Chobble Tickets vs Hi.Events

Two open source options

It's rare to have two genuinely open source ticketing platforms to choose from, so let's be upfront: Hi.Events is a solid project. It's got 3,600+ GitHub stars, 35+ contributors, and a modern React/Laravel stack. If you're looking for open source ticketing, both platforms deserve your attention.

This page is an honest comparison to help you decide which fits your needs better.

Pricing comparison

The pricing models are quite different:

Hi.Events Cloud charges no upfront fee but takes 0.75% + 40¢ (~32p) per ticket sold, plus Stripe processing fees. You can pass these to the buyer or absorb them yourself. Free events are completely free.

Hi.Events Self-Hosted has no platform fees at all - you only pay Stripe processing and your own server costs (roughly £16-32/month for hosting).

Chobble Tickets charges a flat £50/year (£25 for charities and community groups) with no per-ticket fees. You pay Stripe or Square processing fees on top.

For small numbers of tickets, Hi.Events Cloud is cheaper since there's no annual fee. But as volume grows, Chobble's flat fee becomes better value - if you sell more than about 150 tickets at £15 each in a year, you'll pay less with Chobble Tickets.

Interactive cost calculator

Drag the sliders to see how costs compare at different volumes:

Feature comparison

Both sites share some features:

• Open source with self-hosting option
• Stripe payment processing
• Apple Pay and Google Pay at checkout (via Stripe)
• QR code scanning for check-in at the door
• API access for custom integrations
• Custom questions at checkout
• Capacity management to prevent overselling
• Email confirmations to attendees after booking
• Free event support with no payment setup required
• Refund processing
• Embeddable ticket widgets for your own website
• Multiple ticket types per event with shared capacity limits — both platforms support VIP, early bird, and tiered pricing with a shared attendee cap across ticket types

Both platforms cover the core ticketing basics well, but they differ in focus and extras:

Hi.Events has features Chobble Tickets doesn't:

• Drag-and-drop event page builder — a visual editor for designing event pages with flexible layouts, images, and custom sections
• Promo codes and discount management — create percentage and fixed-amount discount codes with usage limits, expiry dates, and codes tied to specific ticket types
• Affiliate and referral tracking — track which promoters and links are driving ticket sales with commission tracking
• Product add-ons — sell merchandise, parking, meal upgrades, or other extras alongside tickets
• Custom PDF ticket designs — design your own ticket layouts with branding, logos, and custom fields
• Multi-currency support — sell in different currencies for international events
• Donation and tiered ticket types — offer donation options and flexible pricing tiers beyond fixed and pay-what-you-want
• Tax and custom fee management — configure VAT rates, add service fees, and manage tax reporting per event
• Real-time sales dashboard — live analytics showing ticket sales, revenue, and check-in rates as they happen
• Stripe Connect instant payouts — receive payments directly to your Stripe account with faster payout times
• Custom registration questions with free-text fields — add free-text, date, and other custom field types beyond multiple choice per ticket type (Chobble supports multiple-choice custom questions)
• Bulk messaging by ticket type — send targeted emails and updates to attendees based on which ticket type they bought
• Waitlists — automatic notifications when places open up on sold-out events
• Ticket transfers — allow attendees to transfer their tickets to someone else
• Automatic invoicing — generate invoices for orders automatically
• XLSX export — export attendee and order data in Excel format (Chobble supports CSV only)
• Branded organiser homepage — a page showcasing all your events under your organiser profile
• Multiple check-in lists — create separate lists for different areas, gates, or purposes
• Offline check-in support — continue scanning tickets when internet connectivity is lost
• Multi-language support — serve the checkout in multiple languages
• Hidden/locked tickets — tickets hidden behind promo codes for presales, VIP access, or invite-only events
• Abandoned cart handling — detect and act on incomplete checkouts to recover lost sales
• Event badge designer — a browser-based badge design tool for printing attendee badges at events
• SEO tools — per-event custom meta titles, descriptions, Open Graph images, and XML sitemap generation
• Offline payment methods — record and track cash, bank transfer, or other non-digital payments
• Marketing opt-in — checkbox during checkout for attendees to opt into marketing communications

Chobble Tickets has features Hi.Events doesn't:

