Lu.ma is live · free plan, paid from $59/mo billed annually · last verified 22 Oct 2026 · viability healthy

Lu.ma

Lu.ma

Luma turns an event into one shareable link that handles RSVPs, tickets, and check-in.

78/100Safe BetFree · from $59/mo billed annuallyFreemium

For social and community events, Luma is often the least painful option: one shareable link, RSVPs, payments, and mobile check-in without an enterprise setup. The free plan is genuinely workable — unlimited events and guests — but the 5% platform fee on paid tickets adds up once you're selling real volume, so Luma Plus at $59/mo billed annually pays for itself. Pair it with Eventbrite if you need multi-track agendas and speaker tooling; stay with Luma if you're running meetups, run clubs, or workshops.

Verdict generated

Verified 7d ago · liveness 78/100 · cite: rightaichoice.com/tools/lu-ma

Best for
  • Individual hosts running social gatherings and launch parties
  • Community organizers and run clubs running recurring meetups
  • Small teams hosting workshops or classes with paid tickets
  • Hosts who want an event live and shareable in minutes
Not ideal for
  • Multi-track conferences needing agenda and speaker tooling
  • Teams that require CRM integration
  • Programs needing deep analytics and reporting
Visit Website

Beginner-friendlyA single free event is live in roughly 10-15 minutes — page, cover image, time, venue, share link. Moving to Luma Plus to remove the platform fee and enable tax collection is a billing change, not a rebuild. Zapier automation and API access take longer to wire up, typically an afternoon for a first workflow.Web · MobileAPI available6.5k viewsVerified 7d ago
Pricing
Free · from $59/mo billed annually
FreemiumFree tier3 plans5 hidden costs
Learning curve
Beginner-friendly
A single free event is live in roughly 10-15 minutes — page, cover image, time, venue, share link. Moving to Luma Plus to remove the platform fee and enable tax collection is a billing change, not a rebuild. Zapier automation and API access take longer to wire up, typically an afternoon for a first workflow.
Runs on
WebMobile
API available · 2 integrations
Who it's for
Run club organizerWorkshop host selling ticketsCommunity lead running token-gated events
Live sentiment
Is Lu.ma actually worth it?

We scan live Reddit threads, YouTube comments, X posts, G2 reviews and other communities — and hand you an honest verdict in under a minute.

  • Honest verdict, not marketing
  • Real pros & cons from real users
  • Attributed quotes with receipts
Run a free scan

3 free scans · no card needed

Skip it if

Skip Luma if you're programming a multi-track conference that needs agenda tracks, speaker management, or CRM-synced attendee reporting — that's a different class of tool.

Skip-it-if note generated
The 30-second take
Biggest gripe

The 5% platform fee on paid events only disappears when you move to Luma Plus at $59/mo billed annually, so a busy free-plan host can hand over more in fees than the upgrade costs.

Price reality

The free tier (unlimited events and guests, 5% on paid events) undercuts Eventbrite for casual hosts, and Luma Plus at $59/mo billed annually is competitive with mid-tier event tools once you're selling enough tickets that 5% exceeds the subscription. Send add-ons from $50/mo scaled to 100,000 sends make Luma expensive versus a dedicated email tool if newsletters are your main channel.

Generated

In short

Lu.ma — Luma turns an event into one shareable link that handles RSVPs, tickets, and check-in. Best for Individual hosts running social gatherings and launch parties, Community organizers and run clubs running recurring meetups, Small teams hosting workshops or classes with paid tickets. Free to start; paid plans from $59/mo billed annually.

Compared withvs Soulcode

What is Lu.ma?

Lu.ma — Luma turns an event into one shareable link that handles RSVPs, tickets, and check-in. Best for Individual hosts running social gatherings and launch parties, Community organizers and run clubs running recurring meetups, Small teams hosting workshops or classes with paid tickets. Free to start; paid plans from $59/mo billed annually.

