Plugin Author
Remi Corson
(@corsonr)
Automattic Happiness Engineer
Yes, it works fully without WooCommerce, but the vocabulary changes, and that is almost certainly what is blocking you.
Without WooCommerce there are no products. There are “plans“. A product is a WooCommerce concept, so with WooCommerce gone there is nothing to create products with, which is why nothing happens when you try.
The piece that is easy to miss is that you have to tell Milo which mode you are in. It does not switch on its own.
- Switch the mode. Go to Milo Subscriptions, Settings, and set the billing mode to “Standalone“. Until you do, the plugin is still expecting WooCommerce and shows you screens built for it.
- Create a plan. Once you are in Standalone, the “Products” item in the left menu is replaced by “Plans”. That is where you set the name, the price and the billing interval. This is the equivalent of a product.
- Connect Stripe. Install the free Milo Payments plugin and connect your Stripe account. In Standalone mode, payments go through Stripe Checkout: the customer is sent to Stripe’s own hosted page/portal, pays there, and comes back. Card storage and renewals are handled from there.
- Put a subscribe button on a page. If you use the block editor, open the inserter and look for the Milo category. There are four blocks:
Subscribe Button, which asks you to pick the plan from a dropdown, so there is nothing to type or remember. Restricted Content, which hides whatever you put inside it from anyone without the plan. My Subscription and My Account, for a page where customers manage their own subscription.
If you use the classic editor or a page builder, the shortcode equivalents are [milo_subscriptions_subscribe plan=”your-plan”], [milo_subscriptions_restricted plan=”your-plan”]…[/milo_subscriptions_restricted], [milo_subscriptions_my_subscription] and [milo_subscriptions_account].
Worth knowing before you commit to it. Standalone is deliberately simpler: plans plus Stripe Checkout. It has no shipping, no tax rules, no coupons and no payment methods other than Stripe, because those are things WooCommerce provides. It suits digital products, memberships and access to content. If you sell anything physical, or need tax or coupons, WooCommerce mode is the right choice. This may evolve in the future and some basic functions will most likely be added to the standalone mode as it’s getting popular.
