Creating a donation form

Introduction

In this tutorial, we’ll show you how to create and customize a donation form.

Creating a donation form in 7 easy steps

We recommend going through the following steps:

1. Switch to test API mode
2. Create form
3. Configure donation settings
4. Insert form shortcode into a page
5. Test-drive form
6. Customize form
7. Switch to live API mode

1. Switch to test API mode

This tutorial assumes that you’ve already configured your Stripe API keys.

You can switch to test mode on the “Full Stripe / Settings / Stripe account” page in WP admin:

2. Create form

You can create a donation form on the “Full Stripe / Forms” page in WP admin, by pressing the “Add form” button:

On the next page, enter form name and display name, and select a form layout, and press the “Create & edit form” button:

You can compare and learn the difference between form layouts here.

3. Configure donation settings

You can configure the donation settings on the “Payment” tab of the form.

You have control over many settings, you can:

1. Change the donation currency
2. Add, reorder, and delete suggested donation amounts
3. Allow custom donation amount to be entered
4. Select the donation frequencies offered (one-time plus recurring intervals)
5. Enter the transaction description added to every donation (placeholder tokens can be used)

4. Insert form shortcode into a page

You can obtain the form shortcode on the “Full Stripe / Forms” page.

Please visit our dedicated knowledge base article on how to use shortcodes.

5. Test-drive form

Once the form shortcode is inserted into a page, you can open the page, and test your form.

The form is fully-functional in test mode, and you can make payments using test cards to simulate every possible payment outcome.

No need to refund your payment after testing either.

6. Customize form

Now that the form is up and running, you can customize the form if needed:

• Create a Thank you page
• Configure email notifications
• Change labels or translate the plugin labels
• Customize the form with CSS
• Add Stripe badge to the payment page
• Create a Customer portal page

7. Switch to live API mode

When you’re ready to go into production, you can flip the switch on the “Full Stripe / Settings / Stripe account” page in WP admin: