What the 2026 Embedded Payments Benchmark reveals about vertical SaaS

At Rainforest, we answer hundreds of payments questions everyday. What's an ideal take rate for a healthcare platform with $200M in annual volume? Is 75% a good attach rate? What's a realistic goal for adoption?

The reality is that most vertical SaaS platforms have no idea how their embedded payments performance compares to the industry. 

That’s exactly why we built the 2026 Vertical SaaS Embedded Payments Benchmarking Study, so platforms can stop guessing and start benchmarking. 

In this episode, Joshua Silver, Founder and CEO of Rainforest sits down with Brooke Smith, who led the study, to discuss the key findings on adoption, leadership, take rate optimization, and what the highest-performing platforms are doing differently.

They discussed:

• The adoption gap: 78% of platforms are targeting an adoption rate of 71% or more but only 25% of platforms are currently performing at that level
• Why C-suite payments leaders drive significantly better performance across all metrics
• How real-time performance dashboards unlock better decision-making and strategy
• The surprising impact of dedicated payments leadership on take rate optimization
• What mature high-performers achieve: 78% median adoption and 35% of total revenue from payments
  ‍

‍

‍