How to Choose the Right Event Ticketing Platform

There is no universally "best" ticketing platform. The right choice depends entirely on your event. Before comparing platforms, get clear on what you're actually running:

• Event size — 50 people or 5,000?
• Paid or free — Are you charging for tickets or just tracking RSVPs?
• Ticket price — $10 general admission or $150 VIP?
• Recurring or one-time — A single event or a monthly series?
• Venue connectivity — Will you have reliable internet at check-in?
• Check-in staff — One person at the door or multiple entrances?
• Refund needs — Do you expect refund requests? What's your policy?
• Marketing needs — Do you need to reach new audiences, or just your existing list?
• Reporting needs — Do you need financial reports, attendance data, exports?
• Website — Do you have one, or do you need a standalone event page?

Different events lead to different priorities. A school fundraiser needs simple free RSVPs and volunteer check-in access. A festival needs multiple ticket tiers, high-volume checkout, and multiple entrance scanners. A recurring community event needs a storefront where people can find all upcoming dates.

Write down your answers before you start comparing platforms. It will make the evaluation much faster — and prevent you from overpaying for features you don't need.

Ticketing fees are the most common source of confusion — and the most common source of unpleasant surprises. Here's what to compare:

• Platform fee — A percentage of the ticket price charged by the ticketing platform.
• Payment processing fee — A fee from the payment processor (like Stripe or PayPal) for handling the credit card transaction.
• Per-ticket fixed fee — A flat amount added per ticket, regardless of price.
• Who pays — Does the buyer pay the fee on top of the ticket price, or does the organizer absorb it from their proceeds?
• Monthly subscription — Some platforms charge a monthly fee regardless of whether you sell any tickets.
• Setup costs — Most modern platforms have no setup fee, but some enterprise solutions do.
• Payout fees — Some platforms charge a fee to transfer your earnings to your bank account.
• Refund fee policy — When you issue a refund, is the platform fee refunded to you, or is it kept by the platform?

How Side Quest Utah handles fees: Side Quest uses a per-ticket fee with a percentage component and a small fixed amount. Organizers choose whether the buyer pays the fee on top of the ticket price or the organizer absorbs it. Free events are completely free — no booking fee, no per-ticket charge. There are no monthly subscriptions or setup fees. Organizers see the applicable fees before publishing, and fees are clearly disclosed at checkout.

Once you understand the fees, the next step is deciding what to charge. See our how to price event tickets guide for a free interactive ticket price planner that calculates break-even pricing based on your costs, attendance, and fee structure.

Refund fee behavior: When a customer requests a refund, Side Quest retains the booking fee (the fee is nonrefundable). When an event is cancelled or a system error occurs, Side Quest refunds the full booking fee. This is an important distinction — some platforms refund fees in all cases, others never do. Know the policy before you choose.

For a deep dive into how ticketing fees work — with an interactive fee calculator — read our event ticketing fees explained guide.

Checkout is where people decide to finish — or abandon. A good checkout experience is simple, fast, and mobile-friendly. Here's what to evaluate:

• Mobile-first design — Most buyers will purchase from their phone. Does checkout look and work well on a small screen?
• Guest checkout — Can people buy without creating an account? Forcing account creation adds friction and reduces conversion.
• Minimal steps — How many screens between "Get Tickets" and "Confirmed"? Fewer is better.
• Clear fee disclosure — Are all fees shown before the payment step? Surprise fees at the last step cause abandonment.
• Promo codes — Can you create discount codes, and can customers apply them easily at checkout?
• Multiple ticket types — Can customers buy different ticket tiers in the same order?
• Free ticket registration — Does free checkout work as smoothly as paid, or is it an afterthought?
• Payment security — Is payment processed through a certified, secure payment processor?

With Side Quest Utah, checkout is mobile-first with a clean two-column layout on desktop. Guest checkout is the default — no account required. Fees are shown clearly in the order summary before payment. Promo codes, quantity selection, and multiple ticket types are all supported. Free events use a simplified registration flow with the same mobile-first design.

