How does free work?
Your most engaged fans get to be a part of your community, even if they aren't ready to commit to a paid membership. Fans will see the option to Join for free when they visit your Patreon. If fans don't have an account, they only need to enter their name and email address to sign up, and existing users will be prompted to sign in. And that's it — they're in; there's no need to create or remember another password!
To engage with free members, you can create posts for Free members only, make Public posts, or post for All members. Creators have shared everything from monthly newsletters to episode transcripts, livestreams, and freebies. You'll see free members' details in your Audience Relationship manager and get a view of your overall community growth in Insights.
What do members get when they join for free?
- Access to posts made for 'All members', Free members only', and 'Public' delivered to their email inboxes and the Patreon desktop and mobile web app, so they can stay updated on your work
- Notifications via email, desktop, and mobile app when new posts they have access to are published
- Members can easily upgrade to a paid membership whenever they view your Patreon and posts
- Comment access to any posts they have access to (if enabled in your settings)
Benefits of welcoming fans for free
Community growth
More engaged fans connecting on Patreon means you can more easily convert them to paying members over time. Creators have seen a nearly 3x increase in the growth of their communities without a decrease in earnings.
Guaranteed reach to more of your fans
When you share something on Patreon, you know members will see it in their inboxes, the app, and on the web. Your work isn't blocked or buried by an algorithm.
Better member retention
Paid members who cancel will see the option to stay connected as free members, so you can maintain these relationships. 80% of paid members who cancel opt to stay connected as free members, making it easy to win them back in the future.
Seamless sign-up for fans
If fans aren't already logged in, they'll be prompted to log in or sign up. Fans who don't have an account yet can create an account with passwordless sign-up by simply entering their name and email address. Whenever they log in, we'll send them an email with a code to access their account.
Learn more about passwordless login.
Want to convert free members into paid? Check out "Turn Free Members Into Paying Fans" on Patreon for Creators. Currently, Patreon for Creators is only available in English.
You can decide how your free option appears to visitors to your Patreon
Free and paid offerings displayed
Creators whose Patreon is for all audiences will have free and paid options shown to fans by default. When free and paid options are enabled, people will see the button to Join for free directly under your header, with your paid options listed below. We'll continue experimenting with the layout and copy of the join button to see how we can improve overall membership growth.
You can decide whether you'd like your free option prominently placed on your Patreon or subtly placed in your Page settings.
Paid options are prominently displayed
The following creators will have only their paid options prominently displayed on their Patreon by default:
- Creators who haven't set up paid membership tiers, but are earning through custom payments: People who visit your Patreon will see the button to Become a member, and will be directed to the checkout page
- Creators whose Patreon is categorized as 18+: By default, fans will see the Become a member button prominently displayed, with your paid offerings listed below. If you'd prefer to feature the Join for free button prominently instead, you can change this in your Page settings
If your Patreon is suitable for all audiences, you can change your Page settings to show paid options only.
When only paid options are prominently placed on your Patreon, fans can still join for free if they click the more actions "…" menu.
Comment settings
You can control which members get comment access and control the degree of comment filtering applied to comments added by free members (if enabled).
Comment access
You can adjust comment access for your posts from your Page settings to one of the following:
- Allow comments: Members can comment on posts they can see. This means that if you post for Paid members only, only paid members can comment on that post. If you post for Free members only, only free members can comment. And if you post for All members, all your members, free and paid, will be able to comment
- Turn off comments: Hides the comment section for all your existing and new posts. Both free and paid members will see a message letting them know that comments have been disabled
If you allow comments on your posts, you can choose to disable comments on a post-by-post basis from the post editor.
Learn more about comment access.
Comment filtering
You can automatically hide comments made by free members that don't meet our Community Guidelines or are potentially harmful to your community.
Comment filtering is enabled by default for creators who select Allow Comments. You can manage your comment filtering settings anytime from your Page settings.
Hidden comments are visible to the commenter and can be accessed by the creator; however, other members won't see the comment.
Learn more about comment filtering.
If a member's comment violates Patreon's Community Guidelines, you can report them by clicking the "..." button and selecting Report this content. Please include in the report as much evidence as possible (e.g. screenshots, URLs, etc.). Thank you for helping to keep our community safe.
Powerful insights to power your growth
Free members are included in your Membership Insights dashboard, so you can track how your community is growing and how free members convert to paid over time.
From your dashboard you can:
- See your active, new, and cancelled members, with free and paid broken out
- Break your membership down by tier or by paid status to understand what's driving growth
- Track upgrades and downgrades, including members who stay connected as free members instead of cancelling
- Adjust the timeframe (from the past 30 days up to all time) to spot longer-term trends
For a full walkthrough of everything the dashboard offers, see Membership Insights.
The Insights dashboard is updated every 4 hours.
FAQ
- Creators saw a nearly 3x increase in the growth of their communities, without a decrease in new paid member growth. So the data indicates that your new free members are almost all people who otherwise would have left your page without joining a paid tier. Now you have the opportunity to stay connected with them, and perhaps upsell them to paid over time.
- Community growth: More engaged fans connecting on Patreon means you can more easily convert them to paying members. Creators have seen a nearly 3x increase in the growth of their communities, without a decrease in earnings
- Guaranteed reach to more of your fans: When you share something on Patreon, you know members will see it in their inboxes, the app, and on the web
- Better member retention: Paid members who cancel will see the option to stay connected as free members, so you can maintain these relationships. 80% of paid members who cancel opt to stay connected as free members
- Build your mailing list: When fans join for free, they share their email address with you so you will always own that relationship, even outside of Patreon
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We're constantly exploring ways to help creators grow their communities. We've seen the free option give creators access to a larger engaged audience that they can turn into paying members over time. Creators have seen a nearly 3x increase in the growth of their communities, without a decrease in earnings. And 80% of paid members who cancel choose to stay connected for free. We want all creators to benefit from this growth and improved retention, and we'll be continuing to test and improve how new visitors navigate and join creators' communities.
However, we know not every creator is the same. If you don't want to feature the free option on your page, we've given creators control over that visibility in page settings.
- To get a list of your current free members, select Creator studio
from the left navigation and click Audience — you'll land on your Relationship manager, where you can click the Free member quick filter to get a list of current free members.
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You can enable Show paid options only, which will de-emphasize the Join for free button from your Patreon. Fans will instead see a button to Become a member, which will lead to your paid options.
Fans can still access the option to join for free from the more options "…" button on your Patreon. Paid members will also see the option to become a free member if they go through the cancellation flow.