OneNotary vs BlueNotary:
Fees, Payouts, and Legitimacy (2026)
By Andrew Ray Yon, MBA, ChFC · Last updated: October 1, 2026 · Competitor information verified: October 1, 2026
OneNotary charges notaries $0 (Basic) or $25 (Professional) a month plus a $13 or $10 per-session fee. BlueNotary is free on Basic; Notary Pro costs $27 a month, or $297 a year billed annually. BlueNotary keeps $10 per BlueNotary-billed notarization and pays $5–$10 per open-call seal (as of October 1, 2026). Neither platform publishes a volume guarantee, and BlueNotary's helpdesk disclaims one outright. This comparison is published by USA Notary, a membership platform that assigns paid signing sessions to member notaries.
The Short Verdict
Both platforms let a notary start at $0 a month, so the choice turns on what you want from the platform. OneNotary's Basic plan charges a $13 per-session fee only when you actually notarize, per its published notary pricing. BlueNotary's free Basic plan keeps $10 of each BlueNotary-billed notarization, but its platform-sourced work arrives as first-come, first-serve open calls on the $27/month Notary Pro plan, paying $5–$10 per seal — and its own helpdesk states that volume is not guaranteed (all as of October 1, 2026).
OneNotary's jobs page names three states (Florida, Pennsylvania, and Virginia), and BlueNotary sends platform-sourced work as open calls rather than assignments. USA Notary's membership assigns paid signing sessions and includes software for your own clients — the disclosed third column below, with details on the notary-facing platform overview.
Pricing Side by Side (as of October 1, 2026)
Every competitor figure below comes from each platform's own published pages, read on October 1, 2026. USA Notary's column is our own product — affiliation disclosed — and is dated August 20, 2026. Where a platform publishes no number for a line item, the cell says so rather than estimating. BlueNotary's pricing page lists Notary Pro at $27 a month, $297 a year, and $648 for three years, so the first row prints all three.
| Cost line | OneNotary | BlueNotary | USA Notary (ours) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Monthly subscription | Basic $0 · Professional $25 | Basic free · Pro $27/mo · $297/yr (≈ $24.75/mo) · $648 for 3 yrs (≈ $18.00/mo) | $19.95 / $29.95 / $49.95 by tier |
| Per-session fee (GNW, one seal) | $13 Basic · $10 Professional | $10 BlueNotary-billed · $5 first seal when billing privately (Pro) | $12 / $10 / $8 by tier |
| Extra seal / stamp | +$5 Basic · +$4 Professional | $0 additional stamp when billing privately | Not separately published |
| Identity verification (IDV/KBA) | Included (IDology) | Covered by the $5 first-seal platform fee (private billing) | $3 per signer ($2 IDV + $1 KBA) |
| Loan signing / closing session | $30 Basic · $25 Professional | $25 per eClosing / estate-planning session (platform fee when billing privately, Pro) | Not separately published |
| What platform-sourced work pays you | $10 + $3/extra notarization; after 100 notarizations, $6 for requests on the platform and $12 for your own clients (its June 2020 guide, last modified December 2022) | $5–$10 open-call seal · $20 Pro / $15 Free invitation seal · $30 open-call closing | Assigned signings included in membership (availability-based) |
GNW = general notary work, the term both platforms use for standard notarizations (not loan signings or closings). Competitor figures as of October 1, 2026; USA Notary fees as of August 20, 2026 (USA Notary pricing).
Competitor information verified October 1, 2026
Every OneNotary and BlueNotary figure on this page was read on October 1, 2026 from the provider's own pages or, for the BBB and Trustpilot records, from those sites — all linked below. USA Notary (our platform) is the publisher; its own column is dated August 20, 2026 and was not re-checked in this update.
| Provider | Pages read on October 1, 2026 | Figures taken from them |
|---|---|---|
| OneNotary | Notary pricing · Jobs · Pay guide (June 2020, last modified December 2022) · Compliance · Signer FAQ (single-seal price) | Plan and per-session fees, hiring states, legacy pay guide, certifications, the $25 customer price |
| BlueNotary | Pricing · Notary fee schedule · Open calls · Billing your customer · Invoicing outside BlueNotary · Session by invitation | Plan prices, platform fees, payouts, open-call terms |
| Third-party records | BBB profile · BBB complaints · Trustpilot | BlueNotary accreditation, complaint counts, TrustScore — counts roll, so each is shown as displayed on October 1, 2026 |
Method
- Read at the source. Each figure comes from the provider's own pricing, help-center or jobs page. BlueNotary's pricing page builds its plan and fee tables with JavaScript, so those figures were read from the script that renders them (bluenotary.us/js/components.js).
