Selling digital products online is where the money is these days. And with WordPress, you’ve got the perfect platform to set up shop.
Videos, PDFs, photos, software—you name it, you can sell it using WordPress.
Between picking a payment processor, delivering files, and everything in between, selling digital goods can get complicated really fast.
That’s where digital download plugins come to the rescue.
The right plugin can help you get started with minimal configuration. But with so many options, finding the best of the bunch is challenging.
This guide will take the guesswork out of picking plugins.
I’ll walk you through the seven best-selling digital goods on WordPress in 2023. You’ll understand what they do, how much they cost, and which is right for your business.
By the end, you’ll have the tools and know-how to turn your WordPress site into a fully-fledged digital store.
Let’s get started!
If you’re still deciding what products to sell, this list of the best digital products would be a great start.
SureCart makes selling digital products smooth sailing. It’s built using the same tech as Shopify, Basecamp, and Stripe—so you know it’s robust and optimized.
You can sell online courses, memberships, subscriptions, services, event tickets, donations, downloads, and more.
It also works for physical products, making it a robust and complete ecommerce solution for WordPress that is also super-intuitive.
Some handy features:
Pricing: SureCart has a free version with all the bells and whistles, so ecommerce is accessible to everyone. An affordable pro plan is coming soon with extras like affiliate marketing, subscription saver, multi-currency, and other sales boosters.
SureCart is perfect for selling digital goods without traditional ecommerce plugin headaches. Its modern, simple design means excellent performance and usability—even for newbies.
If you want a visually stunning, no-fuss solution for digital sales, SureCart is a top choice. Its focus on accessibility, reliability, and ease makes it stand out—great for beginners or anyone tired of older, clunkier options.
FunnelKit is a flexible and beginner-friendly solution that combines a powerful sales funnel builder with an optimized WooCommerce checkout. It’s designed to help you sell more digital products with simplicity, affordability, and a seamless user experience.
Some powerful features include:
Pricing: FunnelKit offers an affordable entry point at just $99/year, making it a budget-friendly solution for selling digital downloads and even physical products. Every plan includes optimized templates, a drag-and-drop field editor, and conversion-boosting tools to grow your revenue.
FunnelKit is perfect for creators, coaches, and entrepreneurs selling ebooks, courses, memberships, or software. With its focus on flexibility, simplicity, and user experience, FunnelKit gives you everything you need to build high-converting sales funnels and deliver a smooth, streamlined checkout experience. Try its free version to start optimizing your digital sales right away.
Easy Digital Downloads (EDD) is a handy, all-in-one solution that makes selling digital products on WordPress smooth and efficient.
Some key features:
Pricing: The pricing plans start at an affordable $99 per year—good value for businesses of any size.
We’re fans of EDD because it’s great for anyone selling digital stuff on WordPress—videos, PDFs, photos, software, you name it.
The straightforward interface and powerful features make it excellent for beginners and experienced sellers.
CartFlows takes your WooCommerce store to the next level for conversions and revenue. It’s more than a plugin—it’s perfect for WooCommerce owners who want a high-converting online store.
Some awesome features:
Pricing: The free version has a ton of features. Pro offers additional powerful features like WooCommerce one-click upsell, intelligent offers, Canvas Mode — where you can create automated email sequences and workflows through visual drag-and-drop, and more.
CartFlows works excellent for any WooCommerce site—physical products, courses, tickets, services, digital downloads, and dropshipping. You name it.
Perfect for eCommerce stores, course creators, event organizers, coaches, bloggers, niche sites, and any business wanting to boost conversions and build dedicated funnels.
If you want people to purchase a subscription and only enable downloads to subscribed members, SureMembers is what you need.
SureMembers is a super powerful membership plugin for WordPress. It makes it easy to restrict content or create subscription-based courses.
It’s the perfect tool for creating a membership website and enabling paid downloads and premium content.
Some of the best features include:
You can drip content over time and ensure secure file delivery – perfect for selling digital products.
Pricing: SureMembers starts at $99/year for the Pro plan. This plan includes all the features of SureMembers, including selling digital downloads, locking content, and others for a single site.
