Digital products are a popular way to monetize your website or grow your passive income. Once you’ve created a product, you can sell it over and over again to anyone who wants it. No stocking out, no shipping delays, and no painful supply chain issues in sight.
If you’re looking for the best digital products to sell in 2024, you’re in the right place. Discover everything you need to know about creating and selling digital products this year, including the best digital products to sell and how you can get started today.
What are Digital Products?
A digital product is a product that predominantly lives online. Unlike physical products, you can’t hold it in your hands. Instead, you “experience” it via your web browser or device.
We’re talking about things like ebooks, downloadable guides, paid communities and apps — intangible products that are created, distributed, and consumed in a digital environment.
Many digital products take inspiration from physical products, like ebooks versus actual books, or digital planners versus real planners that you write in with a good old-fashioned pen.
But there are plenty of digital products that have been created especially for an online audience. We’re covering both types of digital products here, alongside a bunch of inspiring examples you can use to come up with your own ideas.
Why Sell Digital Products?
The speedy evolution of technology would have us believe that we’re not too far off from living our lives online. But keeping up with changing consumer habits and the advanced state of the digital world aren’t the only benefits of selling digital products.
Sell over and over again
Unlike physical products, you can never sell out of digital products. Where you’d have to stay on top of inventory and keep stock levels high in the physical world, the digital world is different. Once you’ve created a digital product, you can sell it over and over again without needing to order more or wrestle with complex supply chains.
Generate passive income
We’d all like to make money while sitting on a beach sipping mojitos. The reality is that you can with digital products. It takes time to build consistent sales, but once you’ve put in the upfront work and set up your sales system, you can sit back and enjoy the money that comes in on autopilot.
Scale quickly and easily
Digital products require no physical storage space. You don’t need to ramp up manufacturing to meet growing demand. In fact, it’s the same amount of work to sell one digital product as it is to sell 1,000.
Low startup and running costs
There’s a digital product for every budget, but most don’t require a hefty upfront investment to get started. Instead, you can choose a product that fits your budget — the only expense is WiFi, a device to create on, and your time. And very little changes when you grow. Costs are still limited to any tools you need to manage sales and an internet connection.
Freedom and flexibility
Who doesn’t want more freedom? Fancy hopping on a flight to Rome on a random Wednesday afternoon? Want to take an ad-hoc morning off to go swimming with the kids? These dreams are closer than you think when you sell digital products. With passive income trickling in, you can spend more time doing the things you love.
Reach more people
Digital products are often a lot more accessible both in pricing and in location. While you might be limited in who you can sell a physical product or service to, the possibilities are endless with digital products.
Different Types of Digital Products to Sell
The great thing about the internet is that pretty much anything is possible - there’s no limit to the creativity out there.
That being said, certain digital products are more common than others:
- Ebooks and downloadables: Including digital versions of fictional books, practical guides, and downloadable checklists, workbooks, and planners. Basically, anything you can download and read or print out.
- Software: Widgets, plugins, website templates, apps, and tools all make great digital products. There’s some upfront effort involved, but once you’ve designed and made a piece of software, you can sell it countless times.
- Digital media: We’re talking about things like paid podcasts, newsletters, stock photography, stock video, and magazine subscriptions. You can monetize these things in different ways. For example, you can ask customers to pay a one-off fee, you can offer a subscription, or you can sell ads in your chosen media type.
- Online courses and masterclasses: Create a course, tutorial video, or masterclass that walks people through a specific solution or task.
- Memberships and communities: Memberships and online communities bring like-minded people together in exchange for a set monthly fee. A lot of the time, paid members get exclusive content.
🏆 The Best Digital Products to Sell Online
1. Membership sites
Memberships are a great way to build a community around your brand. They provide an exclusive feel and often deliver premium services or perks to paying members.
What your membership includes will depend on your brand and audience. You could offer access to a schedule of relevant online talks, digital coworking sessions, or video coaching in exchange for a monthly fee.
2. Online courses
Get paid for sharing your knowledge with an online course. The parameters are broad; you can build a course for online traders, show freelancers how to land clients or share your experience going viral on social media.
The best part is, that once you’ve created the building blocks of your online course, you can sell it to hundreds of thousands of students. Just remember to update it regularly to ensure students are getting the best bang for their buck.
