Building Recurring Revenue with Stripe Subscriptions

Recurring revenue changes every metric in a software business — churn rate, LTV, payback period, and investor valuation. Stripe Subscriptions handle the billing machinery so you can focus on delivering value each billing cycle rather than chasing payments.

The Customer Object

Stripe's Customer object is the anchor for every subscription. Create one when a user signs up, store the customer.id in your database, and attach all future subscriptions, payment methods, and invoices to it.

const customer = await stripe.customers.create({
  email: user.email,
  name:  user.name,
  metadata: { user_id: user.id },   // link back to your DB
});

// store customer.id in your users table
await db.query(
  'UPDATE users SET stripe_customer_id = $1 WHERE id = $2',
  [customer.id, user.id]
);

Subscription Checkout with Trials

Subscription Checkout works almost identically to one-time payment Checkout — set mode: 'subscription' and point to a recurring Price instead of a one-time price.

const session = await stripe.checkout.sessions.create({
  customer: stripeCustomerId,
  payment_method_types: ['card'],
  line_items: [{ price: 'price_1234...', quantity: 1 }],
  mode: 'subscription',
  subscription_data: {
    trial_period_days: 14,
  },
  success_url: `\${DOMAIN}/dashboard?session_id={CHECKOUT_SESSION_ID}`,
  cancel_url:  `\${DOMAIN}/pricing`,
});

The Self-Service Billing Portal

The Billing Portal is a Stripe-hosted page where subscribers can update payment methods, change plans, and cancel. Enable it in the Stripe Dashboard → Settings → Billing → Customer Portal, then generate a session link on demand.

const portalSession = await stripe.billingPortal.sessions.create({
  customer: stripeCustomerId,
  return_url: `\${DOMAIN}/dashboard`,
});

res.redirect(303, portalSession.url);