Compare · Cherry vs Unlock Protocol
Unlock Protocol alternatives: Hypersub and 4 more
Six ways to sell access to a crypto room, compared: Unlock Protocol keys, Hypersub prepaid time, Guild-gated Discord, Towns, Whop and Cherry paid rooms.
Before the pricing, an Unlock Protocol alternative has to answer a structural question: where does the membership live, and where does the conversation live? Unlock Protocol and Hypersub sell the membership as a token on an EVM chain and leave the chat to a second product, joined by a bot that checks whether a wallet still holds the thing you sold. This page compares six ways to charge for a crypto room, including Cherry (cherry.fun), a wallet-to-wallet messenger and community app where you sign in with a wallet, DM any wallet address, and join or create token-gated, NFT-gated, and paid group chats, with no phone number, email, or KYC.
How we picked
This list is for a community owner who already has people to sell to and has to decide where the membership lives. Six options, chosen because that owner actually chooses between them when the room is the product. Four questions separate them.
- Is the membership a token in the buyer’s wallet, or a record inside the service?
- Does the conversation happen in the same product that took the money, or in Discord, Telegram or a website beside it?
- What does a renewal require from the member, and who can send it?
- What does the member still see on the first day after a payment fails?
Unlock Protocol
Unlock Protocol is a set of open-source contracts for memberships. Its documentation describes it as a protocol for creating onchain memberships and subscriptions as NFTs: a lock is the contract you deploy, a key is the NFT it mints, and the key carries an expiration date. The contracts are deployed on Ethereum, Base, Optimism, Arbitrum, Polygon, BNB Chain, Gnosis Chain, Celo, Avalanche, Linea and Scroll as of September 2026.
Recurring membership has conditions. The lock has to be priced in an ERC-20 token, and the member approves the contract to spend enough of that token to cover the renewals in advance. A membership can only be renewed once it has expired, and anyone can send that renewal transaction as long as the holder’s approval and balance still cover the price. Unlock Protocol carries a 1% fee switch, set by the Unlock DAO through an on-chain proposal approved in May 2024. For buyers without crypto, Unlock Labs announced a card fee schedule in October 2024: $1.00 per purchase under $10, and 3% above $10 with a $10.00 cap.
Fit: you want membership to be a transferable NFT across EVM chains, you have developers, and you already run the place where members talk.
Hypersub
Hypersub sells onchain memberships on top of the Subscription Token Protocol built by Fabric. Its home page in September 2026 reads “Create recurring revenue with onchain memberships” and lists subscriptions priced in ETH and USDC, monthly, quarterly and yearly. The protocol’s second version, announced in June 2024, lets a creator offer different tiers at different price points and share a percentage of revenue back to subscribers.
The billing model is prepaid time. A subscriber pays up front for a block of time in ETH or an ERC-20 token, and the subscription token holds the remaining time. When the time runs out the subscriber keeps the token and loses what it granted: Fabric’s cofounder described that state in August 2024 as a bit like a gift card with $0 on it. Splits’ August 2024 walkthrough of Hypersub described an email reminder before expiry. The chat is somewhere else: the CryptoSapiens Social Club page on Hypersub, in September 2026, lists a member-only group chat among the benefits a subscriber gets.
Fit: your audience already holds ETH, you want a tradable subscription token, and you accept that the room lives in another app.
Guild.xyz with Discord or Telegram
Guild.xyz is the piece in the middle of the first two setups. It grants Discord roles and Telegram access from requirements you set, including token holdings and on-chain activity, with more than 100 integrations and, by its home page in September 2026, more than 1,000 teams using it. Pricing there starts free: “Start for free. Upgrade when you need more.”