Example: Trading community Team Bull Trading has a course covering everything from basic trading strategies to advanced indicators.
3. Ebooks
If you don’t fancy creating an online course, why not share your knowledge in an ebook format? Once you’ve written your content, you can publish it on sites like Whop, Amazon, and other digital platforms to increase your reach. Again, once you’ve put in the effort upfront, you can continue to reap the rewards long after you’ve published your ebook.
Example: This ebook is a guide to becoming an online entrepreneur and sells for $4.99.
4. Tutorials
Provide a walkthrough of a complicated topic or a solution to a pain point a specific audience has. Tutorials can come in video format, guides, or interactive content — whatever method best suits your teaching topic. Similarly to online courses, you can guide buyers through a learning curve, whether it’s how to crochet a frog or make the best cheese sauce.
Example: Codecademy has a ton of tutorials for people who want to learn to code either for their career or for fun.
5. Prints
If you’ve got a creative streak and enjoy drawing or painting, you can turn your masterpieces into sellable prints. There are print-on-demand platforms you can upload your artwork to and have it transferred onto mugs, t-shirts, notebooks, and other physical products — or you can simply sell it as a wall print.
Example: Hebe Studio transfers vibrant travel artwork onto cards, tea towels, notebooks, and other stationery.
6. Planners and journals
Help people stay organized by selling online or printable planners and journals. You can create standard organizers arranged by month and week, or you can sell planners and journals for specific purposes — like journals for small business owners or travel planners.
Example: Daily Journal is an ultimate life tracker, with sections for habits, finance, goals, tasks, and books.
7. Subscriptions
Digital subscriptions work similarly to memberships: people pay a monthly fee in exchange for access to a tool or exclusive content.
You’ll most commonly see subscriptions applied to physical products, like coffee, makeup, or snacks, but there’s no reason why you can’t sell a digital subscription for a niche magazine or a monthly recipe program.
Example: Beat the Books has a monthly subscription for sports picks, insights, promos and betting education on Discord.
8. Software
Building a piece of software requires some dedicated upfront effort (and a certain amount of skill and knowledge).
But, once you’ve got your product, you can sell it to as many people as you like. If you’re not particularly tech-savvy, you can learn some easy coding techniques, use a no-code tool to build your software product, or hire someone to help you make the initial product.
9. Stock photos
Are you a natural behind the camera? If friends and family are often asking you to shoot their weddings, birthdays, and baby showers, why not monetise your skill? Stock photo sites like Shutterstock, Unsplash, and Getty Images pay budding photographers each time someone downloads their image.
Some popular image types include:
- Landscape photos
- Flat-lay photos of desk spaces
- City scenes
- Business-related snaps of meetings and offices
- Still-life pics of flowers and objects
Shutterstock has thousands of photos (both free and paid-for) on its digital marketplace.
10. Stock videos
If you’re better at filming video footage than taking stills, consider selling your scenes on stock video sites. These are becoming increasingly common as people start to experiment more with social videos like Instagram Reels and TikTok.
11. Spreadsheets
Spreadsheets are a bugbear for a lot of people, but if you’re a whizz at Excel formulas, you can make some money helping people ease the pain.
Example: Miss Excel is a great example of someone who has turned spreadsheets into a lucrative digital product business. She sells Excel templates and courses to people who want to get better at using the tool.
12. Digital artwork
While print-on-demand websites let you turn your artwork into printable products, you can also sell digital artwork that stays on screen. We’re talking about things like desktop wallpapers, phone backgrounds, and vectors.
Example: Graphic designer Oliur sells iPod style wallpaper packs for iPhones.
13. Downloadable checklists
Create some digital to-dos around an area of interest or put together a downloadable checklist that helps people complete a specific task. For example, you might sell a checklist for website essentials, moving house, or a cleaning rota.
14. Guides and worksheets
Get hands-on with guides and worksheets. Walk people through a solution or give them a document they can fill out in their own time. Downloadable versions of guides and worksheets can either be used online or printed out and used as a physical copy.
Examples of guides and worksheets include:
- A workbook for discovering and exploring your human design
- A guide to setting up an Instagram profile
- A guide and worksheet for learning about dietary needs
- A guidebook for understanding interior design
Example: Money Mastery Media sells a guide on 'how to start your online business' for $15.00.
