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How to Create a PayPal Donate Button for UK Charities (2026)
July 6, 2026
⚡TL;DR — The Short Answer
The PayPal donate button is quick to set up, but UK charities pay per-transaction fees and must handle Gift Aid separately.
Apply for PayPal's UK charity rate before you go live: without it, you pay the higher standard commercial rate on every donation.
PayPal Donate does not collect Gift Aid declarations or submit claims to HMRC, that 25p per £1 sits unclaimed unless you run a separate process.
Donors leave your site to complete their gift, branding on the PayPal checkout is limited, and donor records stay inside PayPal rather than a CRM you control.
Zeffy is a 100% free alternative: no platform fee, no transaction fee, Gift Aid support, and donors can still pay with PayPal at checkout.
The PayPal donate button is one of the fastest ways for a UK charity to start accepting online donations. Donors recognise the brand, the embed is a copy-and-paste job, and PayPal handles the payment processing. But the setup has a few important quirks for UK registered charities, and the fees you actually pay depend on a status most charities do not realise they need to apply for separately, and that is before you factor in Gift Aid.
This guide walks you through creating a PayPal donate button in six steps, embedding it on the most common website builders, fixing common issues, and understanding what you will really pay in the UK. At the end, we will show you how Zeffy offers a £0-fee alternative for UK charities, including for donors who still want to pay with PayPal.
A PayPal donate button is a button you embed on your website that routes donors to a PayPal-hosted checkout to complete their gift. PayPal processes the transaction, deducts its fee, and deposits the remainder in your PayPal Business account.
It is familiar to donors and quick to set up, but it has trade-offs: donors leave your site to give, Gift Aid is not handled automatically, donor records live inside PayPal rather than a CRM you control, and the fee you pay depends on whether PayPal has approved your registered charity status. We will cover all of that below.
How to create a PayPal donate button in 6 steps
PayPal's Donate button works with all major credit and debit cards and can be placed anywhere on your website. Once built, donors are routed to PayPal's checkout to complete payment.
1. Create or upgrade to a PayPal Business account
You need a PayPal Business account to create a Donate button. If you currently have a personal PayPal account, upgrade it (it is free), personal accounts cannot generate Donate buttons, and using one for charity donations creates accounting and compliance problems.
Go to PayPal.com and click Sign Up, or log into your existing account and select Upgrade to Business Account.
Choose Business Account and enter your charity's legal name, address, and contact details. Use the name exactly as it appears on the Charity Commission register (England and Wales), the OSCR register (Scotland), or the CCNI register (Northern Ireland). A name mismatch is the most common cause of charity verification delays.
If you are a UK registered charity, separately apply for PayPal's UK charity rate. You will need to provide evidence of your registration, including your registered charity number and your entry on the relevant charity register. The UK charity rate is significantly lower than PayPal's standard commercial rate. See the fees section below and our PayPal vs Zeffy comparison for current UK figures.
Start the charity rate application before you launch the button. Without it, every donation is charged at PayPal's standard UK commercial rate.
Sign in with the Business account you just created or upgraded.
Select Donate from the list of button types.
3. Choose the button style
Pick your country and language so donor checkout shows the correct currency and copy.
Select one of PayPal's pre-designed donate buttons, or upload a custom image (PNG, JPG, GIF, or BMP). A button that visually matches your site usually converts better than the default PayPal-branded design.
Click Continue.
4. Set up the donation page
Upload your charity's logo and a cover image. These appear on the PayPal-hosted checkout your donors will see.
Add a short description of your charity's purpose, optional but recommended. Donors arriving on PayPal want reassurance they are in the right place.
Choose between a pop-up or full-page donation experience. Pop-ups keep donors on your site visually; full-page redirects to PayPal.
Click Continue.
5. Customise donation details
Set the primary currency (GBP for UK donors).
Configure preset donation amounts (for example, £10 / £25 / £50 / £100) and decide whether to allow a custom amount.
Enable recurring monthly donations if you want donors to be able to opt in.
Toggle fee coverage to let donors voluntarily add a small amount to offset the processing fee.
Optionally let donors designate their gift to a specific programme or fund.
Click Build It and then Save.
6. Get the embed code
Copy the generated HTML snippet to paste into your website (the next section walks through each builder).
Grab the shareable URL for use in social posts, email signatures, and newsletter campaigns.
