What are the best alternatives to CoinPayments? 6 options compared for 2026

How CoinPayments works: custodial by default, now on two platforms

CoinPayments is one of the longest-running crypto payment gateways. Its site carries a 2013 copyright, says it serves more than 250,000 merchants and lists 40+ cryptocurrencies accepted for payments. Its FAQ lists custom API integrations, payment buttons, "plugins for 15+ eCommerce platforms," an invoice builder, a point of sale and a fiat on-ramp and off-ramp. A lot of WooCommerce stores, WHMCS hosts and custom PHP checkouts were built on its API years ago.

Its fee page, which we checked on 18 October 2026, shows three ways a payment can reach you:

Those percentages are for coins. The same page says the fee starts "at 0.5%" for coins such as Bitcoin, Ethereum and Solana, and that "a 1% fee is charged on incoming token payments instead." USDC and USDT are tokens. Payout modes that need a conversion add 0.1%, and on Ethereum a variable gas surcharge "is added to both the order total the buyer pays and the payment fee."

The default is custody. The wallet in "To Balance" is a CoinPayments wallet, and the site footer says "custodial wallet services and other virtual asset services" are provided by PaidInSatoshi Inc., Centauri Pay LLC or their partners. ASAP mode does forward each payment to an address you choose, but the customer pays a CoinPayments address first. The new platform works the same way. Its webhook documentation describes invoiceCompleted as the event that fires "when funds are reflected in the merchant's balance," and calls it "the safe trigger to release goods."

And there are now two CoinPayments. Its FAQ says the new platform "operates as a completely independent system, meaning all merchant and customer data, funds, and documentation are separate from the legacy platform," and that "we require all users to sign up as new users and complete the verification process (KYC)." Both platforms "will remain accessible during the transition period," with no end date given. The migration guide shows how different they are. The legacy API takes form-encoded POSTs to /api.php, signed with an HMAC header. The new one uses JSON routes and three headers (X-CoinPayments-Client, X-CoinPayments-Timestamp and a Base64 HMAC-SHA256 X-CoinPayments-Signature). Every currency needs its own wallet, currencies are referenced by ID instead of symbol, and IPNs become webhooks.

None of that is a scandal. It's a long-running custodial gateway rebuilding itself. But every change on that list lands on your integration, so it's a good moment to compare. Payzum is a non-custodial, stablecoin-first crypto payment processor: payments settle directly to wallets the merchant controls. It's one of the six options below, and we'll say plainly where another one fits better.

Why merchants are looking for CoinPayments alternatives in 2026

The EU/EEA exit. CoinPayments' FAQ is direct about it: "Due to regulatory requirements under MiCA, COINPAYMENTS is unable to continue serving clients based in the EU/EEA after 1 July 2026. Affected clients were notified in advance and advised to withdraw their full balance before this date." For merchants who didn't, "account access for EU/EEA clients is paused," while the balance is "held securely and kept separate" until claimed. To get it back, you contact support, CoinPayments verifies your identity and returns the funds to a wallet you control. When service will come back "isn't confirmed yet."

The date isn't arbitrary. MiCA's grandfathering clause, Article 143(3), let firms already providing crypto-asset services under national law keep doing so "until 1 July 2026 or until they are granted or refused a MiCA authorisation," as ESMA's MiCA page explains. A provider without an authorisation by then has to stop serving EU clients. And when the provider holds your balance, your money stops with it.

A re-onboarding you didn't choose. If you're on the legacy platform, moving to the new CoinPayments means a new account, a new KYC review, new API credentials with a new signing scheme, a new webhook format and, for cart plugins, a version built for the new platform. That's most of the work of switching providers. If you have to do it anyway, compare first.

The stablecoin surcharge. Say an online store takes $40,000 a month, mostly in USDC. At CoinPayments' 1% token rate, that's $400 a month, plus a network fee per payment in ASAP mode. At Payzum's 0.5% per sale, it's $200 plus on-chain network fees. To be fair, a merchant who mostly takes Bitcoin pays 0.5% at CoinPayments too, so for them the fee isn't the reason to move. Custody and the integration rewrite might be.