After someone buys a ticket, what happens next? Good ticket delivery should be:

• Instant — Tickets delivered immediately, not days later.
• Digital — A QR code on a phone, not a physical ticket to print.
• Accessible — Recoverable if the buyer loses the email or their phone.
• Transferable — The buyer can send the ticket to someone else if needed.

Side Quest Utah delivers QR tickets instantly after purchase. Buyers receive a confirmation email with a link to their tickets. Logged-in users see tickets in their "My Tickets" wallet. Guest buyers can re-access tickets through a "Find My Tickets" lookup using their email. Tickets can be transferred to another person — and when a transfer is accepted, the old QR becomes invalid and the recipient gets a new one.

For a deep dive into how QR tickets work — what's in the code, how scanning validates entry, duplicate protection, screenshots, and more — read our guide to how QR event tickets work.

Check-in is where your ticketing platform meets your actual event. A smooth check-in gets people through the door fast. Here's what to evaluate:

• Phone-based scanning — Can staff scan with a phone camera, or is special hardware required?
• Multiple scanners — Can multiple staff scan simultaneously at different entrances?
• Duplicate detection — Does the system prevent the same ticket from being admitted twice?
• Manual lookup — Can staff find attendees by name or email if their QR won't scan?
• Real-time count — Can you see how many people have checked in at any moment?
• Internet requirement — Does check-in work offline, or is internet required?
• Undo/reversal — Can a check-in be reversed if someone was admitted by mistake?

Side Quest Utah supports phone-based QR scanning with no special hardware. Multiple staff can scan simultaneously at different entrances — all check-ins sync in real time through the server, and duplicate scans are automatically flagged. Manual attendee lookup by name, email, or ticket number is built in as a fallback. Check-in reversal is available to Manager and higher roles.

For a complete guide to planning your front door — staffing, scanning lanes, connectivity, manual lookup, and an interactive check-in planner — see our Event Check-In Guide.

Understanding where your money goes — and how fast it gets there — is critical. Ask these questions:

• Who processes payments? — Does the platform use its own payment system, or do you connect your own account?
• Where does the money go? — Directly to your bank account, or held by the platform?
• When are payouts available? — Immediately after each sale, weekly, or after the event?
• Do I need a connected payment account? — Some platforms require you to set up your own Stripe or PayPal account.
• Who handles disputes? — If a customer disputes a charge, who manages the dispute process?
• Are financial reports available? — Can you see gross sales, net sales, fees, and refunds?
• Can I export records? — Can you download transaction data for accounting?

Side Quest Utah uses Stripe Connect to process payments. Organizers connect their own Stripe account during onboarding, which means they have direct access to their funds through Stripe's payout system. The organizer's connected account receives ticket revenue, and Side Quest's platform fee is deducted automatically. Financial reports show gross sales, net sales, refunds, and organizer proceeds, and transaction data can be exported for accounting.

Selling tickets is only half the job. You also need to manage what happens after the sale. Look for:

• Order search — Can you find a specific order by customer name, email, or order number?
• Attendee lookup — Can you view who bought what, and their check-in status?
• Full refunds — Can you refund an entire order?
• Partial refunds — Can you refund specific tickets within an order without refunding the whole order?
• Checked-in safeguards — Does the system warn you before refunding a ticket that's already been used?
• Event cancellation — Can you cancel an event and process refunds in bulk?
• Audit trail — Is there a record of who issued a refund, when, and why?

Side Quest Utah supports full and ticket-specific (partial) refunds. Organizers can search orders, view attendee details, and issue refunds with a required reason. Refunds of already-checked-in tickets require an admin override and are flagged for additional audit. Event cancellation processes refunds for all ticket holders. All refund actions are logged with the initiator's name and timestamp.