FreemiumBeginner-friendlyAPI availableWeb · Mobile

Luma is an event platform built around a fast, clean event page. You create an event, add a cover image, set time and venue, and share a single link that handles RSVPs plus free or paid ticket sales. It suits individual hosts, run clubs, community organizers, and small teams who want an event live in minutes rather than after configuring a heavy enterprise stack. The core feature set covers customizable event pages, ticket types with group purchasing and coupons, approval- or token-gated registration, unlimited cohosts and event managers, and guest check-in from mobile or web. Blasts and automated reminders go out over email, SMS, push notification, and WhatsApp, and you can take all major credit cards plus Apple Pay, Google Pay, and regional methods such as iDEAL, Konbini, and PayNow. The free tier gives you unlimited events and guests with up to 500 sends per week and charges a 5% platform fee on paid events. Luma Plus at $59/mo billed annually drops that platform fee to 0%, lifts weekly sends to 5,000, and adds tax collection, a check-in manager role, custom event URLs, separate first and last name collection, Zapier automation, API access, and priority support. Extra send capacity is sold as add-ons from 10,000 sends ($50/mo) up to 100,000 ($800/mo), billed annually. Compared to Eventbrite, Luma is deliberately narrower and quicker to set up — a better fit for a workshop, a social gathering, or a recurring meetup than for a large multi-track conference.

Key features

  • Customizable event pages with cover images
  • Unlimited events and guests on the free plan
  • Free and paid ticket sales
  • Ticket types, group purchasing, and coupons
  • Accept credit cards, Apple Pay, and Google Pay
  • Regional payments: iDEAL, Konbini, PayNow
  • Blasts and automated reminders via email, SMS, push notification, and WhatsApp
  • Mobile and web guest check-in
  • Approval-gated and token-gated registration
  • Unlimited cohosts and event managers
  • Tax collection on ticket sales (Luma Plus)
  • Custom event page URLs (Luma Plus)
  • Collect separate first and last names from guests (Luma Plus)
  • CSV import and export
  • Zapier workflow automation and API access (Luma Plus)

Behind the verdict

Luma's strength is that it removes almost every decision between "I want to host something" and "the link is live." You get a customizable event page, ticket types with coupons and group purchasing, unlimited cohosts and event managers, and check-in from mobile or web — all on the free plan, which also covers unlimited events and guests. That combination is why run clubs, launch parties, and workshop hosts gravitate to it. Where Luma clearly earns its keep is the communications layer. Blasts and automated reminders fire over email, SMS, push notification, and WhatsApp from one dashboard, and the weekly send cap is the main lever the pricing turns on: 500 sends per week free, 5,000 on Luma Plus at $59/mo billed annually, and add-ons above that (10,000 sends at $50/mo up to 100,000 at $800/mo, billed annually). Note that the vendor states you can always send unlimited blasts to event guests, so the cap bites on invites and newsletters rather than on everyone who already RSVP'd. Payments are the other differentiator. Luma accepts all major credit cards, Apple Pay, and Google Pay, plus regional methods such as iDEAL, Konbini, and PayNow — useful if your audience isn't US-only. The economics: free plan charges 5% on paid events; Luma Plus drops it to 0% and adds tax collection, custom event URLs, separate first and last name collection, Zapier automation, and API access. Stripe, the payment processor, charges its own card fee (typically 2.9% + 30 cents) on top of either Luma rate, so budget for both. Weaknesses are mostly scope. If you're planning a multi-track conference with speaker tooling, agenda tracks, or deep attendee analytics and CRM sync, Luma's deliberately narrow surface will frustrate you — that's Eventbrite or a dedicated conference platform's job. Teams that need CRM-native workflows should look elsewhere, and heavy newsletter senders will find per-send add-on pricing adds up faster than a dedicated email tool. For everyone else — a recurring meetup series, a token-gated community event, a paid class with discount codes and tax collection — Luma is quick, clean, and hard to beat on setup time.