Pooled balances are the target. TRM Labs' H1 2026 hacks report (1 July 2026) counted 207 hacks and $972 million stolen in six months. Attacks on "the systems, credentials, and signing infrastructure that control assets" caused about 76% of the losses while making up about 15% of incidents. A balance someone holds for you sits behind that kind of infrastructure. A paused account is the mild version of the same risk. We looked at the harsher version in what happens when a crypto payment provider shuts down.

Why it works this way: where the customer's payment actually goes

There's a simple test for any processor. Ask where the customer's transaction goes. If it goes to an address the provider controls, the provider holds your money, even if only until the nightly batch. If it goes to an address your keys control, nobody else holds it.

You'll find five models:

• Custodial balance. The provider receives the payment, credits your account and pays out in crypto or fiat when you withdraw. CoinPayments' "To Balance" mode, BitPay and CoinGate work this way.
• Forwarding. The payment lands at the provider's address and is then sent on to yours, one by one or in a batch. CoinPayments' ASAP and Nightly modes, and NOWPayments' forwarding mode, work this way. It looks non-custodial, but the provider touches every payment.
• Non-custodial, hosted. The provider runs invoices, checkout, network monitoring and notifications, and the payment settles to an address only you control. Payzum and DepiPay work this way.
• Self-hosted. You run the processor yourself and receive straight to your wallet. That's BTCPay Server.
• Protocol or do-it-yourself. You build on an open standard or just share a wallet address.

Custody isn't wrong. It's how a provider can pay fiat into your bank, convert coins for you and recover a payment sent on the wrong network. The question is whether you need those things more than you need the money in your own wallet the moment it confirms. For more on the model, see what a non-custodial crypto payment processor is.

The 6 best CoinPayments alternatives

We checked each provider's public pages and documentation on 18 October 2026, unless a different date is given. They're grouped by who holds the money: three that settle to your wallet, one hybrid, two custodial. We don't link to other providers, but every name is easy to find.

1. Payzum: best for stablecoins on many networks, online and at the counter

Payzum never holds, pools or controls merchant funds. The customer pays from their wallet and the payment settles in yours: the settlement is the payment. It runs on Bitcoin, Ethereum, Solana, Polygon, Base, Arbitrum, Optimism, BNB Chain and Avalanche. Typical confirmations take about 0.4 seconds on Solana and about 2 seconds on Base or Polygon. If you also accept volatile coins, optional auto-convert to USDC or USDT is available on most supported networks, and the result still lands in your wallet (how auto-convert works).

Online, you get no-code payment links and buttons, a hosted checkout (redirect, modal or inline), invoices with an expiry time and overpayment detection, recurring subscriptions and donations. At a counter, the POS shows a new QR code for every sale, any phone works as a terminal, cashiers sign in with a PIN, and you get analytics per cashier and terminal. There are no chargebacks. Payouts live in the same dashboard: CSV mass payouts in BTC, LTC and DOGE, and stablecoin payouts on Polygon, Arbitrum, Optimism, Base, BNB Chain and Avalanche.

For CoinPayments merchants, two things shorten the move. Payzum's signed webhooks come in a CoinPayments-compatible IPN format (HMAC-SHA-512 in an HMAC header) as well as a NOWPayments-compatible one, so an existing handler keeps its logic. And if you use a cart, Payzum's 29 open-source integrations include WooCommerce, WHMCS, Blesta, Magento 2 and PrestaShop. There are official SDKs for Node.js, PHP, Python and Rust. Security includes 2FA, encrypted secrets and a full audit log. Pricing is 0.5% per processed sale on coins and stablecoins alike, plus on-chain network fees.

Limits to know: Payzum is crypto-only and never pays fiat into a bank. It doesn't support TRON, and it focuses on BTC, ETH and stablecoins on nine networks, not 40+ coins. Refunds are on-chain payments you send yourself. Sign-up includes KYC, and your wallet's security is your responsibility. Best for: merchants whose customers pay mostly in USDC, USDT, BTC or ETH, who want the money in their own wallet, online and in person.

