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Nonprofits · head to head

CharityEngine vs Keela

CharityEngine logo

CharityEngine

Nonprofits

Nonprofit CRM with its own in-house payment processing rather than a third-party gateway

From
On request
Rated
-
Full reviewWebsite
Keela logo

Keela

Nonprofits

Nonprofit CRM and fundraising platform with Canadian tax receipting built in

From
On request
Rated
-
Full reviewWebsite

The short version

  • Each has a real cost: CharityEngine payment processing rates are negotiated and never published, so the total cost cannot be compared to a licence-only CRM without getting a quote and modelling your own volume in basis points.; Keela pricing scales with contact count, so a charity that keeps twenty years of lapsed donors pays every month for records it never contacts, and the only fix is deleting history it may need for reporting.
  • They diverge on capability: CharityEngine covers In-house payment processing, Keela covers Donor records and segmentation.
  • Prices and features above were last checked on 31 August 2026.

Where they differ

Only the attributes on which CharityEngine and Keela actually diverge.

Attributes where CharityEngine and Keela differ
AttributeCharityEngineKeela
Pricing modelquotePer month by contact count

Identical on both: starting price (On request), free tier (No), platforms (Web), user rating (Not yet rated), category (Nonprofits).

What each one covers

Drawn from each product's published feature list. An absence here means we hold no record of it - not that the product lacks it.

Only in CharityEngine

  • In-house payment processing
  • Recurring giving recovery
  • Direct mail segmentation
  • Peer-to-peer and events
  • Advocacy and membership
  • Marketing automation

Only in Keela

  • Donor records and segmentation
  • CRA and IRS receipting
  • Donation forms and pages
  • Email and automation
  • Grant and pledge tracking
  • Reporting dashboards

What people use each for

The jobs each tool is most often brought in to do.

CharityEngine

  • A nonprofit processing high recurring gift volume that wants card updater and dunning built into the CRM rather than bought separatelynot Keela
  • Replacing a stack of a CRM, an email tool and a separate donation gateway with one contract and one reconciliationnot Keela
  • A direct mail heavy organisation that needs offline gift entry and mail file segmentation as first-class features, not add-onsnot Keela
  • An organisation whose finance team wants a single settlement file that already reconciles to donor recordsnot Keela

Keela

  • A Canadian registered charity that must issue CRA compliant receipts without building templates itselfnot CharityEngine
  • A development team of two to five people replacing spreadsheets and a mailing toolnot CharityEngine
  • An organisation already running Aplos fund accounting that wants gifts to post through automaticallynot CharityEngine
  • A bilingual charity sending French and English donor communications from one contact listnot CharityEngine

Where each one falls short

Documented limitations, not opinions. Every one is a constraint you would hit in normal use.

CharityEngine

  • Payment processing rates are negotiated and never published, so the total cost cannot be compared to a licence-only CRM without getting a quote and modelling your own volume in basis points.
  • Because the vendor is both the software provider and the merchant processor, switching CRM also means re-papering merchant services and re-tokenising every recurring donor, which is a far larger project than a normal migration.
  • Subscription pricing is quote-only and reported entry points come from third parties rather than the vendor, so small organisations often discover the floor is well above what they budgeted.
  • The interface is dense and configuration-heavy, and organisations without a dedicated database administrator tend to use a fraction of what they pay for.
  • Implementation and data migration are billed on top of the subscription and are commonly the largest first-year line item, which is easy to miss when comparing monthly figures.

Keela

  • Pricing scales with contact count, so a charity that keeps twenty years of lapsed donors pays every month for records it never contacts, and the only fix is deleting history it may need for reporting.
  • The email marketing tools are adequate for donor appeals but weaker than a dedicated platform, so organisations with heavy newsletter programmes end up paying for a second tool and syncing lists.
  • Custom reporting is limited to the fields and filters Keela exposes, so questions the product did not anticipate require exporting to a spreadsheet.
  • The integration list is short next to Salesforce or Blackbaud, so a charity running an unusual event, membership or advocacy tool will be moving data by CSV.
  • Since the 2023 Aplos acquisition the roadmap serves a combined accounting and fundraising suite, so investment favours the accounting join rather than standalone CRM depth.

Pricing, plan by plan

CharityEngine

On request
  • CharityEngine$undefined/year
    • Donor CRM and gift processing
    • In-house payment processing at a negotiated rate
    • Email, SMS and direct mail tools

Keela

On request
  • Keela$undefined/month
    • Published tiers priced by number of contacts held, not by user seat
    • Higher tiers unlock automation, custom fields and additional reporting
    • Card processing is charged separately by the payment processor

Which should you pick?

Choose CharityEngine if

  • You need in-house payment processing.
  • You also want recurring giving recovery.
CharityEngine review

Choose Keela if

  • You need donor records and segmentation.
  • You also want cra and irs receipting.
Keela review

Questions people ask

Is CharityEngine or Keela better?
Neither clearly leads. CharityEngine starts at On request and Keela at On request, and user ratings are close enough to be indistinguishable. Choose on capability and platform support.
Which is cheaper, CharityEngine or Keela?
CharityEngine starts at On request and Keela at On request.
Does CharityEngine or Keela run on more platforms?
Both run on Web, so platform support will not decide this one for you.
What is CharityEngine best used for?
CharityEngine is most often used for a nonprofit processing high recurring gift volume that wants card updater and dunning built into the crm rather than bought separately, replacing a stack of a crm, an email tool and a separate donation gateway with one contract and one reconciliation, a direct mail heavy organisation that needs offline gift entry and mail file segmentation as first-class features, not add-ons, an organisation whose finance team wants a single settlement file that already reconciles to donor records. Of those, a nonprofit processing high recurring gift volume that wants card updater and dunning built into the crm rather than bought separately and replacing a stack of a crm, an email tool and a separate donation gateway with one contract and one reconciliation are not what Keela is typically brought in for.
What can CharityEngine do that Keela cannot?
CharityEngine covers In-house payment processing, Recurring giving recovery, Direct mail segmentation, Peer-to-peer and events. Keela covers Donor records and segmentation, CRA and IRS receipting, Donation forms and pages, Email and automation.

Answered from the vendors’ own pages

CharityEngine: Does CharityEngine publish pricing?

No. Both the subscription and the payment processing rate are quoted. Third-party sites report a starter tier around 550 US dollars a month, but the vendor does not confirm this.

Keela: Does Keela issue CRA compliant tax receipts?

Yes, receipt numbering, required wording and batch issuance are built in, which is the main reason Canadian charities choose it over US products.

CharityEngine: Is the payment processing optional?

In practice no. The processing is the product. Using an external gateway removes most of what distinguishes CharityEngine from cheaper CRMs.

Keela: Who owns Keela?

Aplos Software, a US fund accounting vendor, acquired it in 2023. Keela is still sold as its own product but shares a roadmap with Aplos.

CharityEngine: Is there a nonprofit discount?

Every customer is a nonprofit, so there is no separate discount; pricing is tiered by contact count and gift volume instead.

Keela: Is pricing per user?

No, it is by contact count. Adding staff does not raise the bill, growing the mailing list does.

CharityEngine: How long is the contract?

Annual terms are standard, and multi-year commitments are used to buy down the rate.

Keela: Can it replace a fund accounting system?

No. It records income and pledges but does not do fund accounting, so you still need Aplos, QuickBooks or an equivalent.

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