Limitations

  • On the free plan, paid events carry a 5% platform fee and you can send up to 500 invites or newsletters per week.
  • Luma Plus at $59/mo billed annually removes the platform fee, raises sending to 5,000 per week, and gates API access, Zapier automation, tax collection, and custom event URLs behind Plus.
  • Bigger send volumes are add-ons billed annually: 10,000 sends for $50/mo, 25,000 for $200/mo, up to 100,000 for $800/mo.
  • Stripe, Luma's payment processor, adds a card fee (typically 2.9% + 30 cents) on top of the Luma platform fee.
  • The free plan caps calendars at 3 admins.
  • Deep analytics, agenda tracks, and speaker tooling are outside the product's scope.

as of 2026-10-18

Researching Lu.ma? Get your full AI stack in 60 seconds.

Free, no signup — tell us your goal and get tools matched to your budget & existing stack.

Is Lu.ma still active?

Lu.ma is live · free plan, paid from $59/mo billed annually · last verified 22 Oct 2026 · viability healthy.

Viability score

78/100
Safe Bet

How well maintained and how widely used is Lu.ma? Built from what the vendor actually publishes (docs, changelog, tutorials, integrations, pricing), whether the site is live, and how much real users discuss it. How we calculate this

Recent activity
not measured
Traction
100
Site health
95
User sentiment
95
What the vendor publishes
40

Last calculated: October 2026

How we score →

What do users say about Lu.ma?

What people actually say about Lu.ma — is it worth it?

We ran a structured research pass across product reviews, community discussions, and post-purchase forum threads to surface the patterns vendors won't publish themselves. Below: the recurring strengths, the hidden costs people mention most, and the cohort that consistently regrets adopting this tool.

Researched

29 mentions across 2 sources (Hacker News, Lemmy) · researched Aug 18, 2026.

95% positive5% critical

Average across the 2 sources that answered — each source counts once, not each post.

Recurring strengths
  • +Generous free tier with unlimited events and guests
  • +Easy to set up event pages and share links
  • +Integrated RSVP and check-in via mobile
  • +Switch from Meetup.com to a cheaper, cleaner option
  • +Handles ticket types, coupons, and group buys simply
Recurring frustrations
  • −Not built for large conferences or multi-track events
  • −Lacks advanced marketing and analytics tools
  • −Paid plan ($59/mo) may feel pricey for small hosts
  • −Community data shows little discussion about support quality
  • −5% platform fee on paid events even with free plan
Patterns worth knowing
Lightweight and free for meetups and community events
Seen on Hacker News, Lemmy
Simple setup and ease of use praised by non-technical organizers
Seen on Hacker News, Lemmy
Community recommendations as an alternative to Meetup.com
Seen on Hacker News
Learning curve
beginnerProductive in ~5 minutes
Hidden costs people mention
  • • 5% platform fee on paid events remains on free plan
  • • Paid plan is a significant jump from free
  • • No per-event pricing flexibility beyond the two tiers

How we verified this

Every listed fact about Lu.ma— pricing, features, links, status — is re-read from the vendor's own pages by our verification pipeline and each change is logged with a date; the last pass ran on 22 Oct 2026. Pages mix model-assisted synthesis with human review; see how we verify.

Verification history

We have re-verified Lu.ma 20 times since . Each pass re-reads the vendor's own pages and re-checks every listed field against that evidence; passes where nothing had changed are marked as such.

  1. — changed SSL certificate
  2. — changed switching out, limitations, switching in, use cases, who should skip it, setup time, our verdict, summary, pricing fit, features, description, pricing tiers, hidden costs
  3. — changed who it suits, description, our verdict, features, pricing tiers, summary
  4. — changed pricing page
  5. — changed SSL certificate, domain expiry
  6. — changed limitations

Showing the 6 most recent of 20 verification passes.

Free to cite with attribution — this page re-verifies continuously.

How much does Lu.ma cost in 2026?

Lu.ma: Free to start; paid plans from $59/mo billed annually. Pricing last verified 22 Oct 2026.

Plans compared

Every published Lu.ma tier, its price as the vendor publishes it, who it fits, and what it adds over the tier below. The 12-month cost projection follows.