2. DepiPay: CoinPayments' own non-custodial option

CoinPayments' FAQ points merchants who want to keep control of their funds to DepiPay, "our non-custodial payment solution." DepiPay is operated by Depipay, Inc., and its about page was published on 1 September 2026. You connect a wallet such as MetaMask or TronLink, and each payment goes to a deposit address tied to a smart wallet that only your key controls. Its developer docs say: "you build, sign and broadcast the withdrawal transaction yourself." Its FAQ says it requires "no registration, no identity verification, and no KYC/KYB process."

Its coin list shows eight assets on three networks: ETH, BNB and TRX, plus USDT and USDC on Ethereum and BNB Smart Chain, and USDT on TRON. Solana is "coming soon." The fee is charged when you withdraw, never on incoming deposits. Its pricing page says fees start at 0.5%, a launch rate for merchants who register within the first 50 days, while the coin list shows 1% per coin.

For developers, the model is different from CoinPayments' IPN. The docs say: "create an invoice, then poll for payment events," every two to five seconds during active payments, with requests signed by an Ethereum-style session key. There's no IPN or webhook in those docs, so your CoinPayments handler won't carry over. Every invoice you create through the API is a real one; the docs suggest marking tests with [sandbox] in the description.

Best for: merchants who want to stay with the CoinPayments family without custody, especially if their customers pay USDT on TRON, and who don't mind polling. If you need Solana, Base or Polygon today, or a POS with PIN cashiers, look at the other options.

3. BTCPay Server: best if you run a server and mostly take Bitcoin

BTCPay Server is free, open-source software you host yourself. Its FAQ calls it "a non-custodial invoicing system" for Bitcoin on-chain and the Lightning Network, and says: "There are no subscriptions, no transaction fees." The project focuses on Bitcoin. When we checked on 17 October 2026, stablecoins came through community plugins: the Tether USDt plugin covers USDT on TRON, Ethereum and Polygon, but not USDC. We covered the details in our BTCPay Server alternative guide.

Best for: Bitcoin-first merchants with someone who can run, update and back up a server around the clock.

4. NOWPayments: a hybrid with a long coin list

NOWPayments lists 350+ currencies and offers both forwarding and a custodial balance. As we documented on 14 October 2026, new accounts have started with Custody switched on since 28 May 2026, and even its forwarding mode passes payments through a NOWPayments deposit address. If you've integrated it before, Payzum's default IPN uses the same x-nowpayments-sig format. See our NOWPayments alternatives guide.

Best for: merchants who need long-tail coins with a hosted balance and are comfortable with that model.

5. BitPay: best if you need fiat in a bank

BitPay is custodial: it credits each completed payment to your BitPay account and settles every business day to your bank or a crypto wallet, with a minimum per currency. It deposits US dollars, euros, pounds and Mexican pesos, among others. Its pricing page, published on 13 October 2026 and unchanged when we checked, lists 2% + 25¢ per transaction below $500,000 a month, 1.5% + 25¢ up to $999,999 and 1% + 25¢ above that, with higher fees for high-risk industries. Details in our BitPay alternatives guide.

Best for: businesses whose finance team needs fiat in the bank every morning and doesn't want to hold a wallet.

6. CoinGate: best for EU businesses that want a licensed custodian

For EU merchants cut off by CoinPayments who want the same custodial model, CoinGate is the obvious name. Its site says UAB Decentralized, incorporated in Lithuania, "is authorised as a Crypto-Asset Service Provider under the EU Markets in Crypto-Assets Regulation (MiCA) by the Bank of Lithuania (Authorization code: LB002323)," and is also licensed there as a payment institution (LB002324). It accepts "BTC, USDC, and 10+ crypto assets" and settles "directly into EUR, USD, or stablecoins."

Best for: EU businesses that want euros in the bank from a MiCA-authorised provider. You trade self-custody for that.

When staying on CoinPayments is the right call

If you're outside the EU, take long-tail coins that the options above don't list, have many customers paying USDT on TRON, or like having a hosted multi-coin wallet with conversions and partner fiat off-ramps, CoinPayments still does that job. Moving from its legacy platform to the new one is a real project, but it keeps you with a provider you know.

