For every online business, payment gateways are a necessity. If you have the best payment gateways, it helps you offer the customers a streamlined experience and become a powerhouse by reducing the fee. The choice of payment gateway depends on multiple factors, such as your overall payment needs, coding skills, and sales volume. Listed below are the various types of payment gateways and some of the top brands to check out.

Types of payment gateways
There are two kinds of payment gateways – hosted and direct payment gateways. When using the hosted method, users will be redirected to a hosted payment page, wherein they have to enter their sensitive payment details, and the payment will be processed. It is secure because you will not be entering the card details in the store directly; therefore, they cannot save your card details. On the contrary, in the direct payment gateways, you enter the details in the store itself, ensuring faster processing time.

Best payment gateways

PayPal
It is one of the most widely used payment gateways that lets customers receive and make payments globally. It offers payment processing services for auction sites, e-commerce vendors, and other commercial establishments worldwide. PayPal also accepts credit cards like Visa and Amex and provides several personalization options, cart integration, online invoicing, and equips credit card payments via phone. Usually, PayPal is associated with eBay, but it is no longer the company’s primary option as they have transitioned to Adyen. However, it is still an optional payment gateway service. Overall, it is a competitive option with a 2.9% card processing fee per transaction and zero monthly fees, making it an excellent pick for small and new businesses.

Authorize.Net
Over 430,000 merchants trust Authorize.Net, and it manages more than $149 billion in payments and around 1 billion transactions annually. The company recently won many accolades for holding the maximum successful authorization rate. Authorize.Net allows businesses to provide different payment options to the customers, such as eChecks, credit cards, and debit cards, and digital payments, such as Visa Click to Pay, PayPal, and Apple Pay. It is also one of the best choices as it has advanced features, such as fraud detection, and supports recurring payments.

Stax
It is a scalable, low-cost payment gateway wherein merchants have to bear a per-transaction and a monthly fee. However, there is no markup on the interchange fee. Earlier, Stax listed its per-transaction fee clearly, but that no longer exists. So, you will have to communicate with the firm’s sales representative to get a quotation for your company’s applicable rate. In addition, Stax allows invoicing and integrates with QuickBooks Online for seamless accounting. Fortunately, companies do not have to spend extra amounts for functions they do not wish to use. With optional packages and add-ons, you only pay for your requirements. Some examples of extras include an enhanced dashboard, accounting reconciliation syncing, a dedicated account manager, and an API key integration. It is one of the best payment gateways for growth-oriented companies or businesses with a higher sales volume of above $5,000 per month.

Stripe
Stripe is an excellent platform that lets companies manage transactions and accept payments online. It offers a comprehensive toolkit for businesses operating online, say, a crowdfunding platform, an e-commerce store, an on-demand marketplace, or a subscription service. Stripe employs a cloud-based infrastructure that allows scalability to boost security. It eliminates the financial operation complexity in online commerce by enabling the platform to work with financial institutions, regulators, payment networks, consumer wallets, and banks in place of the business. It also offers a service for payment platforms and marketplaces to use while paying out to a third party or accepting payments, making it easy for Stripe to work for every business model.