Guild is not where the room lives. Its knowledge base describes payment as one requirement type, so a Guild can charge for a role, but the conversation still happens in Discord or Telegram. You sell a key with Unlock Protocol, a subscription with Hypersub, or a pass of your own, and Guild checks the wallet before Discord hands out the role. The cost of that route is the extra step: a member connects a wallet on a third site to get into a chat, and every question about lapses is answered by whichever product holds the money, not by the room. Cherry’s page on Guild.xyz alternatives covers that gating layer on its own.
Fit: the community will not leave Discord, and you accept a verification step outside the chat.
Towns
Towns is an onchain group chat on Base where every group is minted on-chain and every membership is an NFT. It announced recurring memberships in weekly, monthly and yearly periods in October 2025, then USDC-priced memberships with a card and Apple Pay route in January 2026. In February 2026 Towns reported 1.7 million memberships. The iOS app it shipped in February 2026 asks for a new account and a phone number.
Towns closes the gap the first three options leave open: payment and conversation are the same product. The membership is also an NFT the member owns. In 2025 Towns told owners of paid groups “you earn 90%”, which puts its own share at about 10%. See Towns alternatives for the wider comparison.
Fit: your community is on Base, and you want membership to be an NFT the member owns.
Whop
Whop is a checkout and a marketplace for selling access. Its home page in September 2026 lists storefront, checkout and wallet among the components it offers, and states “$4.6B+ paid to businesses on Whop”. Membership is a Whop account rather than a wallet. Whop’s Business FAQ, last updated in December 2022, says Coinbase Commerce handles one-time crypto payments and that subscription renewals pull wEth from an allowance in the buyer’s wallet, so the account stays the membership even when the money is crypto. The fee breakdown sits on Whop alternatives for crypto .
Fit: your buyers pay with cards or a Coinbase Commerce checkout, and you are content for the membership to be an account on Whop rather than a token in a wallet.
Cherry
Cherry charges for entry to the room itself, so there is no second product and no bot between the payment and the chat. Two pricing options exist for paid communities and channels .
One-time entry is priced in SOL, between 0.0001 and 100 SOL, set by the owner. The buyer signs one transaction that pays both legs at once: 70% to the owner’s wallet and 30% to Cherry, as of September 2026. Membership activates when that payment confirms on-chain, and leaving and rejoining later costs nothing.
Recurring entry is priced in USDC, daily, weekly or monthly, from 1 to 10,000 USDC per period, billed through Solana’s official subscriptions and allowances program. The member authorises the plan once and each period is charged without another signature, with the same 70/30 split. Cancelling keeps access until the paid period ends, and members manage their subscriptions from their profile. Changing the price creates a new plan, so existing subscribers keep the terms they signed up for. The mechanics are in how USDC subscriptions work for group chats .
Two constraints matter before you price anything. A paid group has to be public, because its storefront page on chat.cherry.fun is where people read the rules, the benefits, the reviews and the price. And an invite from the owner or an admin is the only comp: a regular member’s invite lands the invitee on the paywall. Payment is one rule type among several, so a room can combine it with token-gated chat rules, up to five of them with all or any logic.
Fit: your members hold Solana wallets, and you want the money, the membership check and the conversation in one place.
Side by side
| Option | Membership is | Chains | Paid in | Chat lives | What the service takes |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Unlock Protocol | An NFT key with an expiration date | 11 EVM networks | ETH, an ERC-20, or a card via Unlock Labs | Wherever you gate it | 1% protocol fee (May 2024); card $1 under $10, 3% above, $10 cap (Oct 2024) |
| Hypersub | A subscription token holding prepaid time | EVM; not stated | ETH or an ERC-20; prices shown in ETH and USDC | Another product | Not stated |
| Guild.xyz | Whatever token you sold elsewhere | Not stated | Payment is one requirement type | Discord or Telegram | Free to start; paid tiers not stated |
| Towns | An NFT minted on Base | Base | USDC, or card and Apple Pay (Jan 2026) | Towns | About 10%: Towns told paid-group owners “you earn 90%” (2025) |
| Whop | A Whop account | Not stated | Card, or crypto via Coinbase Commerce (December 2022) | Whop, Discord or Telegram | 2.7% + $0.30 per domestic card charge; crypto 1.5% (September 2026) |
| Cherry | Entry to the room, attached to the wallet | Solana | 0.0001 to 100 SOL once, or 1 to 10,000 USDC per period | Cherry | 30% of each payment; the owner keeps 70% (September 2026) |
The first day after a payment fails
This is where the three shapes stop looking alike, and it is worth deciding before you sell anything.
