ticket for for-profit organisers (2.0% plus $0.99 for non-profits), dropping to $0.49 per ticket on tickets under $5. Card processing is billed separately: about 3% online, or 2.5% plus $0.30 per transaction at the box office. There's also a per-ticket cost for physical stock — roughly $0.10 for thermal tickets, up to $0.12 for full-colour or wristbands.

Run it on real numbers. An operator selling £10,000 of tickets in a month at an average price of £25 — about 400 tickets — pays Purplepass roughly £250 (2.5%) plus the per-ticket charge, which converts to around £310 for 400 tickets — call it £560 combined, before card processing is added on top. TicketingHub's fee on the same £10,000 is a flat £300, with no per-ticket surcharge; card and OTA integration fees are separate on both platforms, so the fairest comparison is the headline rate. That's roughly £260 a month — over £3,000 a year — staying in your business instead. The dollar-per-ticket fee is what drives the gap, and it bites hardest on lower-priced admissions: a £10 ticket effectively carries close to a 10% surcharge before the percentage is even added. Do the maths at your own average ticket price — the cheaper your tickets, the more you keep by switching.

Purplepass vs TicketingHub, side by side

• Pricing — Purplepass: 2.5% + $0.99 per ticket (for-profit), 2.0% + $0.99 (non-profit), plus separate card processing. TicketingHub: flat 3% per online booking, no per-ticket surcharge.
• Monthly fee — Purplepass: none. TicketingHub: none.
• Setup — Purplepass: no signup or map-building fees, but physical ticket stock is charged per unit. TicketingHub: no setup fee.
• Contract — Purplepass: no contracts, per its own marketing. TicketingHub: no lock-in, pay as you earn.
• OTA channel manager — Purplepass: built for direct event ticketing, not OTA/reseller distribution. TicketingHub: real-time sync with Viator, GetYourGuide and other resellers.
• Magic Link — Purplepass: not built for this; events are typically one-off, not rescheduled by the guest. TicketingHub: customers self-serve reschedule, cancel or convert to voucher.
• Point of sale — Purplepass: box-office hardware and scanners, reviewers flag some hardware quality issues. TicketingHub: iOS and Android POS, works offline, integrates printers, cash registers and PDQ machines.
• Support — Purplepass: 24/7 support included, per its own pricing page. TicketingHub: 24/7 chat and email.
• Reviews — Purplepass: 4.9/5 on Capterra (304 reviews). TicketingHub: 5.0/5 on Capterra.

Why operators switch from Purplepass to TicketingHub

Keep more of every low-priced admission

A 99-cent fee on every ticket stings most where your volume lives — the £8 child ticket, the £12 entry. TicketingHub charges 3% of the online booking, full stop: no per-ticket dollar fee, no monthly fee, no setup fee. Integration fees for payment providers and OTA channels are the only extras, and they're disclosed up front. The lower your average ticket price, the bigger the win.

Fill slots with travellers who've never heard of you

Travellers book tours and activities on Viator and GetYourGuide — marketplaces Purplepass isn't built around. TicketingHub's OTA channel manager syncs your availability with them in real time, so marketplace demand fills the capacity your own marketing can't reach. Operators on TicketingHub grew OTA sales 401% between 2022 and 2025, and Lions Water Adventure Park in Kinston, NC went from around $50K to $260K in online revenue in a year using the widget, Magic Link and OTAs together.

Let guests fix their own plans

A tour that runs daily gets daily reschedule requests — a one-off concert doesn't, which is why event software never solved this. Magic Link lets your customers reschedule, cancel, or convert bookings to vouchers themselves: you keep the sale as a new date or a voucher instead of a refund, and nobody on your team touches an email.

Sell at the gate even when the WiFi dies

Some Purplepass reviewers report scanner and charging issues at events — and a queue at a dead ticket booth is revenue walking away. TicketingHub's POS runs on iOS and Android, keeps selling offline, and integrates printers, cash registers and PDQ machines, so a dropped connection never stops a sale.

What reviewers say about Purplepass

Purplepass holds a strong 4.9 out of 5 rating on Capterra across 304 reviews. Reviewers on Capterra consistently praise responsive customer service, an easy-to-learn interface, and flexible customisation for seating maps and ticket types. The recurring complaints are hardware quality issues with scanners and charging cables, slower-than-expected payout timelines, and a setup process for new events that takes more hand-holding than reviewers expected. Purplepass also advertises round-the-clock support, and its reviewers back that up — it's a genuine strength of theirs. Worth noting, though: a slower payout timeline is your cash flow waiting on someone else's schedule.

Who is Purplepass right for?

• Festivals, fairs, concerts and one-off venue events with assigned seating needs.
• Organisers who want to pass per-ticket fees directly to buyers.
• Events needing box-office hardware and gate-scanning on the day.

Who is TicketingHub right for?

• ✅ Operators selling the same experience on a recurring schedule who want software shaped around slots, not show dates.
• ✅ Businesses that want OTA demand from Viator and GetYourGuide on top of direct sales.
• ✅ Teams that want their inbox back — guests self-serve reschedules instead of emailing support.
• ✅ Anyone selling lower-priced admissions, where a flat percentage beats a per-ticket dollar fee every time.
• ✅ Operators who need walk-up sales to keep flowing when the connection doesn't.

What operators say about TicketingHub

Sam R., a director, has stayed for over a decade: "I've used Ticketinghub since 2014 for events ranging from walking tours to large international conferences." And the platform earns its keep on lost sales too — Shannon R., a small business owner, says the abandoned cart emails "noticeably reduced the number of people that don't book."

FAQs about switching from Purplepass

How do I migrate my events or tours from Purplepass?

Switching costs you an afternoon, not a season. Our team moves products, availability and pricing over at no cost, and your first product can be live in minutes.

Will TicketingHub's 3% always beat Purplepass's fees?

It depends on your ticket price, so do the maths for your own catalogue. On higher-priced admissions the gap narrows; on lower-priced tickets, Purplepass's flat 99-cent charge takes a bigger relative bite, which is where TicketingHub's flat percentage tends to come out well ahead.

Can I run TicketingHub alongside Purplepass first?

Yes, with nothing to cancel if you don't switch. There's no contract and no monthly fee, so you can test TicketingHub on one product while keeping Purplepass running elsewhere, then compare the real numbers.

Work out what the 99 cents is costing you

Multiply your monthly ticket count by 99 cents — that's what the per-ticket fee alone takes, before percentages and card processing. On 400 tickets a month it's roughly £3,000 a year. Switching costs nothing to try: no setup fee, free migration, first product live in minutes. Run one product through TicketingHub and let your own numbers make the case.