Shopify Pricing: Fees and Hidden Costs

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Shopify pricing starts at £5 per month going up to £1,500+ per month with two other price points in between. In this costs guide we’ll break down the pricing and plans Shopify currently offers to online sellers.

Shopify regularly updates its pricing – yet it’s still our top recommended free website builders for ecommerce, thanks to its wide range of integrations and payment providers.

We’ve taken a deep-dive into the terms and conditions to break down all of the costs you could want to know about.

We’ll look at what you get with Shopify in each price plan, as well as explaining the hidden fees.

What's Your Monthly Budget For An Online Shop? Choose an Answer to Start Your Free Trial with Shopify

Under £30

Around £400

£1,500+

Shopify pricing: How much does Shopify cost?

We’ve created this side-by-side comparison table of costs for Shopify plans. There are four plans available, ranging in price and scale to match the particular needs of your business. Let’s take a look at the main features you get at each Shopify price tier.

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Starter	Basic Shopify	Shopify	Advanced Shopify	Shopify Plus

Price (billed annually) £5/month	Price (billed annually) £19/month First month for £1	Price (billed annually) £49/month	Price (billed annually) £259/month First month for £1	Price (billed annually) +$2,300 USD/month
Best For Selling on social media	Best For Starting a small online store	Best For Growing your retail business	Best For International sellers	Best For High volume retailers
Key Features Get shoppable links (URLs) Product pages Basic order management 5% + 25p online credit card rates	Key Features Sell an unlimited number of products Up to two users Sell in 33 currencies (2% conversion fee)	Key Features Five staff accounts Standard reports Task automations 1.7% + 25p online credit card rates	Key Features 15 staff accounts Third-party calculated shipping rates Collect import taxes Advanced reporting	Key Features Faster checkout Automate workflows Security and compliance Priority support
Transaction Fees 5% (with Shopify Payments)	Transaction Fees 2% (if not using Shopify Payments)	Transaction Fees 1.7% + 25p (with Shopify Payments)	Transaction Fees 0.6% (if not using Shopify Payments)	Transaction Fees 0.2% (if not using Shopify Payments)

Shopify offers a free trial of three days so you can test out a price plan to see whether it’s the right fit. You can also take advantage of a promotion currently running where your first month of Shopify costs £1 (for new customers).

Shopify Starter pricing plan

What: Sell products via URLs and a simple landing page
Who: Mobile-first merchants of lower-priced goods
Why: Easy to sell via social media channels
How much: £5 per month – no discounts available for multi-year purchase

Note this plan is only available to new merchants or those on the free trial.

The Shopify Starter plan (formerly called “Lite”) is the cheap option for online sellers to send “shoppable” product links in instant messages over WhatsApp, Instagram, SMS and email. This means your customers click a URL link and buy your product directly or add to a cart and buy some more.

You’ll get a really basic online store with product pages, a page with your contact details, and Shopify checkout. You won’t be able to do much editing to customise the design, though.

It’s aimed at mobile device users because there isn’t loads of space for product specs, product videos, lengthy descriptions or customer reviews. A handy new feature is the ability to take mobile payments with your smartphone.

You’re encouraged to use Shopify’s free landing page app called Linkpop which lets you list products directly for sale. The idea is you can put this landing page link in your social media bio for users to quickly find your products for sale.

It’s much simpler (and cheaper) than a full online shop, and much less formal, hence the cheaper subscription price. For this reason you can expect to sell merchandise, homeware, handmade gifts, clothing, accessories and the like.

It’s not a platform aimed at expensive or regulated items such as precious jewellery and medical supplies. Reason being it gives a slightly less professional impression, and is likely to generate lower trust from your customer base.

Shopify Starter features

One user
Unlimited products
Customer support inbox
Shopping cart
Order management
Analytics

Shopify Starter transaction fees

Transaction fees: 5.0% (if you’re using Shopify Payments)
Online credit card rates: 5% + 25p

Read more about how Shopify works with merchant accounts on our page.

Basic Shopify pricing plan

What: Build an ecommerce website where customers buy your products
Who: Small-scale merchants, independent boutiques and startups
Why: Sell from a professional ecommerce website
How much: £19 per month if you pay for one year up front (or £25 month-to-month)

This is the lowest price you can pay to set up your own Shopify web shop. You create your own online shop using the Shopify drag-and-drop website builder and set up payment options in the dashboard view. This means you can display your products, take payments and manage inventory all from one account.

It’s not by chance we’ve named Shopify as our best ecommerce platform for small businesses. The convenience of the Shopify Basic plan is the ability to streamline your order purchase and fulfilment workflow. You’ll be able to print shipping labels and track packages through Shopify and pay your shipping costs in the same monthly bill as your subscription.

screenshot of dashboard with lefthand sidebar and dropdown menu of payment providers on the right

You can search for payment providers by the type of card you want to accept.

