Everything on the Free Plan: Feature by Feature
Here's a detailed look at what Linktree's free tier actually includes.
Links and Content
You can add as many links as you want. There's no limit on the number of links, and they can point anywhere: your website, social profiles, YouTube videos, podcast episodes, shop pages, or anything else with a URL.
You can also embed videos from YouTube, TikTok, Vimeo, Facebook, and Twitch directly on your Linktree page. Visitors can watch without leaving.
Headers let you organize links into groups. You can add a profile title and short bio at the top of your page.
Design and Customization
The free plan gives you basic themes. You can change background colors, button colors, button shapes, and fonts. It covers the essentials, but you're working within a limited palette.
What you can't do on free:
- Use custom themes or gradients
- Upload custom background images
- Use animated effects
- Remove the Linktree logo from your page
Your page will always show "Linktree" branding at the bottom. For casual use, that's fine. For a professional brand, it's a compromise.
Analytics
Free analytics are basic. You can see:
- Total lifetime views
- Total lifetime clicks
- Click-through rates per link
You cannot see:
- Daily, weekly, or monthly breakdowns
- Which countries or cities your visitors come from
- What devices or browsers they use
- Which social platforms drive the most traffic
- Referrer data
If you want to understand your audience beyond "how many people clicked," you need a paid plan.
Commerce (Selling Digital Products)
Linktree lets free-plan users sell digital products through its Commerce feature. You can list downloadable files, PDFs, templates, presets, and other digital goods.
The catch: Linktree charges a 12% seller fee on every sale. That's on top of Stripe or PayPal processing fees (around 2.9% + $0.30 per transaction).
On a $50 product, you lose:
- $6.00 to Linktree (12%)
- $1.75 to payment processing (~3.5%)
- You keep $42.25 (84.5% of the sale price)
The 12% rate is the highest across all of Linktree's plans. Starter and Pro plans reduce it to 9%. Premium eliminates it entirely, but costs $35/month. For a full breakdown of these fees, see our Linktree 12% fee analysis. We also cover the true cost of Linktree's free plan in our guide: Is Linktree Free? What Creators Actually Pay.
What's Completely Missing from Free
Several features are locked behind paid plans entirely:
- Email and phone collection. You can't capture visitor contact info. This means you can't build a mailing list from your Linktree traffic.
- Link scheduling. You can't set links to appear or disappear at specific times. Launches, limited offers, and time-sensitive content require manual updates.
- Priority support. Free-plan support response times are 48 hours. Paid plans get 4 to 24-hour response times.
- SEO metadata. You can't customize your page's title tag or meta description for search engines.
- Sensitive content warnings. You can't add age gates or content warnings to specific links.
- Featured layouts. Limited to two featured links on the free plan. Paid plans allow unlimited.
Linktree Free vs. Paid: Is Upgrading Worth It?
The answer depends on how you use Linktree.
Stay on Free If:
- You only use Linktree to share links (no selling)
- Your traffic is under a few hundred visits per month
- You don't need audience analytics or email collection
- Linktree branding on your page doesn't bother you
- You're testing whether a link-in-bio tool helps your workflow
Consider Upgrading If:
- You sell digital products regularly (the 12% fee adds up fast)
- You want to collect emails from your audience
- You need to schedule links for launches or events
- Professional branding matters to you (remove Linktree logo)
- You need geographic and device data from analytics
The Upgrade Math
If you sell digital products, here's when upgrading saves money:
| Monthly sales | Free plan fees (12%) | Starter ($8/mo + 9%) | Savings from upgrading |
|---|
| $100 | $12 | $17 ($8 + $9) | -$5 (free is cheaper) |
| $200 | $24 | $26 ($8 + $18) | -$2 (free is cheaper) |
| $300 | $36 | $35 ($8 + $27) | +$1 (breakeven) |
| $500 | $60 | $53 ($8 + $45) | +$7 (upgrade saves) |
| $1,000 |
The breakeven point for Starter is around $267/month in sales. Below that, the free plan's higher percentage still costs less than a monthly subscription plus the lower percentage.
