Dapple is a Submittable alternative built specifically for creative organisations — awards, residencies, exhibitions, open calls, foundations, and small grants. It charges lower submission fees than Submittable (3.9% + $0.65 vs. 5% + $0.99), runs on flexible monthly pricing from $49 with no annual contract, and pays out instantly through your own Stripe account.
Submittable was originally built as a submissions platform for literary magazines and creative open calls. It has since pivoted into a corporate social responsibility and grants management platform for large companies — its current customers include Amazon, Meta, and Visa, and its homepage no longer mentions artists or creatives.
Dapple is what Submittable used to be: a platform built specifically for organisations running awards, residencies, exhibitions, open calls, publishing programmes, and small-to-mid- size grants. It combines a modern submission experience for entrants, a workflow that reviewers and judges actually enjoy, and transparent monthly pricing that doesn’t require a procurement department to approve.
Features and Interface
Dapple supports multiple simultaneous programmes on every plan, including entry-level tiers. Submittable limits most plans to a single programme and organises its interface around compliance workflows, budget tracking, and employee giving tools — features built for grants teams at large foundations, not the open call you’re running.
You see every submission moving through your pipeline in real time, from one hub, with no programme limits and no hunting through tabs for status updates.
Entrants
Dapple’s entry forms are built for creative submissions. Submittable’s are built for grant applications and compliance-heavy processes, which can feel clinical and slow for artists, performers, or writers who just want to submit their work.
Judges
Dapple’s review panels are built for visual and media-based work — photography, film, design. Submittable’s review tools are built for grant committees evaluating dense written proposals, and the interface reflects that.
Judges see exactly what’s assigned to them, where they left off, and what’s complete — with no training required.
"Submittable is complex, difficult to use and doesn't really suit our needs. Dapple is the opposite. You haven't missed anything!"
— Rebekah B, Exhibition Co-ordinator
Pricing
Yes. Dapple’s entry-level plans start at $49 a month with no annual contract. Submittable’s entry-level plans typically require annual contracts starting at around $10,000 a year, with restrictive feature sets like limited form fields or a single programme.
If you’re a small-to-medium creative organisation, you shouldn’t need an enterprise budget to run a professional awards programme.
Setup
Most Dapple programmes go live within hours. Submittable typically requires an onboarding process — setup calls and, for larger programmes, paid professional services — before a programme is configured and ready to launch.
Dapple is designed to be fast. A smart form generator, a large library of creative industry templates, one-click project duplication and an interface your whole team can navigate without a training session. Most organisations are live within hours.
Submittable charges 5% + $0.99 per paid submission. Dapple charges 3.9% + $0.65 in the US (3.5% + £0.49 in the UK). On a programme processing thousands of submissions a year, that difference adds up quickly — use the calculator below to see your exact savings.
Submittable also processes payments through its own payment system, so funds don’t reach you for over a month. Dapple connects directly to your own Stripe account, so funds are deposited instantly with Dapple’s fees already deducted and no separate Stripe fees to pay.
On average, creative organisations save around 30–35% on submission fees by switching from Submittable to Dapple. For example, a programme collecting $5,000.00 a year in submission fees pays around $1,240.00 with Submittable. Dapple estimated annual cost is $845.00, with estimated savings of $395.00. Use the calculator below to estimate your own savings based on your submission volume and average fee per entry.
Dapple uses Stripe Connect to integrate directly with your own Stripe account. Every payment is instantly deposited into your Stripe account with Dapple's fees already deducted. There are no additional Stripe fees to pay, as these are fulfilled by Dapple.
Total number of submissions you receive per year.
What submitters pay, on average.
| Platform | % Take | Per Submission | Estimated Annual Cost |
|---|---|---|---|
| Submittable | 5% | £0.75 | £1,000.00 |
| Dapple | 3.5% | £0.49 | £665.00 |
Submittable pricing: 5% of each paid submission fee + £0.75 per transaction.
Dapple pricing: 3.5% of each paid submission fee + £0.49 per transaction.
The calculation includes any associated Stripe fees which are fulfilled by Dapple directly with Stripe.
