Best Ticketing Platforms

SeatGeek has one of the most polished digital box offices on the market. The site’s expansive sort and search tool pulls tickets from Elton John to John Elway... or his team anyway. The main ingredient to SeatGeek’s usefulness lies in the platform’s ability to scour other ticketing sites and integrate with them for available stubs. This gives you the ultimate power to find seats for the big game.

That third-party agility provides great value to a sporting world where buyers and sellers are accustomed to, well, unpredictable reselling terms. More than sports, you’ll find tickets to comedy shows, plays and musicals, speakers, and of course, chart topping music on SeatGeek’s secure user-friendly platform.

Eventbrite is a smaller name in the ticketing game that locally active folks may have come across in their weekend travels. It boasts the essential features needed to function in today’s digital space, including support and planning services if you need them. Transfer policies are set per event, providing valuable flexibility, and code for an embedded Eventbrite ticket widget is made available for use on websites and in press releases.

They don’t charge you to host free events, which is a common theme for most second-tier ticketing platforms. Eventbrite, though, offers the most complete package of professionalism, functionality, and security, of the bunch.

Ticketmaster is and has been the undisputed king of digital ticketing services. Its merger with Live Nation about a decade ago, granted the platform unique omnipotence over the domain of live music. You’d be hard pressed to find an even somewhat successful performer that hasn’t been featured in a Ticketmaster-partnered event. That kind of industry relevance comes hard-earned and well-deserved.

Buyers enjoy multiple ticket delivery options, wide-reaching and easily sorted event listings, and secure encrypted checkout. Select from a live seating chart or have Ticketmaster fetch the ‘best available’ tickets. In many respects, its feature set is the industry standard.

A branch of the E-Bay empire as of 2007, Stubhub also has the backing of corporate cyber security and identity protections. Its claimed a large piece of the digital ticketing pie by focusing on reselling, helping to legitimize, and cashing-in on, the online ticket scalping community.

The inherent risk with Stubhub doesn’t involve the platform itself. Ticket transactions are slightly more complicated when dealing with any third-party. That’s why Stubhub offers a FanProtect guarantee, ensuring refunds for any unfortunate invalid ticket purchases and for shows that are cancelled and not rescheduled. It’s as good as it gets for reselling, especially when some of the alternatives are a stairwell in the parking garage next to the venue and a Craigslist ad.

VividSeats is one of our favorites for two reasons. It’s a well executed platform, with just as diverse an event search feature as the major players, while also managing to offer lower prices in most cases. Like Stubhub, its sweet spot is the reselling market. And like their biggest competitor, they refund fraudulent tickets and try to secure replacements if they can. With lower web traffic, they can get away with undercutting the competition for some events.

That said, you’ll want to shop around to find the best price for any given show or game. Vivid Seats saves their fee surprises till the very end of the transaction, meaning that killer advertised price could potentially end up breaking your budget once all is said and done.

Club gigs can provide some of the most convoluted ticketing experiences out there. Resident Advisor provides the closest thing to a one-stop-shop for dance music that you’ll find in the Western world. Browse tour dates of your favorite global DJ or host a local party of your own, Resident Advisor checks all the necessary boxes, carrying a gold-plated reputation in the music industry for professionalism and depth of coverage.

RA buyers can swiftly transfer tickets via email, fan-to-fan. Search by artist, city, or venue, and don’t miss exclusive festival partnerships for those fast-selling weekend passes. A clean and efficient web experience smoothes the process even further.