Participant rewards
On Prolific, we endorse the principle of 'ethical rewards'. We believe that fair pay leads to better data quality. We recommend you pay participants at least £9.00 / $12.00 per hour, while the minimum pay allowed is £6.00 / $8.00 per hour.
Our service fee
We add a service charge to provide all of the services that keep the Prolific platform running and improving.
Prolific’s fee never comes out of participant payments. This means participants will receive every penny you choose to pay them.
Our service fee is calculated as a percentage of your total spend. Our fee is:
- 30% for corporate customers*
- 25% discounted rate for academia and not-for-profits*
For example:
- Corporate pricing: if your total study cost is £100, the service fee is £100 x 0.30 = £30*
- Academic pricing: if your total study cost is £100, the service fee is £100 x 0.25 = £25*
*Where relevant, VAT will be charged on top of this service fee (see below for more details).
To qualify for the discounted rate, sign up with your institutional email address and choose either 'Academia' or 'Non-profit' as your account type. We are unable to offer our reduced fee to non-associated email addresses, such as Gmail or Outlook.
Representative samples
Representative samples incur an additional cost on top of our standard service charge. This fee is charged upon study publication (rather than when each submission is approved as with the regular service fee). You can read more about representative samples and costs here.
VAT
You may be charged VAT depending on where you’re based. VAT is charged on service fees and representative sample fees only. Participant payments are not subject to VAT.
You can read more about when we charge VAT and how to add a VAT exception to your workspace here.
Different currencies
Prolific is currently available in GBP and USD for researchers. We can provide invoices in other currencies where needed - please see here for more information.
If you have created an account or workspace in the incorrect currency, or would like to convert an account's or workspace's currency between GBP / USD for any other reason, please get in touch with our Support Team using the button at the bottom of this article. Please note that account conversion between currencies is intended as a one-off change, and is not possible for individual studies.
All participants are currently paid in GBP.
How much will my study cost?
You can find out how much your study would cost by generating a quote for your study. We also have a handy pricing calculator!