Charitable Documentation

Learn how to make the most of Charitable with clear, step-by-step instructions.

How to install and activate Charitable extensions

Charitable extensions are normal WordPress plugins which add extra features to Charitable.

1. Make sure you have activated your license

When you purchase a plugin license through wpcharitable.com, you will receive a single code to register Charitable as a paid (or a “pro” version, not a lite or free version).

After you make your purchase, check your email for the Purchase Receipt email.

Important: Can’t find email? Don’t worry. This code can also be found in your account dashboard on wpcharitable.com.

Once you activate your license in Charitable with this code you will be able to install Charitable extensions two ways.

2. Install the addon manually via wpcharitable.com.

You can download your plugin(s) through the wpcharitable.com account area. Simply log in using the account created when you made your purchase and then download the plugin from the Downloads tab.

Once you download a zip file of an extension you can install it on your site in one of two ways:

  1. Install it in the WordPress dashboard — the recommended approach.
  2. Install it through FTP.

How to install a plugin in your WordPress dashboard

You can install a Charitable extension in your WordPress dashboard. This is the way we recommend installing Charitable extensions, since it’s the easiest.

In your WordPress dashboard, go to Plugins > Add New:

Next, click on the Upload Plugin in the top left corner, attach the zip file you downloaded earlier, and finally click Install Now.

WordPress-plugin-install-with-a-zip-file

Skip ahead to find out how to activate your plugin.

How to install a plugin via FTP

If you have FTP access to your website server and you are comfortable with using an FTP program like Cyberducks or Filezilla, you can follow the steps below to install with FTP.

First of all, you will need to unzip the zip file you downloaded earlier. You will be uploading the plugin folder, not the zip file itself.

Next, log in to your website server using FTP. Navigate to the /wp-content/plugins directory in your WordPress installation files.

Upload the plugin folder to the plugins directory to install it.

Activate the plugin

Now that you have installed the plugin, the final step is to activate it.

If you installed the plugin via the WordPress dashboard, simply click on the Activate Plugin button:

You can also activate plugins by going to Plugins > Installed Plugins.

3. Installing via the addons screen in Charitable

You can also do a one-click install of an extension or addon you have available in your plan by going to the addons screen in the Charitable menu.

Still have questions? We’re here to help!

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Improvement Payments

💸 Introducing Tiered Rates for Fee Relief: Match the Ask to the Gift!

Fee Relief asks your donors one short question at checkout: would you like to cover the processing fee on this gift? Until now that question used a single rate for every donation on a gateway, so a $10 gift and a $500 gift were asked for the same percentage. Fee Relief 1.3.0 lets you set as many donation bands as you like, each carrying its own rate. Why this is important:

  • 🪙 Gentler on small gifts: A fixed transaction cost is a far bigger share of a $10 donation than a $500 one, so bands let you ask for less at the bottom.
  • 🎚️ As many bands as you need: Each band carries its own percentage and its own fixed amount, and the top band runs on with no upper limit.
  • 🛑 An optional ceiling: A Maximum fee field stops any donor being asked for more than a number you choose, however large the gift.
  • 🔌 Set per payment gateway: Stripe can run on four bands while Windcave and Payfast stay on a single rate, because bands belong to a gateway and not to your whole site.
  • 🛡️ Nothing changes until you say so: Your current rates stay exactly as they are until you switch Use Tiered Rates on under Charitable » Settings » Advanced » Fee Relief.

Check out our announcement here.

Donations Improvement

📊 Your Pro Dashboard Can Now Compare, Export, and Score!

Most fundraising dashboards only tell you how much you have raised. Charitable Pro 1.8.19 rebuilds the dashboard and the Reports Overview around the harder questions: whether anything is broken, whether this period beat the last one, and which single change would make the most difference today. Why this is important:

  • 📈 Every figure has a trend: Pick a period and the tiles and the chart move together, with each total shown against the previous period.
  • 🗓️ Charts that stay readable: Short ranges group donations day by day, while longer ranges group by week or month, so a full year reads as a curve instead of a flat line.
  • 🔀 Compare any 2 periods: Not just consecutive ones, so you can ask how this December did against last December. That matters because fundraising is seasonal.
  • 📤 Export the whole summary: Send the full overview out as CSV or PDF, ready for a board pack or a funder report.
  • 🎯 Score your setup for free: Have your fundraising setup scored, so the one change worth making next is the one you can see.

Check out our announcement here.

Feature New

🎟️ Introducing Charitable Events: Sell Tickets Inside Your Campaigns!

Most nonprofits sell event tickets in one tool and collect donations in another, which leaves two sets of reports and a manual match at the end of the year. Charitable Events brings both together, selling tickets through the same donation forms and payment gateways you already run in Charitable. Why this is important:

  • 🎟️ Every ticket is a donation: Ticket sales run through the gateway you already use and count toward the campaign goal, with everything managed under Charitable » Events.
  • 📱 QR check-in from any phone: Each attendee gets their own QR code on the receipt, and volunteers scan at the door through a check-in link that needs no WordPress account.
  • 🧾 Receipts ready for tax time: Give each ticket type a fair market value, and Charitable puts the correct tax-deductible amount on every donor receipt.
  • 📋 Attendee details at checkout: Ask every guest for a meal choice, shirt size, or access needs, with a separate attendee record created for each ticket.
  • 🗓️ Blocks and calendars included: Three editor blocks plus Sugar Calendar and The Events Calendar support put your events where supporters already look.

Check out our announcement here.

ai New

🚀 Unleash AI Power in Charitable!

Your AI assistant can now build, edit, and manage your Charitable fundraising campaigns directly — just by asking. With Charitable Pro adding write support for the WordPress Abilities API, tools like ChatGPT, Claude, and Cursor can handle full administrative actions safely through MCP. Why this is important:

  • 🤖 Campaign creation in plain language: Prompt your assistant with a goal like “Set up a fundraiser for the shelter with a $5,000 goal”, and it builds a real draft campaign complete with suggested donation tiers.
  • 🎨 Instant donation form tweaks: Add custom fields, change button colors, or reorder elements without diving into form settings.
  • 📝 Offline gift logging: Tell your assistant about cash or check gifts, and it will match donor emails and record transactions into your history.
  • 🛡️ Safety and control by default: Write access stays strictly off until turned on in Charitable » Tools » AI MCP, keeping read-only reporting safe by default.
  • 📜 Full audit logging: Every change made by an AI assistant is tracked under Charitable » Tools » Logs, so you always know who (or what) updated your site.

Check out our announcement here.

Improvement Payments

💰 Accept Recurring Donations with Windcave and Charitable

A donor sets their gift up once on Windcave’s secure payment page, and Charitable bills every renewal after that on schedule. Why this is important:

🏦 Organizations banked in New Zealand or Australia: monthly giving on the gateway your bank already set you up with, with no second processor to onboard.
⛪ Churches taking regular tithes and offerings: congregants set their own schedule once, which is the simplest way to launch recurring church giving without a separate platform.
🌏 Groups with donors in several currencies: Windcave handles more than 20, so a supporter can give in the currency they actually hold.
📅 Operating funds rather than one-time campaigns: switch on Recurring Only mode and the one-off option disappears, so every gift to that campaign is a subscription.
🧾 Teams with no developer on staff: 3 sets of credentials pasted into a settings page, and no code anywhere.

Check out our announcement here.