Integration Options 

Chargebee offers the following options to integrate the hosted checkout depending on your application/website's framework and business model.

• Hosted Pages API: recommended if you want to authenticate the user at your end, override payment-related information, handle returning users, and collect additional information.
• Drop-in Script.
• Item specific URL.

When to use API vs. Drop-in Script 

Hosted Pages API 

Using Hosted Pages API to create In-app Checkout is the recommended approach when you already maintain a user-management or authentication system. It gives you control to override predefined information for a particular instance like changing the price of an item or providing additional trial period.

Benefits of using API integration 

• Allows you to manage authentication, collect additional information in your application/website.
• Allows you to override plan and add-on pricing during checkout.
• Optimize trial tenure. This allows you to customize the trial tenure based on the customer (For example, you can offer a 14-day trial to one customer, and a one month trial to another).

Here's a quick example on when you may want to choose Checkout via API over Drop-in script:

Let us assume that James runs a digital weight loss and fitness app. He wants to collect user information such as the client's height, weight, food habits, and so on along with their address, email, and store it in his database instead of Chargebee. He would still like to use Chargebee's Checkout as he does not want to get involved in the nitty-gritty details of PCI Compliance.

James can choose the API integration as this would allow him to collect additional information at his frontend and then use Chargebee's Hosted Pages API to collect the remaining information (specifically payment details for example).

To understand more about the integration and implementation of Checkout via API, read our developer documentation .

You can use hosted checkout via APIs for the below workflows:

• Checkout for new subscriptions 
• Checkout for existing subscription upgrades 
• Checkout for one-time purchases 

Drop-in Script 

Drop-in Script is a plug-in type easy to use solution that requires minimal developer help. You can easily create a checkout page by adding a script generated for the plan-item on your HTML page.

Checkout integrated using Drop-in script is Level 1 PCI compliant. Hence you need to fill in this questionnaire  before integrating.

To use the Drop-in Script to integrate Checkout, follow these steps:

1) Click Settings>Configure Chargebee>Checkout and Self serve portal>Integrate with Chargebee.

2) Select the Product family, Plan, Currency, and Frequency from the drop-down list.

3) Add Addons and Charges if applicable using Add addon and Add charge options.

4) Copy the Header script and paste it within the head element of your website's HTML.

5) Copy the generated Checkout Button Code and hyperlink it in the subscribe button in your website's HTML. This way, when a customer clicks the subscribe button, the Checkout opens and displays the above selected parameters of plan name, frequency, addon, and so on.

You can use hosted checkout via Drop-in for the below workflows:

• Checkout for new subscriptions
• Checkout for one-time purchases

Learn more  on how to integrate Checkout using Drop-in script.

Item specific URL 

Chargebee allows you to construct a customized URL where-in, you can pass additional customer and subscription information during checkout. The resulting Checkout URL can then be embedded into your application/website.

You can also retrieve subscription details once a sign-up is successful. This information can be used in case you want to display custom messages to your customers after signing up.

Here's is an example of an item-specific URL for a plan:

https://{sitename}.chargebee.com/hosted_pages/checkout?subscription_items[item_price_id][0]={item_price_id}&subscription_items[quantity][0]={quantity}

Use an item-specific URL for your website 

To use the customized URL, the placeholders need to be replaced with your Chargebee site name and Plan ID or Plan Price Point ID.

For example,

For a site named mars-voyage.chargebee.com having Plan Price Point ID as "mars-trip-usd-monthly" you can construct the item specific URL as below:

https://mars-voyage.chargebee.com/hosted_pages/checkout?subscription_items[item_price_id][0]=mars-trip-usd-monthly&subscription_items[quantity][0]=5

Further, you can add addons, charges, and coupons to the query string (part in the URL followed by the question mark) to create a plan. When the users click on the link, it displays the checkout window with the plan details. Your customers can use this link to preview the subscription details they are signing up for, securely input payment information, and complete their purchases.

Let us see an example where an item-specific URL is being used:

Here is how an Item specific URL for a plan with addons and charges would look like.

https://mars-voyage.chargebee.com/hosted_pages/checkout?subscription_items[item_price_id][0]=plan-mars-bunker-rent-usd-monthly&subscription_items[item_price_id][1]=addon-oxygen-supply-usd-daily&subscription_items[item_price_id][2]=charge-spacesuit-with-pockets&subscription_items[quantity][2]=5&coupon_ids[0]=instigator-settlement

The following table describes the above example URL:

List of supported Query Parameters 

Here is an API spec of query parameters supported which can be used in the plan URL.

You can integrate hosted checkout via Item-specific URL for the below workflows:

• Checkout for new subscriptions
• Checkout for one-time purchases