If you’re a creator who’s trying to decide whether or not to try Fansly vs OnlyFans, it essentially comes down to discovery and payout options. Both keep 20% of every subscription, tip and pay-per-view message. OnlyFans reported 377.5 million fan accounts, but its internal discovery is limited to home-page recommendations. Fansly runs a For You Page inside the app that shows creators to fans who have never heard of them, and it pays out in most major currencies by bank, crypto and local e-wallets, while OnlyFans pays US dollars only.
OnlyFans paid out roughly $5.8 billion to creators in its last audited year, from a total of $7.22 billion in fan payments. In May the family trust that controls it sold roughly 16% of parent company Fenix International to Architect Capital at a $3.15 billion valuation. However, the investment has not changed the 20% fee.
Fansly Vs. OnlyFans
The decision rests on how you get paid, how easily fans convert, and whether you need the platform to find fans for you.
Getting paid: OnlyFans pays in US dollars by bank or wallet, while Fansly adds crypto and local rails in most major currencies, which matters if you are outside the US or a bank has dropped you.
Conversion: OnlyFans’ size does not send you traffic, but a fan you send there may already have an account, a card on file and, where the law requires it, an age check behind them, which shortens checkout and removes a potential barrier of having to add in payment details all over again.
Discovery: Getting discovered on OnlyFans can be difficult without an established audience, as Freya Parker confirms: “…when you don’t have any way of advertising yourself, it is not easy.” Fansly’s For You Page and Suggestions tab can put your posts in front of strangers, while OnlyFans’ limited home-page recommendations don’t. You can’t expect Fansly’s FYP to work overnight, but it can be helpful. Fansly’s own guides tell creators they still have to promote outside the platform, to post on predictable days and times, and to set the profile up to convert the visitors the FYP sends. Plan on bringing your own traffic either way.
Content Allowed: Because OnlyFans is the biggest, and therefore most visible and scrutinized platform of them all, they’ve had to adhere to stricter terms of service in order to operate. That means there’s a lot of things not allowed on OnlyFans that you can get away with on other platforms. If your niche is fetish, you may find that OnlyFans doesn’t permit a lot of your content to exist on the site. Public nudity for example is not allowed, and there is even some censorship on the types of sex toys you can use (no food items like cucumbers, for example). Even just types of sex acts have been banned from OnlyFans– controversial performer Bonnie Blue was banned from OnlyFans for her sex challenges involving multiple people, yet she continues to exist on Fansly. Mia Ventura cautioned her fans that much of her kink content is not available on OnlyFans: “if you want fetish stuff it is definitely Fansly and LoyalFans.”
However, don’t be surprised if other platforms change their TOS on you– as credit card companies continue to crack down on adult sites, many have no choice but to change the type of content you can post. Rachel Steele has experienced this, noting: “I did actually just get a notification from Fansly recently that a bunch of things that were previously okay are now no longer okay.”
Comparing OnlyFans, Fansly, Fanvue and Hidden on Payouts, Fan Discovery, AI guidelines and More
| OnlyFans | Fansly | Fanvue | Hidden | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Creator share | 80% | 80% | 80%; the 85% rate for creators who joined in 2022 ended in May 2026 | 82% of everything, tips included |
| Minimum payout | $20 for most methods; shown per method on the Statements Page | $20 Paxum, Cosmopayment, US ACH and local bank; $50 SEPA; $100 wire and crypto | $20 available balance, and at least 5 uploads; regional variations | $20 in the US; varies elsewhere |
| Payout timing | 7-day pending balance, then paid on request or on a daily, weekly or monthly schedule; 21 days in a few high-reversal countries for the first four months | Earnings clear after 7 days; payout on request | Request, then sent within 3 to 5 business days per its help centre; payout terms allow a 7-day hold, up to 28 on risk flags | 5-business-day rolling hold, then request; lands in 3 to 5 business days |
| In-app discovery | Limited home-page recommendations; no public search | For You Page, Suggestions tab, hashtag and profile-tag search | Discover feed, randomised with new and fast-growing accounts nearer the top; Suggested Creators tabs; name search | Discovery feed and Explore page, driven by 30+ categories and 150+ approved tags |