SureMembers is perfect for agencies, bloggers, podcasters, influencers, ecommerce gurus, and course creators—anyone wanting to create member areas, content upgrades, paid podcast access, Patreon-style sites, and more.
The easy setup, flexibility, and features make SureMembers a top choice for WordPress membership sites.
Let’s look at two ways to quickly set up payments on WordPress. Setting up any of the plugins above should give you payment capabilities, but enabling more payment options is always a good idea.
We’ve already discussed SureCart for its ability to enable paid downloads. SureCart is a full-fledged ecommerce solution that competes directly with WooCommerce—the ecommerce platform designed by WordPress.
If you’ve tried WooCommerce, you know it’s complex and prone to break. SureCart fixes that. It has been built from the ground up with simplicity and ease of use.
But there’s more to SureCart.
It doubles as a robust payment gateway for WordPress.It currently supports Stripe, PayPal, Paystack, and Mollie. Support for additional regional gateways like Mercado Pago, RazorPay, and more is being worked on.
If you only need Paypal, Payment Plugins for PayPal WooCommerce might be the perfect plugin for you.
With a streamlined setup, you can start selling products or services in minutes with a basic plugin configuration.
The checkout process is simplified as the entire payment flow happens in a popup window without leaving your site. For selling digital goods, Payment Plugins for PayPal WooCommerce generates encrypted and auto-expiring download links.
It can also integrate with WooCommerce to combine its store management capabilities with simplified payments.
Payment Plugins for PayPal WooCommerce ensure complete security and compliance with PayPal standards.
Note: The developer Payment Plugins also has individual plugins for different payment gateways.
However, we’d recommend going with them only if you have particular payment gateway requirements—for example, you only want to enable Paypal and nothing else.
That’s because additional plugins can increase the load on your website, causing it to slow down.
Apart from the plugin, keeping a few other things in mind is useful. Let’s go over the most important things to know.
Choosing a WordPress theme that will stay compatible over time is tricky. Updates from WordPress or the theme developer can cause bugs.
Pick a theme that has remained compatible throughout all WordPress updates.
This is where a theme like Astra shines. Astra is free and lightweight, and the dev team thoroughly tests bugs before releasing new features.
The internal quality checks and the versatility of this theme are why Astra is also the #1 theme on WordPress.
However, if you want to see what else is out there, here are some of the best free themes for WordPress.
Like anything online, there are always risks. Fortunately, WordPress offers robust tools to lock things down.
Here are some top tips:
Top security plugins like Sucuri, Wordfence, and iThemes Security harden WordPress in critical ways.
They have all the tools for two-factor authentication, firewall rules, and malware scanning.
MalCare is also an excellent option. While it doesn’t have two-factor authentication, it does have automated malware removal included as part of its service.
Adopt a whole-site security policy. Monitor closely for threats and have an incident response plan. Limit integrations and custom code, which increases risk.
With precautions in place, WordPress can be very secure.
Keep it updated, back it up, limit access, and use security plugins. WordPress has robust defenses if you employ them properly.
Stay vigilant, and your site will stay safe!
Picking the right web host is important for any WordPress site. It affects performance, security, scaling—everything that makes or breaks a site.
Let’s break it down:
For WordPress, managed WordPress hosting and shared hosting are standard options.
Managed hosts like SiteGround or WP Engine handle optimization, security, updates, caching – the technical stuff.
Prices start from $5/month for the basic hosting plans.
Consider these factors when picking a host:
Research those items before settling on a web host or package. Managed WordPress is a great option if budget allows.
It removes more work since you no longer have to worry about keeping your WordPress setup up-to-date and secure, as the host does it all for you.
Selling digital products is how most online entrepreneurs make money these days. I hope this guide showed you how WordPress provides the perfect platform to set up a digital shop.
We discussed the essential plugins for handling payments, downloads, subscriptions, and more.
While it can feel overwhelming initially, take it slow and focus on getting one piece working at a time. Before you know it, you’ll have a fully functioning digital store that makes sales a breeze.
So, don’t let complexity hold you back, and take the first step today!