On Unlock Protocol the key expires by itself. Nothing can renew it until it has expired, and the renewal goes through only if the holder’s ERC-20 approval and balance still cover the price, so a wallet that spent the token silently becomes a wallet with an expired key. Whatever gates the chat reads that and takes the role away.
On Hypersub there is no charge to fail. The prepaid time ends, the token stays in the wallet with nothing left on it, and the member has to come back and buy more time.
On Cherry a failed pull paywalls the member. They stay a member and the content is withheld until the next payment lands. Cancelling is gentler: access runs to the end of the period already paid for. The difference is what the lapsed member sees, and it decides how many of them come back.
Which one to pick
Choose a membership contract, meaning Unlock Protocol or Hypersub, if the token itself is the product: you want it transferable, readable by other apps, and independent of any chat you happen to run this year. You are signing up to run two products and the bot between them.
Choose a paid room if the conversation is the product. On Cherry the buyer pays in SOL or USDC from the wallet they already use, the owner’s 70% arrives in that same transaction, the check that keeps non-payers out is the same system that hosts the messages, and a lapse leaves a member you can still reach. If you are selling an alpha group, the step-by-step setup takes a few minutes.
To price a room this way, create it at chat.cherry.fun and add a payment rule.
FAQ
What is the best Unlock Protocol alternative for a paid group chat?
It depends on whether the membership has to be a token someone can hold and resell. If it does, Hypersub and Towns both sell one, and the chat sits in a second product for Hypersub and in the same app for Towns. If what you want is a room people pay to enter, Cherry prices entry in SOL or in USDC per day, week or month and keeps the payment, the membership and the conversation in one place.
Can I sell access to a community without Stripe or a card processor?
Yes. On Cherry the buyer signs one transaction from their own wallet and the owner’s 70% lands in the owner’s wallet in that same transaction, with 30% going to Cherry as of September 2026. Unlock Protocol and Hypersub also take payment on-chain, in ETH or an ERC-20 token, with a card route offered separately by Unlock Labs.
What happens on Hypersub when a subscription expires?
The subscriber keeps the subscription token and loses the access it carried, because the token holds prepaid time and the time has run out. Fabric’s cofounder described that state in August 2024 as a bit like a gift card with $0 on it, and Splits’ August 2024 walkthrough of Hypersub described an email reminder before expiry.
Does Unlock Protocol work on Solana?
No. Its deployments are EVM networks: Ethereum, Base, Optimism, Arbitrum, Polygon, BNB Chain, Gnosis Chain, Celo, Avalanche, Linea and Scroll as of September 2026. A Solana community that wants payment and membership on Solana needs a Solana-native option such as Cherry, which prices entry in SOL or USDC.
Can a paid room also require a token balance?
On Cherry it can. Payment is one rule type among several, and a room can combine up to five rules with all or any logic, so a room can ask for 1 USDC a week and a minimum token balance at the same time.
Sources
- Unlock Protocol documentation , including deployed networks and membership renewals .
- Unlock DAO tokens and the fee switch , proposal approved May 2024.
- Unlock Labs on updated credit card fees , 21 October 2024.
- Hypersub and the Subscription Token Protocol V2 announcement , 21 June 2024.
- Splits on Hypersub interoperability , 22 August 2024.
- Guild.xyz , Towns , Whop and Whop pricing .
Try Cherry
Sign in with a wallet, DM any address, and join token-gated and paid communities. No phone number, email, or KYC.