| AI content | Allowed, must be captioned #ai | Photorealistic AI banned, labelled or not; non-photorealistic virtual personas allowed with real ID | Fully AI content allowed with disclosure in bio, caption or watermark; face-swaps only of a verified real model; AI creator category | AI of yourself only, labelled #ai; no AI of anyone else; no AI-written messages |
| Chargebacks | Creator’s share of a disputed payment is deducted | Chargeback protection, per Fansly’s FAQ | Deducted from earnings; $50 fee per dispute above a 1.5% rolling rate per its payout terms; payouts restricted while a rate stays high | Reversals taken back through the platform; no creator-protection terms published |
| Payout methods | Depend on country; for a US creator: bank transfer, Paxum, Wise or Payoneer; no international wire or crypto for US accounts; SEPA and international wire ($30 OnlyFans fee) are for creators elsewhere; USD only, conversion charged to creator | Bank (ACH/SEPA/SWIFT), Paxum, Cosmopayment, crypto, regional e-wallets; most major currencies | Bank worldwide; Masspay, Cosmo and crypto by location; 1% fee on crypto via TripleA; no PayPal | Bank, USD only; other methods; no fee in the US, UK or EU; $30 wire fee elsewhere on payouts under $400 |
How Much Fansly and OnlyFans Really Take
Fansly vs OnlyFans is a tie on fees. Both keep 20% of fan payments. OnlyFans writes it plainly in its terms: the fee “is calculated as 20% of the total Fan Payment,” and it applies to subscriptions, tips and PPV alike. Fansly and Fanvue charge the same. though the latter did have an 85% rate for creators (taking 15%) who joined in 2022. That ended in May 2026. Hidden undercuts all three at 18%.
Payout Rules That Can Take Money Out of a Creator’s Pocket
The Hold:
OnlyFans keeps the last seven days of earnings in a pending balance before they can be paid out, and 21 days for creators in a small number of countries with high reversal rates. Refunds and chargebacks come out of that balance as adjustments. Fanvue’s terms allow a seven-day hold, up to 28 on a risk flag, but its help center says payouts are sent within three to five business days.
The Dispute Fee:
Fanvue charges a $50 administrative fee per dispute once a creator’s chargeback rate passes 1.5% in a rolling month. Fansly’s FAQ page says it offers chargeback protection so creators keep the funds they earn.
The Dormancy Clause:
Fanvue marks a balance dormant after twelve months without activity. The creator waives the right to that money unless it is reclaimed within six years.
Where the Money Can Go:
OnlyFans pays in US dollars only, and any currency conversion is charged to the creator. For a US creator, the methods are bank transfer, Paxum, and Wise or Payoneer. International wire, at a $30 fee, and SEPA for creators outside the US. There is no crypto option.
Fansly pays in most major currencies through bank transfer, Paxum, Cosmopayment, crypto and regional e-wallets such as PIX, Mercadopago, GCash and GrabPay, depending on your country, with no hidden payout fees.
Fanvue pays by bank anywhere, plus Masspay, Cosmo and crypto where available, with a 1% fee on crypto, while Hidden pays by bank in US dollars, listing no other method. It charges no fee in the US, UK or EU and a $30 wire fee elsewhere on anything under $400.
Adult creators are routinely refused accounts, frozen or dropped by banks and processors, as Wet Ink has reported. A creator outside the US, or one whose bank has closed the account, can still be paid on Fansly through crypto or a local rail. Stella Barey, founder of Hidden, recounts her own experience with getting her accounts pulled because of payments from OnlyFans: “I’ve even been banned from two banks. Randomly, they just figured out that I was getting paid from OnlyFans and said I don’t comply with their terms.”
Age Checks Before the Paywall
Age verification adds another step before a viewer can reach a creator’s page, and for many fans it’s a bigger hurdle than paying. The UK’s Online Safety Act has required adult sites to verify age since July 2025, and roughly two dozen US states now require a government ID or an equivalent check before anyone can view a site that is more than a third sexually explicit; Missouri’s law took effect on August 28 with fines of $10,000 a day. Texas has gone further and requires app stores to verify the age of anyone downloading an app, a rule the Supreme Court left in force in July.
Pornhub cut off UK users who had not already verified rather than collect their IDs, and came back only for age-confirmed iPhone users once Apple started confirming age at the account level. Adult retailers in age-check states told Mashable that DVD sales are up because customers would rather pay cash than scan a face.