15. Newsletters
Newsletters are a great way to grow an audience and become an expert on a chosen topic. There are several ways you can monetise your subscriber count, including running paid ads, partnering with brands, and setting up a paid tier that goes above and beyond the regular content delivered in your newsletter.
Example: Therapist Kate Marley sends a weekly deep-dive coaching newsletter to subscribers who pay $8 a month.
16. Online communities
Despite the growing remote work trend, plenty of people still crave connection with other humans. Online communities provide a place for people with specialist interests to get together and socialise — even if it is through a screen. The best part is, that you don’t even have to offer exclusive content like you would in a membership program. Instead, the value is in the connections and the ability to meet other like-minded people.
There are a few platforms that support paid online communities:
17. Video courses
If you’ve got something to teach and don’t want to create a full-on interactive course, you can sell a video series or a video course. Simply film a lesson or two and upload them to YouTube via a paywall, or use a platform like Whop or Podia.
18. Templates
Make people’s lives easier by selling downloadable or digital templates. There are so many ways you can present these — for example, lots of creators have jumped on the Notion bandwagon to create templates for different audience segments.
Example: Take BankPath, for example, an online business focused on 'making placements easy' for students with financial cover letter and CV templates.
19. Calendars and trackers
Similarly to planners and journals, calendars and trackers help people stick to a routine or plan a specific task they need to do. You might create a tracker for journalists to help them pitch publications or a workout calendar for people looking to get healthier in the New Year.
Example: Anete Lusina has created a cold pitch tracker for freelance writers.
20. Fonts
Create fun text styles and unique fonts for your audience. Sites like 1000 Fonts and DaFonts have a bank of browsable fonts that people can download either for free or for a fee.
People can download free and paid-for fonts on DaFont.
21. Social media templates
Lots of people DIY their social media graphics which is harder than it looks. If you’ve got a good eye, you can create and sell templates for Instagram images, Stories, and Reels. Your audience can download the templates and fill them out with their own information.
22. Icon sets
Icons are stylised graphics that people can use on their websites, social media, and landing pages. They can either work as clickable buttons or simply be a decorative addition to a webpage. Sites like Iconmonstr and Iconfinder have libraries of icons users can browse and you can charge a fee for them to download yours.
23. Pre-made website templates
Not everyone is a dab hand with design and putting together a website is an arduous task. Sell pre-made website templates to people who want to DIY their websites without having to do the design work themselves.
You can upload your templates to website libraries like ThemeForest and Creative Market and sell them for a one-off fee.
24. Apps
Everyone uses apps these days, whether it’s for organizing their schedule or listening to music. Create an app for a specific target audience and sell it in the App Store. You can add a paid plan to generate passive income or charge for in-app purchases.
Browse the Apple App Store or Google Play to get potential business ideas.
25. Video games
Similarly to apps, you can create a video game series for people to play on their phones or computers. You can monetize it via a subscription service, in-app purchases, or a one-off download fee.
26. WordPress plugins
WordPress plugins help users customize their websites and add features without needing to know complex coding languages. If you do have coding knowledge (or have someone to help), you can create plugins and sell them via the WordPress plugin marketplace or your own website.
27. Masterclasses
If you’ve run in-person workshops or masterclasses, a really easy way to make them work harder for you is to sell the recording online. Alternatively, you can create a fresh masterclass from scratch — once it’s recorded and uploaded, you can sell it over and over again.
Platforms like Whop make it easy to create and seller a masterclass without needing to create a website or get your head around complex design aesthetics. You can browse the platform for inspiration, like this masterclass that teaches you how to become a better trader.
28. Email courses
Land directly in people’s inboxes with an email course spread out over days or weeks. This keeps you front of mind and you can use the emails to upsell other digital products. You can keep it simple here. Ask for a one-time fee in exchange for the course or offer a monthly plan where people pay a rolling fee for fresh course content each month.
29. Photoshop Brushes
Photoshop brushes help users create unique designs and add their own mark to the photo editing process. Create downloadable brushes that people can add to Photoshop and charge a one-off fee or tiered package prices for multiple brushes at once.