A new bonus Shopify has added this year is to substantially increase the number of inventory locations you can manage from your account. Last year you could only coordinate up to four inventory storage spaces from your Shopify Basic account – this is now boosted to up to 1,000 across all Shopify subscription plans.

Basic Shopify features

Up to two users
Online shop website and blog
Up to 1,000 inventory locations
List unlimited products
Order management

Basic Shopify transaction fees

Transaction fees: 2.0%
UK credit card rates (online): 2% + 25p
International/Amex credit card rate (online): 3.1% + 25p
Credit or debit card rate (in person): 1.7%
Currency conversion fee: 2% (with Shopify Payments)

Advanced Shopify plan

What: Ecommerce website with advanced reporting and more international options
Who: International sellers with medium or large stores
Why: Improved control on international selling and cost transparency for buyers
How much: £259 per month if you pay for one year up front (or £344 month-to-month)

The Advanced Shopify plan is aimed at sellers who have been running for a couple of years, and may sell products to international markets.

This is the cheapest Shopify price plan at which you can get third-party calculated shipping rates. And unlike the lower priced Shopify price plans, Advanced Shopify lets you estimate duties and import taxes at the checkout stage. This can bump up your chances of improving customer satisfaction if you’re selling internationally, because buyers won’t be caught off guard by unexpected overseas fees.

Thanks to its inventory management features (as well as advanced performance reports and fraud prevention automation) at this price plan, we recommend Shopify as our top ecommerce platform for large companies.

Transaction fees drop significantly with this plan as well; you’ll be charged 0.5% less for online credit card payment processing than you would on the Basic Shopify plan.

Advanced Shopify features

Up to 15 users
Automated customer segmentation
Estimate import taxes
Maximum 1,000 inventory locations
Advanced sales performance reports
Third-party calculated shipping rates

Advanced Shopify payment processing fees

Transaction fee: 0.5%
UK credit card rate (online): 1.5% + 25p
International/Amex credit card rate (online): 2.5% + 25p
Credit or debit card rates (in person): 1.5%
Currency conversion rate: You can set this manually

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Try Shopify

Does Shopify have a free plan?

Shopify doesn’t have a free plan but it does offer a three-day free trial so you can test some of its premium features free of charge. The trial period used to be 14 days, which it offered last year, and most competitors offer still.

To make it easier to start using Shopify’s features without commitment, Shopify won’t ask for your payment details until the end of the trial period. At which point you can simply walk away if you’re not comfortable signing up. Or you can take advantage of the current offer of your first month for £1.

This is really convenient for those looking to set up an online store and try out the best ecommerce platforms without committing financially at first. You can save your cash until you’re absolutely sure which ecommerce provider is best for your particular business.

Shopify fees and costs: Billing cycles, ongoing costs and hidden fees

Lots of services are included in all Shopify pricing plans including the following:

Website builder
Web hosting
SSL certificate
Unlimited products
Unlimited bandwidth
Unlimited contacts
Sell in 130+ countries
Web shop analytics
Abandoned cart recovery
Gift cards

NOTE: Starter does not include the website builder

Shopify billing cycles

Shopify subscriptions are charged month to month unless you pay in advance for one, two or three years
Cancel your Shopify subscription at any time (however, you won’t be refunded that month’s fee)
You can downgrade or upgrade your Shopify plan at any time (however, you cannot downgrade to Shopify Starter)

Additional Shopify website costs

Domain name that isn’t myshopify.com (approx £4-£32 per year)
Themes (template designs) ranging from $170 (~£130) to $380 each (~£290) or choose one of 12 free ones
Apps for additional website features (costs variable)
Emails: First 10,000 per month are free then $1 (~76p) per 1,000 emails sent

Shopify themes are rather expensive.

Additional Shopify sales costs

Transaction fees of 2%, 0.5% or 0.15% with the Basic Shopify, Advanced Shopify, and Shopify Plus plans respectively (applies only if you don’t use Shopify Payments)
Credit and debit card fees (these vary depending on price plan)
Duties and import taxes rates of 1.5% (applicable for Advanced Shopify)

Shopify Payments fees

You can avoid the transaction fees by using Shopify Payments, the company’s proprietary payment gateway (powered by Stripe).

Either way you’ll still pay the following payment processing fees per transaction:

UK card (online): 2% + 25p
UnionPay: 3.1% + 25p
Amex (online): 3.1% + 25p
International card (online): 3.1% + 25p
Additional cost for foreign currency: 2%
Chargeback: £10 (may be refunded if appealed)

With Shopify Payments the duties and import taxes rates on Advanced Shopify decreases to 0.85%.

There are no charges for refunds, declined payments or rewards transactions.

It’s worth noting that the UK card fee with Shopify Payments is more expensive than the standard Stripe fee of 1.5%+ 20p available directly from the provider. Currency conversion fees are the same, however.