Assume every platform verifies age wherever the law requires it. The difference for a creator is who has already done it. A fan who already uses OnlyFans in an age-check state or country has cleared that step once and does not have to clear it again for your page. A fan you send to a platform they have never used has to verify before they can get in, and some may not.
Age checks are one more reason the platform where your fans already have accounts can convert better, and one more cost of asking them to follow you somewhere new. Fanvue, for example, shows safe-for-work content by default and asks fans in some regions to verify before NSFW content is shown.
How Fansly Works for Discovery
Fansly’s creator guides describe automatic and searchable promotion. Automatic promotion can put posts on the For You Page and the Suggestions tab based on user activity. It should be noted that the FYP only accepts video, not photos. Also, the preview-versus-main-video setup can be confusing and a lot of creators we’ve surveyed say they struggle with it and that it’s not the most user-friendly mechanism.
To reach the FYP, a post needs an unlocked media item or preview and the “Post to FYP” box checked. Fansly recommends five to ten hashtags. Creators can also let people follow for free and control what followers, subscribers and pay-per-view buyers see.
Fansly says its FYP recorded more than 1 billion swipes in 2025 but its guides also state that the FYP is not a substitute for your own promotion. Keep posting externally, post at predictable times, use a free preview and five to ten hashtags to build the profile so a visitor who arrives from the FYP has a reason to follow and then pay. Treat it as an extra source of traffic, not the only one. Fans can search hashtags and profile tags, and profile tags also feed the Suggestions tab.
While Fansly doesn’t publish fan-account numbers; OnlyFans reports 377.5 million. Some creators run both and post the same catalogue to each.
OnlyFans Scale, Discovery and Ownership
OnlyFans reported 4.634 million creator accounts alongside the 377.5 million fan accounts shared for 2024, with fan payments up 9% on the year. A fan you have brought to the page may already have an OnlyFans account and a card on file, so there are fewer steps between deciding and paying.
Its internal discovery is limited to home-page recommendations. The terms describe a limited recommender that may show “Creator accounts on your home page” to fans with similar tastes. There is no public search, no browse page, no equivalent of an explore tab. OnlyFans even bans creators from buying Google Ads to promote their own pages. Creators bring fans from X or a SFW funnel they control.
The one route to being found that OnlyFans does run is OFTV, its safe-for-work streaming service, which is essentially their version of YouTube for creators and is available in the App Store. If your content is strong enough, they’ll feature your video on the OnlyFans home page, and the traffic spike can be enormous, up to 700% or even more. The catch is that these features are hand-picked rather than algorithmic, and some creators are featured far more often than others, so it can feel biased. The content bar is high as well: must be horizontal, at least three minutes long, clean audio, and non-explicit. Their rules on what you can say can feel stricter than YouTube’s. Every video you submit is approved by a human and it can take a few days.
When founder/owner Leonid Radvinsky died in March, his widow, Yekaterina Chudnovsky, took majority control of Fenix International, OnlyFans parent company. In May the trust sold roughly 16% of Fenix International to Architect Capital for $535 million. That valued the company at $3.15 billion, below the $8 billion discussed in 2025. Architect founder James Sagan has since talked about a stock market listing as early as 2028 and about seeking a banking license to make creator payouts more reliable. Wet Ink’s story about that interview has the details. The deal has not changed the 20% fee, and Architect’s plans are not OnlyFans policy.
OnlyFans vs Fanvue and Fansly for AI creators
While OnlyFans permits AI-generated content only when it is captioned #ai, Fanvue accepts fully synthetic, disclosed AI creators as a category. Its rules require the disclosure to be prominent, in the bio, the caption or a watermark, and they allow face-swapped material only when the real model behind it is verified. Fanvue reportedly raised $22 million in January to expand its AI tools, including a proprietary artificial intelligence toolkit, which includes predictive analytics, automated DM messaging agents, automated profile optimization, and voice cloning. Its Discover feed is randomized by default, with new, fast-growing and high-performing accounts nearer the top, and intro videos always get a placement.
Fansly does not allow AI. Its terms also bar AI systems that talk to fans without human oversight, and any content that passes off AI material as human performance. A non-photorealistic virtual persona is allowed, but a real person has to verify with a government ID behind it.