CoinPayments vs the alternatives, side by side

Fees are as each provider published them on the dates above. Where we couldn't verify a fee on publication day, we left it out. For a wider list, see the best crypto payment processors in 2026.

How does Payzum compare with CoinPayments?

If you're deciding between CoinPayments and Payzum specifically, these are the differences you'll notice day to day. CoinPayments facts come from its fee page, FAQ and API documentation, checked on 18 October 2026.

The short version: if you want a hosted multi-coin wallet with conversions and a long coin list, CoinPayments does that job. If you want stablecoins in your own wallet the moment they confirm, at half CoinPayments' token rate, with a counter and payouts in the same account, Payzum does that job.

How to move from CoinPayments to Payzum, step by step

If you use a CoinPayments cart plugin, the move is mostly installing Payzum's plugin for the same platform and pasting your keys. If you built on CoinPayments' legacy API, follow this order so no paid order gets lost.

1. Get your balance out first. Withdraw everything from your CoinPayments wallet to a wallet you control. Its FAQ says the minimum withdrawal is generally twice the network fee for that coin. If you're in the EU/EEA and your account is paused, follow CoinPayments' reclaim process: contact support, verify your identity and give them a wallet address.
2. Check what your customers pay with. Export a few months of transactions and group them by coin and network. Watch for USDT on TRON: according to Tether's transparency data on 18 October 2026, about $93.0 billion of the $183.7 billion USDT in circulation (50.6%) was issued on TRON. Payzum doesn't support TRON. If that's a big share of your sales, ask those customers to send USDT on BNB Chain, Polygon or Solana, or keep CoinPayments or DepiPay for that slice.
3. Set up Payzum. Create the account, complete KYC and turn on 2FA. Connect wallets you control, choose coins and networks, and decide whether to auto-convert. Test on the sandbox first (staging.payzum.com, with its own keys).
4. Choose your IPN format. An account uses one format at a time. Tell us you're coming from CoinPayments and we'll switch your account to the CoinPayments-compatible format. For new code, we recommend the NOWPayments-compatible format instead, because it carries a signed timestamp for replay protection and the CoinPayments format doesn't.
5. Replace the invoice call. Swap cmd=create_transaction on /api.php for POST /v1/payment with an x-api-key header. Send price_amount and price_currency, set pay_currency to "all" so the buyer picks the coin, pass your order_id and ipn_callback_url, and redirect to the returned invoice_url. Add an Idempotency-Key header, and keep your own uniqueness check on order_id, because the API doesn't enforce it server-side.
6. Change the handler's settings, not its logic. Your CoinPayments merchant ID becomes your Payzum merchant ID, and your IPN secret becomes your Payzum webhook secret, which is shown once when you create or rotate it. Read your order number from the invoice field, where Payzum puts your order_id, not from custom or item_number. Keep verifying the HMAC over the raw body bytes, and deduplicate on ipn_id, which stays the same across retries. The official SDKs do the verification for you: verifyCoinPaymentsIpn in Node.js and PHP, verify_coinpayments_ipn in Python and Rust.
7. Test, then cut over. Run the sandbox, then one small real payment. Switch new checkouts, replace old payment buttons and links, and keep your CoinPayments IPN endpoint running until the last open CoinPayments invoice has timed out.

Here's the core change in a typical legacy integration:

# Before: CoinPayments (legacy API)
POST https://www.coinpayments.net/api.php
HMAC: <HMAC-SHA-512 of the raw POST body, keyed with your API private key>
Content-Type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded

version=1&cmd=create_transaction&key=<public key>
&amount=49.99&currency1=USD&currency2=USDC.BEP20
&[email protected]&invoice=1042
&ipn_url=https://shop.example/cp/ipn
# -> send the buyer to result.checkout_url

# After: Payzum
POST https://merchant.payzum.com/v1/payment   # sandbox: https://staging.payzum.com
x-api-key: <Payzum API key>
Idempotency-Key: order-1042
{ "price_amount": 49.99, "price_currency": "usd", "pay_currency": "all",
  "order_id": "1042",
  "ipn_callback_url": "https://shop.example/cp/ipn",
  "success_url": "https://shop.example/thanks",
  "cancel_url": "https://shop.example/cart" }
# -> send the buyer to invoice_url