- Conflicts are printed, not settled. Where a provider's own pages disagree — OneNotary's two price sets, BlueNotary's private-billing fee — every figure is listed with its page and date, and the page says which one it uses.
- Nothing is estimated. A cell says "not published" when the provider publishes no number. Take-rates and breakevens are our arithmetic on published figures and are labelled that way.
- Dates matter. Providers change pages without notice, and BBB and Trustpilot counts roll daily, so every figure is stamped with the day it was read.
BlueNotary's own pages publish conflicting fees
The table above uses BlueNotary's pricing-page figures. Its help articles list different numbers for the same lines, and none of the pages says which one supersedes the others (all read October 1, 2026):
| BlueNotary page | Date shown | Private billing: first-seal platform fee | Additional stamp |
|---|---|---|---|
| Pricing page ("Our cut") | Read October 1, 2026 | $5 | $0 |
| Notary fee schedule | Updated January 30, 2026 (heading: December 19, 2025) | $5 | $0 |
| Billing your customer ("Your Own Invoice") | Updated June 23, 2026 | $10 | $2 |
| Invoicing outside BlueNotary | Updated August 28, 2026 | $3 | $0 |
The same split shows up on BlueNotary-billed sessions. The pricing-page calculator applies a $10 fee per notarization to both Basic and Pro members (the notary keeps $15 of the $25 base price), while the fee schedule pays $15 per invitation seal to free members and $20 to Pro members. An "invitation" session is one where you invite your own client, per BlueNotary's Session by Invitation article. Confirm the fee in force before you rely on any of these numbers: the gaps are small per session and compound at volume.
How Each Platform Gets You Work
OneNotary: its own customers' requests, plus a jobs page naming three states
OneNotary also sends notaries requests from its own customers (its pay guide: "You can work with your own clients as well as with clients from OneNotary"). Those customers pay $25 for a notarization with one seal (per OneNotary's signer FAQ, as of October 1, 2026). The June 2020 guide, last modified December 2022, says the notary earns "$10 for the first notarization plus $3 for each additional notarization" and, after 100 notarizations, "$6 for requests on the platform and $12 for your own clients." The jobs page lists "Growing volume of notarization requests" among what OneNotary offers, and its hiring is narrower: the OneNotary jobs page (updated July 31, 2026) says "We're hiring Remote Online Notaries in Florida, Pennsylvania, and Virginia!" — behind an approved profile and an onboarding quiz.
Notaries commissioned outside FL, PA, and VA can serve their own clients on OneNotary for any document their state permits to be notarized online (per its notary FAQ); its jobs page names those three states.
BlueNotary: first-come, first-serve open calls
BlueNotary routes its platform-sourced leads through "open calls" available only to Notary Pro subscribers. Its own Open Calls helpdesk article (updated June 23, 2026; read October 1, 2026) says open calls are "first come, first serve," pay "$5-$10 for each Open Call completed," and carry the disclaimer "We do not guarantee a certain volume for open calls."
The same article notes that accepting an open call and failing to complete it "may risk suspension of your account," that Open Call Testing is required first, and that Alabama notaries are not eligible.
Three different work models, in one sentence each
- OneNotary — platform-sourced requests: OneNotary's own customers send requests, and its jobs page names FL, PA, and VA.
- BlueNotary — open-call grab: Pro subscribers race for each lead; volume is explicitly not guaranteed.
- USA Notary — membership assignment: the platform assigns paid signing sessions to member notaries on an availability-based schedule (ours — disclosed).
Comparing more than these two? The full six-platform RON comparison for notaries covers Proof, NotaryLive, and Notary Hub with the same fee-sheet method.