• End-to-end encryption — attendee data is encrypted at rest with hybrid RSA-OAEP + AES-256-GCM, not just stored in a database
• Apple & Google Wallet tickets — attendees can add tickets to their phone wallet
• ICS calendar feeds — subscribers get automatic calendar updates
• RSS feeds — syndicate your events to feed readers
• Pay-what-you-want pricing — let attendees choose their price
• Daily/recurring event support — built specifically for events that repeat on a schedule with per-date capacity
• Event groups with shared capacity — organise related events into collections for multi-event bookings with a single checkout, and use max attendees per group to create tiered ticket types (VIP, early bird, etc.) sharing a venue cap
• Admin API — authenticated API with API keys for reading and editing private event and attendee data
• Custom email providers — use Resend, Postmark, SendGrid, or Mailgun so emails come from your domain, not the platform's
• Customisable email templates — full control over confirmation emails with Liquid syntax for a fully white-label experience
• Markdown event descriptions — write content in markdown with header image uploads
• Custom domain support — use your own domain name
• Activity logs — full audit trail of all admin actions and booking activity
• Square payment support — Chobble supports both Stripe and Square; Hi.Events is Stripe-only
• No branding requirements — Chobble's AGPLv3 licence has no "Powered by" requirement; Hi.Events requires visible "Powered by Hi.Events" branding unless you buy a $499+ commercial licence
• Serverless edge deployment — Chobble compiles to a single JS file that runs on Bunny.net edge scripts with a Bunny.net edge database — no server to manage, no scaling to configure, no database replication to maintain. Hi.Events needs a traditional server (2 CPU, 4GB RAM minimum) that you're responsible for keeping online, updated, and backed up

Different philosophies

The biggest difference isn't features - it's approach.

Hi.Events is built on PHP/Laravel with a React frontend. It's a full-featured web application with a polished, modern UI aimed at nightclubs, festivals, conferences, and professional event organisers. It has instant Stripe Connect payouts and strong branding customisation. The self-hosted version requires a server with at least 2 CPU cores and 4GB RAM.

Chobble Tickets is built on Deno and compiles to a single JavaScript file that runs as an edge script on Bunny.net — no traditional server required. It uses a Bunny.net edge database, so there's no server to manage, no scaling to worry about, and no database replication to configure. It prioritises simplicity, privacy (hybrid RSA/AES encryption for attendee data), and predictable flat-rate pricing. It's aimed at community groups, schools, small organisers, and anyone who values data ownership over feature density. It's run by a Community Interest Company, not a traditional startup.

Licensing and self-hosted costs

Both platforms are open source, but with very different licences and self-hosting economics:

Hi.Events uses AGPL-3.0 with additional terms. The free self-hosted version requires a visible "Powered by Hi.Events" link. To remove branding, you need a commercial licence:

• Single Domain — $499 (~£420) for one production domain
• Multi-Tenant (SaaS) — available at higher tiers for running your own ticketing platform (contact Hi.Events for pricing)

Chobble Tickets is open source with no branding requirements and no commercial licence needed. Self-host for free, modify as you like, and use your own domain — no extra cost.

Self-hosted cost calculator

Compare self-hosting costs — Chobble Tickets has no license fee:

The self-hosted comparison above uses the Hi.Events Single Domain commercial licence ($499/~£420) since most organisations will want to remove the "Powered by" branding. Note that the Single Domain licence is perpetual for the covered version — you don't pay annually. If you're happy keeping the branding, Hi.Events self-hosted is free — just like Chobble Tickets.

When Hi.Events might be better

• You want a polished, modern UI with a visual page builder
• You need promo codes, affiliate tracking, or merchandise sales
• You prefer a pay-per-ticket model with no upfront cost
• You're running large nightlife events or festivals and want instant payouts
• You need multi-currency support
• You want a more feature-rich platform and don't mind the complexity

When Chobble Tickets might be better

• You want predictable, flat-rate pricing with no per-ticket fees
• Privacy and encryption matter to you
• You prefer a serverless, edge-deployed platform with no server management
• You're a community group, charity, or school (£25/year)
• You want Apple/Google Wallet integration, calendar feeds, or RSS
• You value a Community Interest Company over a traditional startup

Who builds Hi.Events?

Hi.Events is created and maintained by Dave Earley, a developer based in Dublin, Ireland. He describes it as a "passion project" built primarily during evenings over approximately one year. There is no known company entity behind the project, and it has no venture funding. Earley previously created Attendize, another open source ticketing platform, which he sold in 2018 (the new owners subsequently abandoned it). Hi.Events is a ground-up rewrite, not a fork.

The project has 3,600+ GitHub stars and 41 contributors, but Earley is overwhelmingly the primary contributor. It is licensed under AGPL-3.0 with an additional attribution requirement (a "Powered by Hi.Events" link must remain visible unless you buy a $499+ commercial licence).

Chobble Tickets is run by one person as a Community Interest Company (CIC) — a UK legal structure that locks the company's assets for community benefit. All of Chobble's code is public under AGPLv3 with no attribution requirement, and the platform can be self-hosted by anyone without depending on Chobble as a company.

Pricing sources

The pricing information on this page was verified in March 2026. Fees may change — check the links below for the latest figures.

• Hi.Events pricing — 0.75% + 40¢ per ticket (cloud)
• Hi.Events open source / self-hosted — $499 single domain commercial licence
• Hi.Events Single Domain licence terms
• Hi.Events on GitHub
• Chobble Tickets features
• Hi.Events on Hacker News — Show HN launch discussion