Download the QR code for print materials, event signage, and direct-mail appeals.
How to add your PayPal donate button to your website
PayPal generates a standard HTML snippet. Every modern website builder accepts it, but the steps differ. Here is how to embed it on the platforms most charities use.
WordPress
If you are on the block editor (Gutenberg): add a Custom HTML block to the page or post where you want the button, paste the PayPal snippet, and preview. The button renders on the front end, not in the editor.
If you are on a classic theme or want the button in a sidebar or footer, paste the snippet into a Custom HTML widget under Appearance > Widgets. Several free PayPal Donations plugins exist if you would rather configure the button inside WordPress, but for a single embed the Custom HTML block is the simplest path and does not add a plugin dependency.
Wix
In the Wix editor, click Add Elements > Embed Code > Embed HTML. Paste your PayPal HTML into the Custom Code window, click Update, then drag the embed box to position and resize it. Publish the site for the button to go live, embeds do not render in the editor preview.
Squarespace
Edit the page where you want the button and add a Code Block (Insert > Code). Make sure the language is set to HTML and the "Display Source" toggle is off. Paste the PayPal snippet and save. The button appears immediately on the published page.
Shopify
Shopify is built for product checkout, so embedding a PayPal Donate button is less common, but it works. Add a Custom Liquid section to the page where you want it (Online Store > Pages > Add Page, or edit your theme) and paste the PayPal HTML. If your theme strips form tags, paste the snippet into a Custom HTML block instead.
Custom HTML or static sites
Open the HTML file for the page where you want the button, paste the PayPal snippet inside the `<body>` where you want the button to render, and deploy. No additional libraries or dependencies are needed, PayPal hosts the checkout; your site just hosts the button.
What you'll actually pay: PayPal donate button fees in the UK
This is the part most setup guides get wrong. PayPal offers a reduced UK charity rate, but that rate only applies if your charity has applied for it separately and been approved. Without that approval, every donation is charged at PayPal's higher standard UK commercial rate, a meaningful difference when you multiply it across a year of fundraising.
What that means in practice: at PayPal's standard UK rate, a charity raising £10,000 in online donations pays a significant portion in transaction fees. Apply for and receive PayPal's UK charity rate, available to charities registered with the Charity Commission for England and Wales, OSCR, or CCNI, and those fees fall noticeably. With Zeffy, the full £10,000 reaches your cause. Nothing is deducted in fees.
Heads up: if you signed up with a regular PayPal Business account and never separately applied for the UK charity rate, you are paying the higher standard rate on every donation. Check your account settings and submit your charity registration evidence to PayPal if you have not already done so.
Where Gift Aid fits (and does not) with a PayPal donate button
This is the single most important UK-specific gap in the PayPal Donate button product.
PayPal's standalone Donate button does not collect a Gift Aid declaration at checkout, and it does not submit Gift Aid claims to HMRC via Charities Online. That means a UK charity relying solely on PayPal Donate may be leaving up to 25p for every £1 unclaimed, unless it runs a parallel Gift Aid workflow.
To capture Gift Aid on PayPal donations, a charity must either:
Follow up with each donor by email to request a signed Gift Aid declaration, or
Hold a standing Gift Aid declaration on file for regular donors and periodically batch-upload claims to HMRC Charities Online.
Neither is automatic. Both require admin time that many small charities simply do not have.
The PayPal Giving Fund, a separate UK-registered charity intermediary, can process Gift Aid on donations routed through it, but it disburses on its own monthly schedule, which can delay access to funds by several weeks.
For charities where Gift Aid is a significant income stream, and for many small UK charities those 25p-per-£1 top-ups are a genuine survival lever, moving to a platform that captures Gift Aid declarations at checkout and handles HMRC submissions automatically is worth evaluating carefully.
Pros of using a PayPal donate button
Donor familiarity and trust. Millions of people have a PayPal account. Seeing the logo at checkout reduces hesitation, especially for first-time donors who do not yet recognise your charity.
Fast setup with no developer needed. Build, copy, paste. No code beyond a single HTML snippet.
Secure and PCI compliant. PayPal handles fraud detection, encryption, and card data, none of that liability sits with your site.
International donations. PayPal accepts payments in dozens of currencies and converts them, which is useful for charities with overseas supporters.
