Sway vs EventSquare: which ticketing platform for your event?

EventSquare is a Belgian ticketing platform used widely by nightlife and event organisers in Belgium, with weekly payouts and the choice to pass the service fee to the buyer. Sway is an app and a ticketing platform built for electronic music: line-ups, set times, door check-in, and organiser tools in one place.

Both can sell a paid ticket. The difference sits in what is published about the fee, when the money reaches you, and whether you want a venue box office, a large marketplace, or a scene app with line-ups and discovery.

The notes below match what is public in November 2026. The published Essentials rate is €0.75 + 2% per paid ticket excluding VAT, or €0.91 + 2.42% including VAT. A higher published plan is €0.99 + 2% excluding VAT, or €1.20 + 2.42% including VAT. Card payments use 3% instead of 2%. Transaction costs are included. You choose, per ticket type, whether the buyer or you pays the service fee. Free tickets have no service fee. There are no setup fees and no contract. Payouts leave every Wednesday morning; before the event you can request up to 80% of ticket revenue, and the remaining 20% follows after the event (once refunds are settled and reserved scanners are back). You can also choose monthly or quarterly payouts. If your contract says something else, your contract wins.

A €20 ticket

On Sway, the buyer fee is published and the same on every standard plan: 3% + €0.30 per paid ticket, VAT included. On a €20 ticket the buyer pays €0.90 and you receive €20.00 on a standard card.

On EventSquare's published Essentials line, a €20 ticket is €0.75 + 2% = €1.15 excluding VAT, or €0.91 + 2.42% = €1.39 including VAT (Bancontact or iDEAL). If you pass that fee to the buyer, you keep the ticket price; if you absorb it, it comes out of what you receive.

In the US, the price a buyer sees on Sway is all-in: the event page shows the price with fees included. In US dollars the service fee is 4.5% + $0.35 per paid ticket.

Tools, discovery and the scene

Sway puts together what an electronic-music team needs: tickets (early bird, promo codes, pay-in-instalments), order control (resend, refund), door check-in and offline scanners, guest list, line-up and set times, sales insights, photo galleries, ambassadors, and Swapy to ask how a night is selling or to draft a campaign. Creating a page and an event is free. Email campaigns, custom push notifications and discovery boosts are growth tools on paid plans. Swapy is free on every plan, Basic included.

EventSquare is built as Belgian organiser ticketing: shops, seating plans, free professional scanners to reserve (one per 250 paid tickets on the published line), and support including an emergency line during the event. It is not a discovery app organised around electronic-music line-ups the way Sway is.

When to choose Sway, and when to stay on EventSquare

Sway makes sense if you want a published buyer fee, the full ticket price in your account within a week — including before the event — and ticketing, check-in, line-up, galleries, ambassadors and an assistant in one place, on an app ravers use to find electronic events.

EventSquare can be the better fit if you want Belgian support, free scanners on the published allowance, a seating plan included, and weekly payouts with an 80% request before the event.

Both can be the right fit. It depends on your contract, where people already buy, and what you want to keep: the ticket price, the cash-flow calendar, or a particular discovery network.

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See also what Sway does for promoters, for an event and pricing. Nearby comparisons: Sway vs Shotgun, Sway vs DICE, Sway vs Eventbrite, Sway vs TicketUX, Sway vs Weeztix.