Shopify pricing versus competitors’ pricing

BigCommerce is a major Shopify rival, as both offer similarly priced subscriptions. For instance, you can pay $29 (~£22) per month for BigCommerce Standard which is similar to Shopify Basic at £19 per month (both billed annually). However, you’ll also get unlimited staff accounts with BigCommerce on all plans, which you won’t with Shopify. Therefore BigCommerce is more useful for collaboration with a multiple team members.

Yet your first year with Shopify would be cheaper than a subscription with BigCommerce, thanks to the current deal of your first month priced at £1.

Square Plus (£20 per month, billed annually) charges 1.4% + 25p per transaction for UK cards online, whereas Shopify Basic (£19 per month, billed annually) charges 2% + 25p. And you’ll need to pay an extra 0.5% on top of that unless you’re signed up for Shopify Payments.

However, you should be aware that BigCommerce, Square, Wix, and WooCommerce don’t charge additional transaction fees – unlike Shopify. That could mean you end up paying less with one of these over Shopify, depending on your specific business’ sales revenue.

To connect a payment provider to Shopify, simply read the account permissions, and log into your account.

If you’d be content with less sophisticated sales features, you’ll definitely pay less with Wix than you would with Shopify. Wix price plans range from £7.50 to £119 per month, which is far cheaper than Shopify’s range of £19 to $2,000+ (~£1,500+).

You’ll likely pay less overall using WooCommerce than Shopify, so long as you’ve got the technical know-how (or you’re willing to hire someone to set up a website for your business). You’ll need to have a WordPress website in order to use WooCommerce.

There are no subscription fees at all with WooCommerce; you’ll be paying for any add ons you’d need to build the store you really want. However, the same could be said of Shopify, but it also comes with monthly fees.

Expert verdict

You’ve got plenty of pricing options with Shopify: four plans to choose from.

If you pay for a one-year price plan, the monthly Shopify cost comes to:

Shopify Starter: £5 per month
Basic Shopify: £19 per month
Advanced Shopify: £259 per month
Shopify Plus: Bespoke pricing

With a Value For Money score of 3/5, Shopify is in the mid-range of delivering features versus taking your money. As ever, the way to get the most bang for your buck is to pay upfront for two or three years of Shopify. This way you’ll benefit from a 20% or 25% discount versus paying month-to-month.

We found you could save more money with WooCommerce because of its lack of subscription fees. Yet Shopify offers more convenience compared with WooCommerce because of its built-in hosting.

If you’re looking for a low cost, low fuss online shop website builder, then you may prefer Wix instead of Shopify. Both tools have a free trial period, so if you’re a small-time seller, then we recommend you give Wix a go first.

Why you can trust our research

We have been testing website builders with online payments features for over ten years. We know the priorities of small business leaders like you.

That’s why we rate and evaluate providers based on objective criteria including:

How easy the platform is to use
Whether it’s good value for money
Design capabilities
Customer support options

Only after putting each platform through over 50 tests do we decide on the best ecommerce platforms for small businesses. More than 30 hours of research goes into deciding the winners, with input from out expert in house research team and focus group users, too.

FAQs

How much does Shopify cost for a month?

You can currently sign up to four different price plans with Shopify: Starter (£5 per month), Basic (£19 per month, billed annually), Advanced (£259 per month, billed annually) or Plus (from $2,000, which is roughly £1,500, per month, annually).

The month to month price for each of these subscriptions is considerably higher.

Is Shopify worth it for a small business?

Shopify’s extra fees are quite significant compared to platforms like Square Online and may not be worth it for businesses with a lower turnover.

With Shopify, you’ll have to pay subscription fees plus payment processing fees and transaction fees (unless you use Shopify Payments). On the other hand, you only pay 1.4% + 25p UK online card processing fees with Square Online’s free plan (compared with 2% + 25p on Shopify Basic, which costs £19 per month when billing annually).

Whether or not Shopify is worth it for your small business specifically depends on the rate at which you sell products, the average order size, and the amount of revenue you take per month.

What percentage of sales does Shopify take?

If you don’t use Shopify’s own payment gateway, you’ll be charged additional transaction fees for online payments of 5% (in the Starter plan); 2% + 25p (Basic plan); 1.5% + 25p (Advanced plan). These are quite hefty fees considering competitors such as Wix and BigCommerce don’t charge any equivalent fees. The exception being that Wix takes a 2.5% commission on ticket sales. By comparison, WooCommerce only charges 1.4% + 20p per sale.

Is Shopify more expensive than Etsy?

It’s hard to say whether you’ll end up paying more fees selling on Shopify or Etsy, because the former comes with a monthly subscription fee, while Etsy will only charge you per sale.

You’ll pay 15p (billed as US$0.20) per item listed on Etsy, which means you’d have to add 127 items to your Shopify Basic (£19 per month, billed annually) account each month for the costs to become equal.

However, Etsy’s transaction fee is 6.5%, which is higher than Shopify’s 2% on its Basic plan. Etsy’s payment processing fee is 4% + 20p which is higher than any of Shopify’s (and any other mainstream payment gateway’s) fees.

Shopify Pricing: Plans, Fees and Hidden Costs