Integrations. PayPal connects to a number of CRMs and accounting tools, though the depth of integration varies by system.
Limited branding. You can upload a logo and cover image, but the checkout still reads as PayPal, not as your charity. There is no way to fully customise colours, fields, or follow-up messaging.
Processing fees on every gift. PayPal's standard UK rate applies unless your charity has been approved for the reduced charity rate. Over a year, that difference can amount to hundreds of pounds redirected away from your cause.
No automated Gift Aid handling. PayPal's Donate button does not collect Gift Aid declarations or submit claims to HMRC. That means 25p per £1 sits unclaimed unless your charity runs a separate workflow. See HMRC's Gift Aid guidance for what a compliant declaration process requires.
No built-in donor management. Donor records live in PayPal's transaction list, not a CRM. Exporting and reconciling is manual work, and you do not get segmentation, donor history views, or campaign attribution.
Limited reporting and analytics. Basic transaction exports only. No funnel data, no source tracking, no campaign-level performance.
Recurring donation limits. PayPal's recurring options are narrower than dedicated fundraising platforms, fewer cadences, less retry logic when a card fails, and donors can cancel inside their PayPal account without notifying your charity.
Donor data ownership. Donor email addresses and contact information are not always passed through cleanly. You may have supporters whose only record is a PayPal transaction line.
Limited UK regulatory signalling. The PayPal-hosted checkout does not prominently surface your registered charity number, Fundraising Regulator membership, or Gift Aid information. UK donors look for these trust signals before giving, a charity-branded donation page can display all of them clearly.
Common PayPal donate button problems and how to fix them
The button is not displaying on my website
Usually the embed code is being stripped by your editor. Make sure you pasted it into an HTML / Custom Code / Code Block component, not a regular text block. On WordPress, check that your theme or a security plugin is not filtering out form tags. On Wix and Squarespace, the button only renders on the published site, not in the editor preview.
Donors are seeing error messages at checkout
The two most common causes are an incomplete PayPal Business account (missing verification, no linked bank account) or a button built before the account finished setup. Rebuild the button after confirming your account is fully verified, then replace the old embed.
Funds are not appearing in our account
Check whether donations are routing through PayPal Giving Fund. PayPal Giving Fund disburses through a separate UK-registered charity intermediary on its own monthly schedule, which can delay funds by several weeks. Confirm in your Donate button settings that gifts are going directly to your Business account and not through Giving Fund, unless you specifically opted into that flow.
Charity rate verification is taking a long time
PayPal reviews UK charity rate applications against your entry on the relevant charity register. Common causes of delay: the legal name on your PayPal account does not exactly match the name on the Charity Commission register, your OSCR record, or your CCNI listing; your registered charity number is missing or mistyped; or you have used your trading name rather than your full registered charity name. If it has been more than four weeks, contact PayPal support directly, the queue often needs a nudge.
The button looks broken on mobile
PayPal's stock button is fixed-width and can overflow narrow containers. Wrap the embed in a container set to `max-width: 100%`, or upload a smaller custom button image at step 3 of the build flow.
Donors are not having Gift Aid claimed on their gifts
This is expected behaviour with a PayPal Donate button: PayPal does not collect a Gift Aid declaration at checkout. To claim Gift Aid on donations, your charity must capture declarations separately, by email follow-up or by holding a standing declaration on file, and submit claims via HMRC Charities Online. Basic-rate UK donors do not need a receipt from PayPal for personal tax purposes; a payment confirmation is a sufficient personal record. The issue is with your charity's Gift Aid reclaim process, not the donor's own records.
PayPal donate button vs a £0-fee alternative
If the fee picture above gives you pause, it is worth comparing PayPal's Donate button to a free alternative side by side. For a deeper comparison, see our PayPal alternatives guide.
Standard UK commercial rate; reduced UK charity rate for registered charities
£0, completely free
Donor checkout
Redirected to PayPal
Embedded on your own site
Automated Gift Aid capture and HMRC claims
No
Yes
Customisable branding
Limited (logo and cover image only)
Full charity branding
Built-in donor CRM
No
Yes
Recurring donations
Yes, with limited options
Yes, with retry logic
UK regulatory fit (Fundraising Regulator, UK GDPR)
Payment processor only; compliance is the charity's responsibility
Platform built for UK-registered charities
Ticketing, auctions, memberships, raffles
No
Yes, all included free
Accepts PayPal at checkout
Yes
Yes, donors can pay via PayPal on Zeffy too
Why charities choose Zeffy as a free alternative to PayPal
Zeffy is a 100% free fundraising platform built for charities and not-for-profit organisations. There are no platform fees, no transaction fees, and no monthly subscription. Zeffy replaces your PayPal donation button and covers all payment processing on its end, so on £10,000 raised, you keep the full £10,000. Nothing is deducted in fees.