Lu.ma pricing plans compared
PlanPriceBillingWho it's for
Luma FreeFree—First-time hosts and run clubs running free or low-volume paid events who want unlimited events and guests without a subscription.Adds: Free entry point: unlimited events and guests, 500 sends per week, 3 calendar admins, and a 5% platform fee on paid events.
Luma Plus$59/mo billed annuallymonthly, billed annuallyWorkshop hosts and community organizers selling enough paid tickets that the 5% free-plan fee exceeds $59/mo billed annually.Adds: Adds 0% platform fee, 5,000 weekly sends, tax collection, check-in manager role, custom event URLs, Zapier automation, API access, and 5 calendar admins.
EnterpriseCustomquoteOrganizations needing SSO, security restrictions, and managed community events across multiple calendars.Adds: Adds organization accounts, security restrictions, Single Sign-On, advanced integrations, additional APIs, and custom-built features on a contact-us plan.

12-month cost

Project the real annual outlay, including the implied monthly cost when only an annual tier is published.

Annual total
Free
Over 12 months
Effective monthly
—
—

Vendor list price only. Add-on usage, seat overages, and contract minimums are surfaced under Hidden costs & gotchas.

Hidden costs & gotchas

What the public pricing page doesn't put in bold. Captured from pricing-page footnotes, contract terms, and recurring complaints.

  • The 5% platform fee on paid events only disappears when you move to Luma Plus at $59/mo billed annually, so a busy free-plan host can hand over more in fees than the upgrade costs.
  • Stripe's card fee (typically 2.9% + 30 cents) is charged on top of Luma's platform fee, so your effective take rate is higher than Luma's headline percentage.
  • Going past 5,000 weekly sends on Luma Plus means buying add-ons — 10,000 sends adds $50/mo, and 100,000 sends adds $800/mo, all billed annually.
  • The free plan includes up to 3 calendar admins; Luma Plus includes 5 and charges for additional seats beyond that.
  • Tax collection, custom event URLs, separate first/last name collection, Zapier, and API access are all Plus-only, so a free-plan host who needs any one of them pays the full $59/mo billed annually.

Where the pricing makes sense

The company stage and team size where Lu.ma's pricing actually pencils out — and where peers do it cheaper.

The free tier (unlimited events and guests, 5% on paid events) undercuts Eventbrite for casual hosts, and Luma Plus at $59/mo billed annually is competitive with mid-tier event tools once you're selling enough tickets that 5% exceeds the subscription. Send add-ons from $50/mo scaled to 100,000 sends make Luma expensive versus a dedicated email tool if newsletters are your main channel.

Hidden-cost and price-fit notes generated

Has Lu.ma's pricing changed?

No plan price for Lu.ma has moved since we began logging in Aug 2026; the pricing page is re-read on every verification pass.

Who should pick Lu.ma?

Pick Lu.ma if you are Individual hosts running social gatherings and launch parties, Community organizers and run clubs running recurring meetups, Small teams hosting workshops or classes with paid tickets, Hosts who want an event live and shareable in minutes.

Look elsewhere if you are Multi-track conferences needing agenda and speaker tooling, Teams that require CRM integration, Programs needing deep analytics and reporting, High-volume newsletter senders who need cheap unlimited email.

Skip it if Skip Luma if you're programming a multi-track conference that needs agenda tracks, speaker management, or CRM-synced attendee reporting — that's a different class of tool.

Generated

Real-world workflow fit

Concrete scenarios for the personas Lu.ma actually fits — and what changes day-one when you adopt it.

Run club organizer

You create a free event page, drop in a cover image and route map, set a recurring weekly slot, and share the single link in your WhatsApp group. Luma sends automated reminders over email, SMS, push, and WhatsApp while you check people in from your phone on the day.

Outcome: A recurring meetup runs itself on the free plan with unlimited guests and no per-event setup work.