Side by side
The table below compares Dapple and Submittable’s published pricing and feature sets directly, plan for plan. Dapple’s lowest plan costs less per month than what most organisations pay in a single year on Submittable.
| Pricing | ✦ Dapple | Submittable |
|---|---|---|
| Submission fees | 3.9% + $0.65 | 5% + $0.99 |
| Platform fees | Start from $49/m | Start from $10,000/y |
| Industry discounts available | ✓ | CLMP only |
| Monthly subscription option on all plans | ✓ | — |
| Feature | ✦ Dapple | Submittable |
|---|---|---|
| Workflow & Management | ||
| Multi-projects on all plans | ✓ | — |
| Immediate launch | ✓ | — |
| Visual kanban boards | ✓ | — |
| Project hub | ✓ | — |
| Advanced permissions | ✓ | ✓ |
| Multi-team & org | ✓ | — |
| Advanced bulk messaging | ✓ | ✓ |
| 1:1 messaging | ✓ | ✓ |
| Submission & creator tags | ✓ | ✓ |
| Administrators can edit applications | ✓ | — |
| Automations | ✓ | ✓ |
| Applications list view | ✓ | ✓ |
| Automated draft reminders | ✓ | ✓ |
| Message scheduling | ✓ | ✓ |
| Judging & Review | ||
| Advanced review features | ✓ | ✓ |
| Bulk assign | ✓ | ✓ |
| Hide fields from review panels | ✓ | ✓ |
| Customised rounds on all plans | ✓ | — |
| Unlimited judging stages | ✓ | — |
| Forms & Submissions | ||
| Unlimited form fields on all plans | ✓ | — |
| Maximum file size upload limit | 1gb | 400mb |
| All file types | ✓ | ✓ |
| Listings page | ✓ | ✓ |
| Form versioning | ✓ | ✓ |
| Form conditional logic | ✓ | ✓ |
| Auto-form generator | ✓ | — |
| Demo mode | ✓ | — |
| Entry resubmission | ✓ | ✓ |
| HD video hosting | ✓ | ✓ |
| Image display | ✓ | — |
| Analytics, Discovery & Support | ||
| Advanced reporting tools on all plans | ✓ | — |
| Claude MCP integration | ✓ | — |
| Built-in analytics dashboard | ✓ | ✓ |
| Data export | ✓ | ✓ |
| Zapier integration | ✓ | ✓ |
| Audit history | ✓ | ✓ |
| Discovery platform | — | ✓ |
| Public voting | — | ✓ |
| Corporate volunteering tools | — | ✓ |
| Employee giving tools | — | ✓ |
| Live chat support for all plans | ✓ | — |
*All data on this page is based on publicly available information and reviews for these sites as of February 2026.
For creative organisations specifically, yes. Dapple is built only for awards, residencies, exhibitions, open calls, and publishing, with cheaper fees, faster setup, and a judging experience designed for visual and creative work. Submittable is built for corporate grants and CSR programmes, so creative organisations end up paying for compliance features they don’t need.
Yes. Dapple charges 3.9% + $0.65 per submission compared with Submittable’s 5% + $0.99, and Dapple’s plans start at $49 a month with no annual contract, while Submittable’s entry-level plans typically require annual contracts from around $10,000 a year.
Yes. You can get started on Dapple for free with no credit card required, and upgrade to a paid plan once you’re ready to launch a live programme.
Dapple connects directly to your own Stripe account using Stripe Connect, so there are no extra Stripe fees layered on top of the platform fee. Submittable processes payments through its own system, which adds cost and delays when funds reach you.
Yes. There’s no exclusivity requirement, so you can run programmes on Submittable and Dapple at the same time, or migrate a single programme to Dapple to compare the experience before switching everything over.
With Dapple, submission payments are deposited into your own Stripe account instantly. With Submittable, funds are typically held in its own payment system for over a month before they reach you.
If you’re a corporation running CSR, employee giving, or large-scale grant programmes, Submittable’s feature set is built for that. If you’re a creative organisation running awards, residencies, exhibitions, open calls, or literary submissions, Dapple is built specifically for that — with lower fees, faster setup, and a judging experience designed around creative content.
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