# Your IPN handler, in CoinPayments format, stays the same:
#   ipn_mode == "hmac", HMAC header == HMAC-SHA-512(raw body, webhook secret)
#   merchant == your Payzum merchant ID
#   order number in "invoice"; deduplicate on "ipn_id"
#   status >= 100 -> complete · status < 0 -> failed · else pending

And here's how CoinPayments' status codes map to what Payzum sends in the CoinPayments format:

One difference to plan for: neither CoinPayments' legacy IPN nor its Payzum-compatible version carries a timestamp, so no replay window is possible. Deduplicating on ipn_id is the defence. If you'd rather have signed timestamps, use Payzum's NOWPayments-compatible format, covered in our guide to signed webhooks.

CoinPayments alternatives in practice: seven merchants

The right choice depends on the business. Here's how the options map to real situations, including the ones where the honest answer isn't Payzum.

• A hardware shop in Berlin with a custom PHP checkout. Its CoinPayments account was paused on 1 July 2026. It reclaims its balance through support, opens a Payzum account and asks for CoinPayments-format IPNs. The developer changes the invoice call, the merchant ID and the secret. The handler that has worked for six years stays. Customers now pay USDC on Base or Polygon straight into the shop's wallet.
• A web host in Texas on WHMCS. Moving to CoinPayments' new platform would mean a new account, new KYC and a new module anyway. It installs Payzum's open-source WHMCS module instead, and invoices are marked paid from the signed callback, not the return page.
• A game top-up store taking $40,000 a month in USDC. At CoinPayments' 1% token rate it paid $400 a month, plus network fees on each forwarded payment. At Payzum's 0.5% it pays $200 plus on-chain network fees, and each payment lands in its own wallet in seconds on Solana or Base.
• A food stand at a market in Austin. It never needed a full gateway, just a fast way to take USDC. With the Payzum POS, each sale shows a new QR code on any phone, every server has a PIN, and the money settles in the owner's wallet with no chargebacks.
• An electronics exporter in Dubai whose buyers pay USDT on TRON. Payzum doesn't support TRON, and asking every buyer to switch networks would cost sales. It stays on CoinPayments, or moves to DepiPay if it wants the same networks without custody.
• A Bitcoin-only merchant with a sysadmin. It never took stablecoins and pays 0.5% on BTC at CoinPayments. BTCPay Server removes the processing fee, and the team is happy to pay for hosting and run the server.
• A B2B supplier in Rotterdam whose accountant wants euros. It needs a regulated provider in the EU that deposits euros to its bank. CoinGate, authorised under MiCA by the Bank of Lithuania, fits that better than any non-custodial option.

Common objections to leaving CoinPayments

"CoinPayments accepts 40+ coins. Payzum doesn't."

That's true. Payzum focuses on BTC, ETH and stablecoins on nine networks. Before you decide, look at your own data: if 95% of your volume is USDC, USDT, BTC and ETH, the long tail costs you little. If a real share comes in coins Payzum doesn't list, CoinPayments or NOWPayments may suit you better.

"CoinPayments' new platform fixes the old problems."

It modernises a lot: a JSON API, multi-user permissions, MPC-backed signing and risk screening. It's still custodial. Its own docs say the moment to release goods is when funds are "reflected in the merchant's balance," and the balance is CoinPayments'. If custody was your concern, the new platform doesn't change it.

"We don't want to manage keys."

Fair. With a non-custodial processor, your wallet's security is yours: use a hardware wallet or a multisig, keep a backup and test a withdrawal before you go live. If nobody on your team wants that responsibility, a licensed custodian such as BitPay or CoinGate is the more honest fit.

"Switching means rewriting our integration."

Not the hard part. With CoinPayments-format IPNs, your handler keeps its verification and status logic. You change one invoice call and a few settings, then test on the sandbox. Compared with re-onboarding to CoinPayments' new platform, it's less work.