Workshop host selling tickets

You publish a paid workshop with an early-bird coupon and a group-purchase rate, turn on tax collection on Luma Plus, and accept cards, Apple Pay, and Google Pay. On the day, a designated check-in manager scans arrivals.

Outcome: Tickets sell with 0% Luma platform fee and tax handled automatically, with a clean attendance record.

Community lead running token-gated events

You gate registration so only token holders can RSVP, add cohosts as event managers, and export the attendee list to CSV afterward for your community records.

Outcome: Access control and follow-up happen without building a custom registration flow.

Workflow scenarios generated

Use cases

  • Publish a free event page for a run club and share one link over WhatsApp with automatic reminders.
  • Sell workshop tickets with group discount codes and collect tax automatically on Luma Plus.
  • Gate registration to token holders for a community or NFT event.
  • Track who actually attended by pairing the Zoom integration with Luma check-in.
  • Run a recurring meetup series with unlimited cohosts and manage check-in from one dashboard.
  • Accept iDEAL, Konbini, or PayNow from international attendees alongside card and Apple Pay.

Setup time & first value

How long it actually takes to get something useful out of Lu.ma — broken out by persona, not the marketing-page minute.

A single free event is live in roughly 10-15 minutes — page, cover image, time, venue, share link. Moving to Luma Plus to remove the platform fee and enable tax collection is a billing change, not a rebuild. Zapier automation and API access take longer to wire up, typically an afternoon for a first workflow.

Switching to or from Lu.ma

How to bring data in from common predecessors and how to get it back out — written for the switcher, not the buyer.

Migrating in
  • →From Eventbrite: recreate the event page in Luma, re-upload the cover image, rebuild ticket types and coupons, then share the new Luma link to your list.
  • →From a Google Form or spreadsheet RSVP: use CSV export from the old flow and CSV import into Luma to seed an existing guest list.
  • →From Partiful or a link-in-bio tool: publish the Luma event page and use its custom URL (Plus) so previously shared links can be updated.
Migrating out
  • ↗To Eventbrite: export attendee data via CSV, rebuild ticket types and pricing on Eventbrite, and redirect your shared link to the new page.
  • ↗To a dedicated email platform: export guests via CSV and move your newsletter sends there to escape per-send add-on pricing above 5,000 weekly sends.

Integrations

ZapierZoom

Tutorials & Learning

YouTube returned 6 videos for “Lu.ma”, and we withheld 6: 6 could not be judged, because “Lu.ma” is a single word that other videos use for other things. We are showing none, because we could not prove any of them are about Lu.ma.

Official links

What are the best Lu.ma alternatives?

The closest alternatives to Lu.ma we list are Pestle, Wander Maps and ZapZipped. Ranked by direct product-type match, not category overlap.

Closest alternatives to Lu.ma
AlternativePricingStarts atLast verified
PestleFreemiumPricing not published—
Wander MapsFreeFree—
ZapZippedFreeFree—

Alternatives to Lu.ma

View all
Pestle

Pestle

Pestle turns links from Instagram Reels, TikTok, Facebook, YouTube and food blogs into a clean, ad-free cookbook you actually cook from on iPhone and iPad.

FreemiumTry
Wander Maps

Wander Maps

Wander Maps turns Instagram reels, TikToks and travel links into offline-ready travel maps with AI place extraction.

FreeTry
ZapZipped

ZapZipped

Free WhatsApp bot that turns an exported group chat into shareable stats and awards cards.

FreeTry

Tools that pair well with Lu.ma

Common stack mates teams adopt alongside Lu.ma, with the specific reason each pairing earns its keep.

Lu.ma vs its closest rival

Lu.ma's closest head-to-head is with Soulcode — If you're organizing any kind of event—from a small workshop to a community meetup—Lu.ma is the clear winner with its practical ticketing, reminders, and integrations. SoulCode serves a niche spiritual need, but its lack of integrations and narrow focus make it a poor choice for general use. Unless you're specifically seeking soul-level connections, choose Lu.ma. Verdict generated

Frequently asked questions

Used Lu.ma? Help shape our editorial sentiment research.