Get Paid Through MuscleBuddy
Stripe Connect payouts, your monthly rate, the platform fee with a worked example, the coach directory, referrals and what happens when a card fails.
Clients can pay you through MuscleBuddy. They subscribe to you at a monthly
rate you set, Stripe charges their card, MuscleBuddy keeps a platform fee, and
the rest goes to your Stripe account. Everything here lives on Coach
billing (/coach/billing), which the dashboard links as Manage billing
or Connect Stripe.
Connect Stripe
The Stripe Connect status card shows where you are:
| Status | What it means |
|---|---|
| Not connected | You have not started. |
| Onboarding in progress | You started Stripe's form and have not finished it. |
| Active: ready to accept clients | Stripe can charge clients and pay you. |
| Action needed: Stripe flagged your account | Stripe wants more information before it pays you again. |
Tick the box accepting the coach terms (the 1099 contractor and revenue-share agreement in Terms §8), then press Connect with Stripe or Continue onboarding. Stripe hosts the form. When you finish, Stripe sends you back to Coach billing.
Set your rate
Once the account is active, the Monthly coaching price card appears. Enter a price in dollars and press Save. The minimum is $9.99 a month, the price of Pro, so coaching through MuscleBuddy costs a client at least what the app alone would.
A new rate applies to clients who subscribe after you save it. Clients already subscribed keep the price they signed up at.
Every client who pays you gets full Pro access through you, for as long as their subscription to you runs.
The platform fee, with an example
MuscleBuddy keeps a share of each client payment it processes for you. The share is 20% unless MuscleBuddy has agreed a different rate with you, and any agreed rate sits between 20% and 30%. The line under your price reads Platform takes a 20% fee (or your agreed rate), so you can check which one applies to you.
Say you charge $120 a month and the fee is 20%:
| Clients | Billed per month | Platform fee (20%) | After platform fee |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | $120 | $24 | $96 |
| 10 | $1,200 | $240 | $960 |
| 20 | $2,400 | $480 | $1,920 |
The fee applies only to clients who pay you through MuscleBuddy. Your own Coach subscription is a separate $29.99 a month.
Payouts
Stripe sends the money to the bank account on your Stripe account on Stripe's standard rolling schedule, which is typically daily, a couple of days after each charge. MuscleBuddy does not hold your earnings for a month. View full payout history in Stripe on Coach billing opens your Stripe dashboard, where you can see each payout and change your bank details.
The earnings view
The Earnings card on Coach billing shows:
- Active paying clients: clients with a live subscription to you.
- Billed per month: what those clients are charged each month.
- After platform fee: what you keep of that.
The dashboard's top card shows the same two numbers as Paying clients and MRR after platform fee.
The coach directory
The directory at /coaches is where members and visitors find a coach and
hire one without an invite. You can list yourself once your Stripe account is
active and you have saved a rate. Tick List me in the coach directory and
allow self-serve sign-ups, add comma-separated specialty tags such as
"powerlifting, contest prep", and press Save tags.
If your Stripe account stops being active, for example because Stripe flagged it, MuscleBuddy takes your listing down and notifies you. Clients you already coach are unaffected. Your listing stays off until you fix the account with Stripe and tick the box again. MuscleBuddy notifies you when the account is active again.
A directory hire becomes your client the moment their checkout completes. If they close the checkout page or their card is refused, nothing is created. Onboard a client covers what a directory hire can see.
Referrals
Members you referred lists the members who signed up through your referral
link, with the date they joined and their plan. Your link is on Invite
friends (/invite). The monthly summary email carries the same list.
When a client's card fails or they cancel
- A failed payment (Stripe marks the subscription past due) changes nothing while Stripe retries the card. The client stays on your roster, keeps the Pro your coaching gives them, and gets one email with a link to My coaches, where they update the card.
- A cancelled or expired subscription ends the relationship, the same as if the client removed you. You lose access to their data and they keep all of it. Ending a coaching relationship has the details.
Clients manage their subscription to you from My coaches in their settings. An invited client who does not pay you yet sees Subscribe through this coach there. The button only works once your Stripe account is active and your rate is saved.
Where to go next
More guides
MuscleBuddy 101: What's Where and Why
A quick orientation to the app: what Plan, Train, Nutrition, Health and Community do, and how they connect.
Logging Your First Workout
The logging flow: starting a session, recording sets, RPE/RIR, and how offline mode keeps you covered.
Understanding Your Program & Progression
How double progression, linear, RPE and the other progression methods set your training loads from what you log.
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