More than 100,000 charities and not-for-profit organisations worldwide use Zeffy, and the platform has helped move over £2 billion to causes with zero fees deducted. PTAs, village halls, community sports clubs, churches, foodbanks, and small charities have replaced their PayPal Donate buttons with Zeffy and reinvested the savings directly into their work. For a village hall treasurer managing the whole fundraising operation alongside a full-time job, or a PTA volunteer whose per-ticket fete costs eat into every event, the difference adds up quickly.
With Zeffy, your charity gets:
Embedded donation forms so donors stay on your site
Gift Aid declaration capture at checkout and support for HMRC reclaim workflows
Built-in donor CRM with full transaction and contact history
Recurring donations with retry logic and donor-side management
Ticketing, peer-to-peer fundraising, auctions, raffles, and membership tools in one platform
Real human support, free
And if some of your donors still want to pay with PayPal? Zeffy accepts PayPal as a donor payment option at checkout, so you get the £0-fee platform without asking supporters to abandon a payment method they trust.
Yes. PayPal is a PCI-compliant payment processor and handles fraud detection, encryption, and card data on its end. Donors who already have a PayPal account can pay with a saved card or PayPal balance without re-entering card details. The main risks for charities are operational rather than security-related: donor records staying inside PayPal rather than a CRM the charity controls, and Gift Aid declarations not being captured at checkout.
Funds typically reach your PayPal Business account within minutes of the donation being made. Transferring that balance to a UK bank account usually takes one to three business days. If donations are routed through PayPal Giving Fund, disbursement follows PayPal Giving Fund's own monthly schedule, which can delay access to funds significantly.
Yes, to a degree. You can upload a custom logo, cover image, and, if you prefer, a custom button image (PNG, JPG, GIF, or BMP) rather than the default PayPal-branded pill. The PayPal-hosted checkout page still carries PayPal's own branding; you cannot fully replace it with your charity's colours and design. For a fully branded donation experience, a platform that embeds the form directly on your site gives you far more control.
PayPal Giving Fund UK is a UK-registered charity that acts as an intermediary between donors on PayPal and enrolled charitable organisations. When a donor gives through PayPal Giving Fund rather than directly to your PayPal Business account, PayPal Giving Fund receives the donation, processes Gift Aid where applicable, and disburses it to your charity on a monthly schedule. The advantage is Gift Aid handling without your charity having to manage individual declarations; the trade-off is that you receive funds on a delay and have reduced visibility into individual donor data.
PayPal's terms of service require a Business account for receiving charity donations. Using a personal account routes gifts into your personal tax affairs, creates accounting and compliance problems, and disqualifies you from PayPal's reduced UK charity rate. Upgrading from a personal to a Business account is free and straightforward, do it before you launch your Donate button.
PayPal is not entirely free. Registered UK charities can apply for a reduced charity transaction rate, which is lower than PayPal's standard commercial rate but is still deducted from every donation. There is no monthly subscription fee for the Donate button itself, but every transaction carries a processing charge. If you want to raise funds with zero fees deducted, Zeffy charges no platform fee, no transaction fee, and no monthly subscription, the full amount of every donation reaches your cause.
No, not automatically through the standalone Donate button. PayPal's Donate button does not collect a Gift Aid declaration at checkout. Your charity is responsible for capturing declarations separately and submitting reclaim requests to HMRC via Charities Online. The exception is PayPal Giving Fund: when donations route through it, PayPal Giving Fund can process Gift Aid, but disbursement is on a monthly delay and donor data visibility is reduced.
Yes. Zeffy accepts PayPal as a donor payment option at checkout. Switching to Zeffy for your charity's fundraising does not mean asking supporters to abandon a payment method they trust. They can still choose PayPal at the Zeffy checkout, and your charity pays £0 in platform or transaction fees regardless of how they pay.
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