Luma vs Whova

If you run many events — meetups, field marketing, customer events, workshops, and conference registration — and want to set each one up in minutes with published pricing, choose Luma. If you run multi-day conferences where attendees need an event app with a personalized agenda, plus exhibitor tools and abstract submissions, Whova is built for that.

Pricing

Luma: Pricing is published and self-serve. Free events are free, with unlimited events and guests. On the Free plan, paid tickets carry a 5% platform fee plus Stripe processing (2.9% + 30¢). Luma Plus is $59/month billed annually (or $69 month-to-month) per calendar and drops the platform fee to 0%, so you pay only Stripe processing. For larger organizations, Luma Enterprise adds SSO, CRM integrations, and a company-wide organization, with pricing based on your needs.

On a $300 conference ticket, fees total $24.00 on the Free plan or $9.00 on Luma Plus.

Whova: Pricing for the event app and management platform isn’t published — Whova’s pricing page is a quote form that asks about your event format, duration, attendee count, and how many events you run per year. Licenses are generally quoted per event, and third-party reports put typical quotes in the low-to-mid four figures per event, depending on size and modules. For paid tickets, Whova lists a ticketing fee of 3% + $0.99 per paid ticket, with no fee on free tickets.

Pricing checked in September 2026. See Whova’s pricing page to request a quote, and its registration fee comparison for ticketing fees.

How They Compare

Whova is an all-in-one conference platform centered on its attendee app. Attendees get a personalized agenda, live polls, messaging, a community board, and networking tools, while organizers get registration, an event website builder, name badges and kiosk check-in, surveys and certificates, abstract management for calls for speakers, and exhibitor and sponsor management with lead retrieval and sponsor banners. It’s popular with associations, academic conferences, and nonprofits running a few big events a year, and it also offers a lighter product for smaller events.

Luma is built for running many smaller events. Anyone on your team can create and publish an event page in a couple of minutes, with no per-event quote to request first. Guests register with just a name and email (no account required), get a calendar invite automatically, and can add their ticket to Apple Wallet or Google Wallet. Teams organize events under calendars, send invites and blasts, collect registration questions, require approval or run a waitlist, and check guests in from the iOS or Android app.

The tradeoff is scope. Luma doesn’t have agenda or session management, a conference app with personalized schedules, abstract submissions, or exhibitor or sponsor tools. If your conference depends on those, Whova is the better fit; Luma fits the other events your team runs during the year.

Where Luma Shines

1. Fast for every event: Create and publish an event in minutes, then clone it for the next city or date. Running your 50th event costs the same as your first.
2. Published pricing: Free events are free, and Luma Plus is a flat monthly subscription — no per-event license to negotiate.
3. Curate a paid guest list: Require approval works with paid tickets — guests’ cards are held when they apply and only charged if you approve them. Paid waitlists work the same way, so you can fill sold-out spots without chasing payments.
4. Paid memberships: Sell monthly, yearly, or one-time memberships that give members access to your events — recurring revenue, with Luma handling the billing.
5. Built for recurring programs: Calendars with subscribers, newsletters, and event tags keep your audience in touch between events, and embeds put your events on your own website.

Why You Might Choose Whova

• Attendee event app – Personalized agendas, live polls, messaging, a community board, and attendee networking in one app.
• Agenda & sessions – Build multi-track agendas that attendees can browse and bookmark.
• Abstract management – Collect and review speaker and paper submissions, common for academic and association conferences.
• Exhibitors & sponsors – Exhibitor profiles, lead retrieval, sponsor banners, and gamification to drive booth traffic.
• Virtual & hybrid – Live streaming and interactive sessions for online attendees.

Migrating from Whova to Luma

1. Start with the events that don’t need a conference app — meetups, workshops, field events, customer dinners, webinars.
2. Create a Team Calendar for your organization or program, and add your teammates as admins.
3. Export attendee lists from Whova as CSV and use them to invite guests to your Luma events.
4. Connect your Stripe account if you’re selling tickets, and set up ticket types and coupons.
5. For SSO, CRM integrations, or bringing many teams onto Luma at once, contact enterprise@luma.com about Luma Enterprise.

FAQs

Does Luma have an event app? Luma has iOS and Android apps where guests see their tickets and join event chat, and hosts manage events and check guests in. There’s no conference agenda or session schedule in the app.

Can Luma handle a multi-session conference? Luma doesn’t have agenda or session management. You can model a few sessions as separate ticket types, or create each session as its own event on one calendar — see multi-session events.

Does Luma print badges? Yes — onsite badge printing is available on Luma Enterprise. On any plan, you can also export your guest list with per-ticket QR codes and print badges with your own template — see printing event badges.

Can I collect feedback after the event? Yes. Luma can automatically email guests a feedback request after the event ends, and you can export responses as CSV.

Will guests need to create a Luma account? No. Guests register with a name and email.