Linktree isn't the only free option. Here's how it compares to alternatives that also have no monthly fee:
| Feature | Linktree Free | Talkspresso | Beacons Free |
|---|
| Monthly fee | $0 | $0 | $0 |
| Transaction fee | 12% | 10% | 9% |
| Unlimited links | Yes | Yes (profile page) | Yes |
| Video calls | No | Built-in HD | No |
| Workshops/webinars |
If you're a creator who sells products, offers paid sessions, or wants to book appointments, Linktree's free plan is actually the most limited and most expensive option in this comparison.
For more on how Linktree stacks up against booking-focused alternatives, see our Linktree vs. Talkspresso for bookings comparison.
What Linktree's Free Plan Is Actually Good For
Despite its limitations, Linktree free genuinely works well for certain use cases:
Personal social media profiles. If you just want a tidy page linking to your Instagram, YouTube, Twitter, TikTok, and website, Linktree free is perfect. No selling, no analytics needed, just organized links.
Event or campaign pages. Need a quick landing page for a specific event, campaign, or launch? Linktree free gets you a shareable link in under five minutes.
Testing link-in-bio tools. Never used a link-in-bio tool before? Start with Linktree free to see if it fits your workflow before committing to anything.
Non-monetized creators. If you create content but don't sell products or services, the free plan's limitations around Commerce and email collection don't affect you.
When Linktree Free Costs You More Than It Saves
Linktree's free plan becomes a problem when you outgrow it:
You want to monetize. The 12% seller fee is steep. On $500/month in sales, you're paying $60 to Linktree plus processing fees. That's $720/year in platform fees alone on a "free" plan.
You need to own your audience. Without email collection, every visitor who doesn't click a link is lost. You have no way to follow up, announce launches, or build a direct relationship. This is the single biggest limitation for any creator trying to build a sustainable business.
You offer live services. Linktree doesn't support video calls, scheduling, or any kind of live interaction. If you're a coach, consultant, or creator who offers paid sessions, you need an entirely separate set of tools on top of Linktree.
Your brand matters. The Linktree logo on your page signals that you're using a free tool. For professionals and established creators, that can undermine credibility.
A Better Starting Point for Creators Who Sell
If you're going to sell products, services, or your time, starting on a platform built for monetization saves you from outgrowing your tools later.
Talkspresso costs $0/month and charges 10% only when you earn. That's 2 percentage points less than Linktree's free-plan fee, and it includes:
- HD video calls for 1:1 sessions and group calls, built right in
- Workshops and webinars for up to 500+ attendees
- Scheduling and booking so clients can self-book and pay in one step
- Digital product sales for downloads, courses, and recordings
- Session recording with automatic AI-powered notes and summaries
- Professional booking page that doubles as your link-in-bio
- Email collection included on the free tier
No subscription fees to outgrow. No stacking tools. One platform that handles everything from the start.
For a detailed feature comparison, check our guides on Linktree pricing, what Linktree costs, and the best link-in-bio tools for selling services.
The Bottom Line
Linktree is free in 2026, and the free plan is fine for sharing links. It does that job well with no cost and no commitment.
But the moment you want to sell, collect emails, or look professional, the free plan either charges you more than alternatives (12% per sale) or forces you onto a paid tier that now starts at $8/month and goes up to $35.
For creators who just need links, keep Linktree free. For creators building a business, start on a platform that includes the tools you'll need from day one.
If you are weighing Linktree's free plan against the real cost of monetizing your audience, these guides go deeper:
Ready to Monetize Beyond Links?
Keep using Linktree's free plan for what it does well — sharing your other profiles. Add Talkspresso for what Linktree free can't do at all: take payments, book sessions, sell digital products, and collect emails.
Talkspresso is free to start, has no monthly fee, and charges 10% only when you actually earn — 2 percentage points less than what Linktree's free plan takes on every paid link. Set up your page in five minutes.
Create your free Talkspresso page →