OnlyFans and Fansly Alternatives
Fansly and OnlyFans are not the whole market, so creators should research all the options, including Hidden, JustFor.Fans, LoyalFans, ManyVids, Stripchat and other cam sites. Fees, discovery tools and payout options differ, and so does how much of it they publish.
| Creator share | Payouts | Discovery | |
|---|---|---|---|
| JustFor.Fans | 80%; 85% for exclusive performers | Bank, crypto; $50 minimum | Explore page and tag search |
| LoyalFans | 80% | ACH, wire, SEPA, Paxum; $50 minimum, 1st and 15th | Tabs for “new creators,” “recently updated” and going “live” within the platform. |
| ManyVids | 80% on club subscriptions, tips, custom vids and store items; 60% on vid sales, bundles, pay-to-open messages and contest votes | Direct deposit ($2 US, $5.50 international), Paxum ($1, non-US or corporations only) or Cosmopayment; $50 minimum; paid every Wednesday, one week in arrears | Site search with category tags and filters; a Creators page ranked by MV Score, with a trending filter; a free Club feed |
Hidden is the one Wet Ink has looked at most closely. Performer Stella Barey founded it, launching in April 2025 and co-owns it with Lana Rhoades and Ari Kytsya, which puts sex workers on the ownership side of the platform. As seen in the first comparison chart in this guide, creators keep 82% of everything including tips, with no tiers and no conditions. Earnings sit in a rolling five-business-day hold, then you request a payout and it lands in three to five business days, by bank in US dollars, free in the US, UK and EU. Discovery runs through a Discovery feed and an Explore page fed by more than 30 categories and 150 approved tags; a post with neither is shown only to people who already follow you. AI content is allowed only of yourself and must be labelled #ai, but AI-written messages to fans are banned. There is no comment section, and fans pay to message.
JustFor.Fans pays performers 80% across the board and 85% to its Exclusive Performers on tips, store, private media and messaging, as seen in the above chart. It has an Explore page with tag search, and it takes fan payments in crypto. Creator payouts are reported as bank or crypto with a $50 minimum.
LoyalFans is reported to run the same 80/20 split as the big two, with payouts on the 1st and 15th by ACH, wire, SEPA or Paxum and a $50 minimum. It also offers a 5% lifetime referral share on creators and fans you bring in, region blocking so your profile is invisible where you choose, watermarking and a Go Live feature.
ManyVids is a marketplace first and a subscription site second, and its help centre is unusually specific. Creators keep 80% on club subscriptions, tips, custom videos and store items, and 60% on video sales, bundles, pay-to-open messages and contest votes; MV Live tokens pay $0.08 each. Payouts go out every Wednesday, held one week in arrears, once you pass a $50 minimum you can raise but not lower. The methods are direct deposit at a $2 fee in the US or $5.50 internationally, Paxum at $1, which US creators can only use through a corporation, and Cosmopayment. Fans can pay in more than 50 cryptocurrencies, but creators are not paid in crypto. Discovery is search with category tags and filters, a Creators page ranked by MV Score with a trending view, and a free Club feed where creators can post four times a day. ManyVids calls itself a human-centred economy: it does not accept new AI-only accounts by default, and a human creator’s account with more than three AI-generated videos can be reclassified, cut back in exposure or closed.
A subscription site may not be the best place to start at all. SWR Data’s State of the Creator survey found that dedicated cammers were the group most likely to report income growth in a bad year. Nearly 80% of them ranked a platform’s internal traffic as the most important factor in choosing where to work, ahead of payout percentage. Wet Ink covered the findings in May. If you have never streamed, start with our camming guide for new models.
Decisions, Decisions: How to Choose Between Fansly, OnlyFans and the Rest
Ultimately, new creators have many platforms to choose from and the best one for you will be based on a variety of factors. This guide is meant to help with the biggest questions—how you’ll be paid and how you’ll be discovered—with compared and contrasted stats and information. The next step is figuring out what your priorities are. Here are some final tips to help tailor your decisions:
Do You Have an Established Audience?
A fan you bring may already have an OnlyFans account and card on file, which can shorten checkout. Kimberly Kane confirms that your fans may already be on the platform, commenting: “…you have to be where the fans are, and the fans are [on] OnlyFans.” It’s your best bet if you already have a following on social media you can bring over, just make sure to check how OnlyFans pays you where you live before you default to it. Add Fansly as well, if keeping the same catalogue on two platforms is manageable.
