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Set your default payment link

Your default payment link is a quick way to open Paddle Checkout for a transaction, and used when updating a payment method. Set it in the Paddle dashboard.

Transactions have a checkout payment link that you can use to open a checkout to collect for payment. Set a default payment link to tell Paddle which page in your app or website that checkout payment links should point to by default.

Your default payment link is also used to open a checkout to let customers update their payment method. It's included automatically in emails sent by Paddle to customers.

You must set your default payment link to start selling with Paddle. You can't create transactions without it — including manually-collected transactions (invoices).

How it works

Every Paddle account has a default payment link. It's used for:

  • Unique payment links against transactions that automatically open a Paddle Checkout to collect for payment.
  • As a redirect for the payment method update URL against automatically-collected subscriptions to let customers update payment details.
  • In emails sent by Paddle to customers to let them update their payment details for automatically-collected subscriptions.

Your default payment link should be a page for an approved website that includes Paddle.js. You don't need to do anything to get Paddle.js to open a checkout, it automatically opens a checkout for the transaction when the query parameter is present.

Transaction payment links

All automatically-collected transactions include a checkout payment link.

Manually-collected transactions don't include a checkout payment link by default, but you can set billing_details.enable_checkout to true when creating or updating to include one. When enabled, this link is automatically included on invoice documents sent by Paddle.

Checkout payment links are returned in transaction responses as checkout.url. They're made up of your default payment link with a _ptxn query parameter appended. The value of the query parameter is the transaction ID. For example:

In this example:

Default payment linkhttps://aeroedit.com/pay
Query parameter key?_ptxn=
Query parameter value (transaction ID)txn_01h2b0qpjc0xt8k5aw6nsdec4p

You can pass any of your other approved websites as checkout.url when creating or updating a transaction to override the default checkout link, if you want to point to another page.

Payment method update links

For compliance, subscription emails from Paddle include a link to let customers update their payment method and cancel their subscription. Links are also returned when working with subscription entities against subscription.management_urls.

The link to update a payment method redirects to your default payment URL to open a checkout to update a payment method.

Before you begin

Get your website approved

Add the website where your default payment link page is hosted to Paddle > Checkout > Website approval.

If you're using a sandbox account, your website is automatically approved right away. You should see a check mark.

For live accounts, website approval may take a few days as the Paddle verification team check your website. To learn more, see Website verification FAQs

Build your default payment link page

Your default payment link should be a page for an approved website that includes Paddle.js. It might be your checkout page, or you might create a separate page specifically for it.

If your page calls Paddle.Checkout.open() on load with a list of items or a transactionId, this takes priority over the query parameter.

By default, Paddle.js opens an overlay checkout for the passed transaction. You can set default checkout settings by passing them to Paddle.Initialize(). Paddle.js uses default settings when opening a checkout payment link.

Set your default payment link

You can set your default payment link in the Paddle dashboard. You must set a default payment link — even if you only sell by invoice or only sell one-time products.

Your sandbox and live systems are separate. You should set a default payment link for both systems. They don't have to be the same.

  • Go to Paddle > Checkout > Checkout Settings.

  • Add your default payment link under the "Default payment link" heading. This should be a complete link, like https://aeroedit.com/pay. You can use localhost if you're testing locally on sandbox, then change it later.

  • Click Save changes when you're done.

Screenshot of the checkout settings page in Paddle. It shows the general tab, which has sections for marketing consent, checkout discounts, statement description, and default checkout link. The default checkout link section is called out, and there's a sample link in the text box.

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