Example: PixelBuddha sells unique Photoshop brushes and bundles on Creative Market at different price points. Customers are charged $17 for personal use and $21 for commercial use.
30. Printable colouring sheets
Turn your artwork and patterns into coloring sheets for adults or children. You can charge a one-off fee for an instant printable download, or you can turn it into a subscription service that delivers fresh coloring sheets every month.
Example: Fox + Hazel has a range of printable coloring sheets as well as wall art and digital wallpapers.
31. Audiobooks
If you’d rather talk about your knowledge than write about it, turn your hand to creating audiobooks. You can write a short story (for kids or adults) and record yourself reading it to sell to customers. This can work particularly well for children’s books or relaxing content that can be consumed before bedtime.
32. Printable games
Keep kids and parents happy by creating printable paper games for the whole family. We’re talking about things like crosswords, word searches, or activity books. Again, you can charge a one-off fee per game or you can create a subscription where customers can download new games each month.
33. Songs and licensed music
If you’re a keen lyricist or songwriter and want to get paid for your creativity, consider selling your songs online. When you license your tracks, people pay a fee to use them in films, videos, and social media, giving you passive income every time someone chooses your song (plus, it gives your music more exposure… who knows, you might catch the attention of a label).
34. Content libraries
It can be disheartening to create a piece of content and watch it gather dust. Instead of leaving your videos, blog posts, and guides to decay online, combine them in a content library (often known as a content vault). People can then pay a one-off fee (or a monthly subscription) to access the content.
How to Create Digital Products
Hopefully, your creative juices are well and truly flowing by this point and you’ve got lots of digital product ideas buzzing around your head. Once you’ve decided this is the path you want to take, here’s how to get started.
1. Identify your audience
Determine who you want to create a digital product for. It helps if you know an audience well (or, even better, are the audience). For example, if you’re a parent of young children, you might decide to create digital products for parents or children based on what you already know.
Try to be specific with your audience too — instead of choosing “women”, dig deeper and choose a segment like “20-25-year-old women who enjoy yoga but don’t have the money or are too busy to attend weekly in-person classes.”
Here are some questions you can think about when determining your audience:
- How old are they?
- Where do they live?
- What are their interests?
- What problems do they face in day-to-day life?
- What are their biggest challenges?
- Why might they need a digital product?
Not only will this help you market your digital products to the right people, but it’ll ensure you’re creating products that they really want and need.
2. Brainstorm product ideas
Now you know who you want to create digital products for, start thinking about what you’re going to create for them. While reading this list, did anything jump out at you? It’s always best to choose a format you feel most comfortable with. For example, if you don’t enjoy being in front of the camera, don’t make a video course or film a masterclass.
But it’s not just about you. It’s also about your target audience and what they want.
When you identify your audience, you should come up with some challenges and interests they have. You can use this information to brainstorm what kind of products might suit their needs. For example, 20-25-year-old women who are too busy to attend in-person yoga classes might relish an online membership with weekly online classes.
3. Create your digital product
This is where the fun starts. You’ve got your audience and you’ve got an idea, which means it’s time to create your digital product. If it’s a one-off product, like a recorded masterclass or an app, it helps to map out your production plan. Do you need any help? What research do you need to do beforehand?
Then, make use of online tools to help make your product look as professional as possible. Here are some tools that might come in handy:
- Canva
- Creative Market
- Loom
- Notion
This is also a good opportunity to think about where your digital product is going to live. Do you need to create a standalone website? Or can you harness make an existing platform, like Creative Market, Etsy, or Whop?
4. Promote your digital product
Once you’ve made your digital product and it’s ready to be released into the wild, think about how you’re going to spread the word. It helps to have an existing platform you can market on straight away, but most creators start from square one with no followers and no audience.
It’s much easier to choose one or two places to promote your product instead of spreading yourself thin across every platform you can think of, so decide where you want to spend your time (and, more importantly, where your target audience spends their time). For example, you might market your online yoga classes for 20-25-year-old women on TikTok and Instagram, as those platforms are most popular among that age group.