Are You Brand New with No Audience Yet?
Start with Fansly for its discovery tools. Adding OnlyFans later means building a new subscriber base. You can repost the content and update your links, however subscribers and their payment details do not transfer.
Sometimes signing with an agency can help in this cause because some of them actually create multiple social media accounts for their creators to drive traffic to their platforms. They also sometimes cross-promote with their other more established models. However, it’s important to note that there are many predatory agencies out there, so do your research. Do not sign a management contract under same-day pressure. Some agencies court new creators with a contract on the spot. Kit Barrus’s guide to spotting them explains what to check before signing.
Beyond that, there’s a whole networking business of paid promotional opportunities with other creators, called “guaranteed gains” or GG for short. How it works is that models advertise a guaranteed number of subscribers to your profile for a certain price, by promoting you on their Fansly or Onlyfans. Telegram has lots of channels dedicated to this networking hustle, though you can also find it on sites like Gigsocial.com. It’s a sizeable business, though whether it converts into paying subscribers can be hard to say. Most models use free trial links to track these new subscribers, but many of these fans don’t end up spending any money, and the quality of traffic you get depends on the creator you buy the GG from.
Interested in AI or Persona Content?
Fanvue is probably your best bet. They hit a $200 million annualized run rate in May of 2026 and has become the default home for AI creators now that OnlyFans won’t host them. But AI-generated creators account for only about 15% of that revenue, roughly $30 million a year split across all of them. The numbers that circulate come from the same two or three names repeated across dozens of sites, and the group actually clearing $20,000 a month is probably in the low hundreds. More than half of creators on the platform make under $15,000 a year. So don’t let the headlines set your expectations.
Outside the US, or Dropped by your Bank?
OnlyFans pays out in dollars no matter where you live, so your own bank does the conversion and takes one to three percent off the mid-market rate. On a $5,000 payout that’s fifty to a hundred and fifty dollars you never see. Your options are a bank deposit, a wire that costs $30 plus your bank’s fee, or an e-wallet in select regions. There’s no crypto route. Fansly publishes a wider menu: Paxum and Cosmopayment at $20, SEPA for the EU and UK, local bank deposits across South America and Asia, SWIFT wires and crypto at $100. Fanvue offers bank transfer worldwide plus e-wallets and crypto, though no PayPal.
That crypto option matters more to creators these days: in December the OCC found that all nine of the largest national banks it supervises had policies making inappropriate distinctions based on lawful business activity, with adult entertainment named among the affected sectors. For example big names like Cherie DeVille and Alix Lynx both had accounts closed this year. Just check which methods are live in your country first, because the menus are regional.
Put money aside for tax from the first payout. What you owe depends on where you live and how the business is set up. Make sure you are educated about your tax liability and get yourself an accountant– there have been many cases of successful creators who now have the IRS on their tail. Some have even been prosecuted, such as Natalie Monroe who owed $1.5 million in taxes and has now been sentenced to an year in jail.
Shooting with Other People?
Each platform has its own consent and verification rules. On OnlyFans, every person in the content must be a tagged verified creator or have ID and written consent on file. OnlyFans can demand those records and withhold earnings, and a co-author can revoke consent. If they are not on the platform, you can send them a model release through Onlyfans to fill out and to provide IDs.
Fansly runs a Co-Performers dashboard: send an on-site consent request to a verified Fansly creator, or upload the consent and ID records Fansly requires, and wait for compliance approval before posting. Fansly is blunt that tagging is not consent and the creator, not the collaborator, has to hold the paperwork.
Fanvue wants either a tagged, verified creator account for each person or a model release with ID, a dated headshot and a full-body photo, with a new form for each piece that features a new person. Check the specific rule on your platform before the shoot, not after. Our guide to finding creator collaborations covers how to set those shoots up.
Consider Running Multiple Accounts on More Than Platform
You do not have to choose. Fansly’s own migration guide describes creators who keep both platforms active and post the same catalogue to each, and in the SWR Data survey two thirds of dedicated cammers also sold fan-site content. Use OnlyFans for the fans already there and Fansly for its FYP and search tools. It is more work, but and Fansly’s discovery is the case for doing it anyway. Some creators run both profiles from one inbox with a management tool such as Infloww. Add a smaller platform when you can keep that page current too.