Take-Rates and OneNotary's Two Price Sets
What each platform keeps (computed from their own pages)
BlueNotary's pricing page lists signer notarizations starting at $25 and a $10 platform cut per BlueNotary-billed notarization — the notary keeps $15, a 40% platform take on the base fee (as of October 1, 2026). OneNotary's pay guide (June 2020, last modified December 2022) puts the customer fee at $25 with $10 to the notary — a 60% platform take under the guide's terms, and $6 per platform request after 100 notarizations. These percentages are our arithmetic on their published numbers, not their marketing claims, and the OneNotary figure uses the older guide because the current plan page does not state what the notary receives.
OneNotary's Basic-vs-Professional breakeven is also worth computing: at $13 versus $25/month plus $10, Professional becomes cheaper from the ninth GNW session in a month; for loan signings ($30 vs $25), from the sixth.
OneNotary publishes two conflicting price sets
OneNotary's current notary pricing page lists Basic at $0/month with a $13 per-session fee and Professional at $25/month with a $10 per-session fee. Its still-live "How to Become an Online Notary" guide — published June 2020, last modified December 2022 — instead promises "no setup or monthly fees," $10 plus $3 per additional notarization, and after 100 notarizations $6 per platform request and $12 for your own clients. Both pages were live on October 1, 2026.
The guide was last modified in December 2022, and the pricing page itself still advertises webinars from August 2020. Treat the current pricing page as authoritative — but the platform has left the older terms published for years.
Is OneNotary Legitimate?
OneNotary is a legitimate remote online notarization platform. Its compliance page documents SOC 2 Type II reporting under AICPA Trust Services Criteria, ISO/IEC 27001:2022 certification, and MISMO guideline alignment; its identity proofing runs through an IDology partnership (all per OneNotary's own pages, as of October 1, 2026).
Legitimacy and earning potential are separate questions. The practical caveats are the ones on OneNotary's own pages: a jobs page that names three states, a platform-request rate that steps down to $6 after 100 notarizations, and a pay guide that has not been updated since December 2022.
One more grounding fact: a RON session's legal validity never comes from the platform — the notary's commissioning state authorizes the act. Any compliant platform, OneNotary included, is a venue for that authority.
Is BlueNotary Legit?
BlueNotary is a real, operating notarization platform. BlueNotary, LLC appears in the Better Business Bureau's records as a business started June 1, 2022, it maintains a live pricing page and a detailed public helpdesk, and it reports notarizing 20,000+ documents monthly (company-reported figure from its own pricing page, as of October 1, 2026). Trustpilot shows an "Excellent" TrustScore of 4.9 out of 5 across 2,947 reviews (as of October 1, 2026). Its free Basic tier genuinely includes an eJournal and automatic billing.
The record notaries should read before paying, though, is its BBB profile: the business is not BBB Accredited, and its complaints page shows 14 complaints in the last 3 years, 11 of them unanswered (3 answered), as of October 1, 2026. Complaint themes are refund refusals on memberships and courses, digital-certificate and e-seal problems, and earnings that fell short of expectations — one August 2025 complainant on a paid plan reported having "only been able to successfully claim 1 witness session making $5.00," and a June 2026 complaint disputes a $297.00 invoice, saying the e-seal provided was incorrect for the complainant's state (the complainant's account, unanswered on the BBB record).
Those accounts are the complainants' own, published by BBB — which notes it does not verify third-party information. BlueNotary's open-call payout range and no-volume-guarantee disclaimer come straight from its own helpdesk, and in a January 2024 response on BBB's complaints page BlueNotary wrote that it "does not guarantee leads or work from open calls." Notaries weighing an exit have a dedicated rundown of BlueNotary alternatives ranked for working notaries.
Where USA Notary Fits (Full Disclosure)
USA Notary publishes this page, so read this section as the vendor's own pitch. USA Notary assigns paid signing sessions to member notaries as part of the membership itself — assignment is availability-based, and, like BlueNotary, we do not guarantee volume — and every tier includes SharpNote tools to bring, keep, and serve your own clients.
Membership runs $19.95, $29.95, or $49.95 per month with a per-session fee of $12, $10, or $8 by tier, plus $3 IDV/KBA per signer — no course upsells at any tier. If the open-call race or a jobs page that names three states is what sent you here, the economics are on our notary membership pricing page.