Try out a few platforms and see what works best:
- Share Instagram Reels and Stories with a link to your product
- Create a free lead magnet to build your email list
- Share your digital product in relevant Facebook groups
- Run paid ads on social media
- Upload your digital product to existing, searchable marketplaces
- Build a website and write content to attract people searching for products like yours
5. Monitor and learn from your results
The best way to make the best digital product is through trial and error and learning from your mistakes. You won’t make millions on your first day, but if you get feedback from customers and tweak your offering to something much-needed and valued, you can make a decent chunk of passive income over time (or a full-time income further down the line).
Where to Sell Digital Products
Once you’re ready to launch your digital product, you need to decide where to sell it. There’s a wealth of platforms designed for selling digital products, including the Whop marketplace. You can find almost every type of digital product there, from ebooks and templates to memberships, online courses and masterclasses.
Ready to get started? It’s really easy to sell your digital products on Whop:
- Create an account on Whop.com
- Choose a business name and add your social media handles
- Describe the digital products you’re selling
- List your product in your dashboard, choose the price, and write a catchy description that explains to buyers what they’ll get
- Go through the handy launch checklist and voila! Your digital product is ready to go out into the world
Other Places to Create and Sell Digital Products
Ultimately, the platform you choose to create your digital product will depend on the type of product you’re selling, but here are some other popular places to sell digital products:
Digital product download sites
Best for: Ebooks, guides, planners, calendars, printables, and trackers.
Sites to use: Whop, Gumroad, Lemon Squeezy, Amazon, Etsy.
App stores and marketplaces
Best for: Apps, software, tools, and video games.
Sites to use: Whop, Apple Store, Shopify App Store, Google Play.
Digital community platforms
Best for: Memberships, online communities, subscriptions.
Sites to use: Whop, Slack, Circle.
Website template marketplaces
Best for: Website templates, Photoshop brushes.
Sites to use: ThemeForest, Creative Market, Elementor.
Online course platforms
Best for: Online courses, content libraries, email courses, video courses.
Sites to use: Whop, Podia, Thinkific, Teachable.
Stock photo marketplaces
Best for: Stock photos, stock videos.
Sites to use: Shutterstock, Unsplash.
Ecommerce platforms
Best for: Independently selling digital products, digital artwork, printables, and courses.
Sites to use: Whop, WooCommerce, Squarespace
How to Market Digital Products
The hardest part of selling a digital product isn’t coming up with digital product ideas or even creating your product — it’s finding people to buy it. If you don’t already have a huge audience waiting with bated breath, you’ll need to promote your digital product in the right places to the right people.
Here are some ways you can start marketing your digital product:
- Run paid ads: get eyeballs on your digital product quickly by running ad campaigns on social media.
- Partner with affiliates: bring industry influencers (small or big) on board to promote your product to their existing audiences in exchange for a slice of the sale price.
- Collect testimonials: gather social proof in the form of reviews and testimonials to share on social media and your product landing page.
- Optimize your website: attract shoppers from the search results by implementing relevant keywords and on-page SEO tactics.
- Use social media: set up social media accounts on your favorite platforms and create engaging content to grow your audience — don’t forget to direct people to your digital product in the captions and your bio.
- Film YouTube videos: create walkthroughs or tutorials that complement your digital product and share them on YouTube.
- Start an email newsletter: nurture connections by encouraging people to join your email list and sharing thoughtful, relevant content with them.
- Sell on an existing marketplace: Whop, Amazon, Etsy - these are all successful digital marketplaces where potential customers can easily find your product by browsing through categories.
Discover the Best Digital Products to Sell in 2024
Digital products aren’t going anywhere. More people are choosing to buy digital versions of traditional media and jumping on the bandwagon could see you earning a decent chunk of passive income with relatively little effort.
Start by brainstorming digital product ideas that align with your interests and skillset and deciding the best format for them to take. Once you’ve created your product, choose a few channels to promote it on and spread the word.
It takes time to build a customer base, so don’t be disheartened if things don’t happen overnight. Just keep plugging away at it and you’ll start to see a snowball effect over time.
You can browse Whop.com’s huge marketplace to find the best digital products to sell online.
Once you’ve solidified your idea and created your digital product, you can start selling on Whop. It takes less than 10 minutes to get started and you can enjoy all of Whop's features, like 24/7 customer service, the Whop marketplace, and a dashboard full of tools to help you manage and grow your business.
