What Shopify Charges to Take Credit Cards
Shopify's cost comes in two parts: a monthly plan and a cut of each card sale. Here is what its own pricing page lists.
A Shopify store pays for card processing in two parts. One is a fixed monthly plan price. The other is a percentage and a flat cent amount taken from each card sale. Both parts move together, and the plan you pick sets both numbers at once. Here is what Shopify's own pricing page says a US store pays, and how to work out which plan fits your sales. Published prices change, so confirm on Shopify's page before you sign up.
What Shopify's pricing page actually lists
Shopify's pricing page says Shopify charges a small fee to let you accept major credit cards such as Visa and Mastercard in your store. That fee is not one number. It is a plan price paid once a month, plus a rate taken from each sale. The rate has two parts too: a percentage of the sale and a flat amount per transaction. A store with many small sales feels the flat amount more. A store with fewer large sales feels the percentage more.
The three plans and their card rates
Shopify's pricing page lists three plans, each with a lower card rate than the one below it.
The Basic plan is $29 a month and card rates start at 2.9% + 30¢ USD. The Grow plan is $89 a month and card rates start at 2.7% + 30¢ USD. The Advanced plan is $359 a month and card rates start at 2.5% + 30¢ USD.
Those monthly prices apply when you pay yearly. Shopify's pricing page says monthly pricing is $39, $105 or $399 USD, against $29, $89 or $359 when paid yearly.
So the trade is simple. Pay more each month and keep a bigger share of each card sale. Whether that trade pays off depends entirely on how much you sell.
The third-party transaction fee
There is a catch if you skip Shopify's own payment system. Shopify's pricing page says third-party transaction fees may apply when you use a third-party payment provider instead of Shopify Payments. The page lists those fees at 2%.
That fee sits on top of whatever your outside provider charges you. So a store that routes cards elsewhere may pay its provider's rate plus 2% to Shopify. Shopify's pricing page says Shopify Payments is available only in certain countries.
In-person card rates and manual-entry rates
For sales made face to face, Shopify's pricing page lists in-person card rates of 2.6% + 10¢ and in-person manual rates of 3.5% + 10¢. The in-person rate applies when the card is tapped, dipped or swiped on a reader. The manual rate applies when you type the card number in by hand, as with a phone order. A shop with many phone orders should watch that line, not just the tap rate. The same two-part logic from a counter sale applies here as well.
How to estimate your own monthly cost
Take your monthly card sales and your average ticket. For each plan, multiply sales by the card rate, add the flat amount times your transaction count, then add the plan price. Do this for all three plans and compare the totals.
Say a store sells $10,000 a month on 200 orders. On Basic, the card cost is roughly $290 plus $60, plus the plan price. On Grow, it is roughly $270 plus $60, plus a higher plan price. The lower rate saves about $20 a month here, which does not cover the gap between the plan prices. A store selling far more each month flips that math, and the higher plan wins on total cost. There is no universal answer. The sales volume decides.
One more cost to check: how fast you want your money. If you ever pay for faster payouts, that fee adds to your card costs too.
Setup fees and where to confirm current numbers
Shopify's pricing page says there are no setup fees on any of its plans. You pay the plan price and the card rates, and nothing extra to open the account.
All the numbers above come from Shopify's pricing page as published. Prices change over time, and the page is the only place with the current figures. Read it on the day you sign up, and run the math on your own sales before you pick a plan.