Different events need different ticket structures. Evaluate:

• Multiple ticket types — Can you create general admission, VIP, early bird, student, and child tickets for the same event?
• Quantity limits — Can you set a maximum capacity and prevent overselling?
• Per-order limits — Can you limit how many tickets one person can buy?
• Sold-out behavior — When tickets sell out, does the system automatically stop sales?
• Sale windows — Can you set when ticket sales start and end?
• Free tickets — Can you offer free RSVPs alongside paid tickets?
• Promo codes — Can you create percentage or fixed-amount discount codes?

Side Quest Utah supports multiple ticket types per event with independent pricing, quantities, and sale windows. Inventory is tracked in real time — when a ticket type sells out, it's automatically marked unavailable. Promo codes support both percentage and fixed-amount discounts, with optional usage limits and date windows. Free and paid tickets can be mixed within the same event.

There's a big difference between platforms that only give you a checkout link and platforms that give you a full event presence. Understand the three levels:

Side Quest Utah provides all three. Every event gets a public event page with a shareable URL. Organizers can enable a branded storefront at /organizers/:slug with their logo, cover image, description, and upcoming events. And if you have your own website, you can embed ticket widgets or a "Get Tickets" button directly on your pages.

You don't need a website to sell tickets. But if you run multiple events, a storefront gives people a single place to find everything you're doing — which builds recognition and repeat attendance.

Ticketing platforms fall into different categories:

• Pure transaction tools — They process payments and deliver tickets. You drive all your own traffic.
• Event marketplaces — They list events where people browse. You benefit from existing traffic.
• Event discovery platforms — They combine ticketing with local event search, city pages, and category browsing.
• Website plugins — They embed into your existing site. You keep your traffic but handle your own discovery.

For local events, discovery can matter a lot. If you're running a community festival in Salt Lake City, being listed where Utah residents are already searching for "things to do" can drive ticket sales you wouldn't get from your own marketing alone.

Side Quest Utah is both a ticketing platform and a local event discovery platform. Published events appear in event search, city pages, and category pages — so people who are already looking for things to do in Utah can find your event. You also get shareable event URLs, promo codes, embeddable widgets for your own website, and a branded organizer storefront.

Looking for event-type-specific guidance? See our guides for festival ticketing, fundraiser ticketing, and school event ticketing.

After you start selling, you need visibility into what's happening. Useful reporting includes:

• Orders — How many orders have come in?
• Tickets sold — How many tickets have been purchased?
• Gross sales — Total ticket face value sold.
• Net sales — Gross sales minus refunds.
• Organizer proceeds — Your earnings after platform fees.
• Attendance / check-in rate — How many ticket holders actually showed up?
• Refunds — Total amount refunded.
• Exports — Can you download attendee lists and order data as CSV?
• Date range filtering — Can you view data for a specific period?

Side Quest Utah provides a reports dashboard with overview KPIs (gross sales, net sales, refunds, organizer proceeds, tickets sold, orders, check-in rate, upcoming events), detailed sales reports, refund reports, attendance reports, and ticket-type-level breakdowns. All reports support date range filtering and can be exported as CSV files. Financial metrics are restricted to Manager and higher roles for security.

If you have staff or volunteers, you need to control who can do what. Not everyone needs full access. Look for:

• Role-based permissions — Can you assign different access levels to different team members?
• Check-in-only access — Can volunteers scan tickets without seeing financial data?
• Financial restrictions — Are refund and payout tools restricted to trusted roles?
• Invitation system — Can you invite team members by email?

Side Quest Utah supports five team roles with hierarchical permissions:

This lets you invite volunteers to scan tickets at the door without giving them access to sales data, refund tools, or organization settings — a critical security feature for events with many helpers.

Side Quest Utah isn't the right fit for every event — and that's okay. Here's where it genuinely shines:

The best way to know is to try it. Start selling tickets or learn more about Side Quest Utah ticketing.

Use this table as a framework for comparing any platforms you're evaluating: