How Much Does Shopify Cost? Complete Pricing Guide 2026

Shopify costs between $29 and $2,300 per month for its four main subscription plans, with the average store paying roughly $39 to $90 once apps, themes, and transaction fees are added in. The exact number depends on which plan fits your sales volume, whether you use Shopify Payments, and how many paid apps you actually need.

This guide breaks down every Shopify subscription plan with 2026 pricing, the hidden costs almost every comparison article skips, three real monthly cost scenarios for actual store types, and the seven specific tactics that bring your bill down without limiting growth. The plan names changed in 2026 (the old "Shopify" tier is now "Grow") and Shopify added a $1/month promotional rate for new merchants, so even guides published twelve months ago are partly out of date.

Shopify Plans and Pricing at a Glance

Shopify's 2026 lineup has four standard tiers plus a few special-purpose plans (Starter, Retail, Pause and Build) that handle specific use cases. Prices below assume annual billing, which is how Shopify advertises every plan on its pricing page. Switch to monthly billing and the rate jumps roughly 25%.

Two promotions are running on the public pricing page right now. New merchants get the first three months for $1/month on Basic, Grow, and Advanced. Annual billing knocks 25% off the monthly equivalent, and Shopify pays back 0.5% of your sales as account credit on every plan above Basic.

For a closer look at every feature included in each tier and how mid-cycle plan switches affect billing, see our deeper breakdown of Shopify subscription plans.

Basic Plan: $29/Month

The Basic plan is where almost every new Shopify store starts. For $29/month (or $1/month for the first three months on the current promo), you get unlimited products, a hosted online store, abandoned cart recovery, basic shipping discounts, two staff accounts, and 24/7 support. Credit card rates are around 2.9% + $0.30 per online transaction when you use Shopify Payments.

The catch most new merchants miss: if you choose any payment processor other than Shopify Payments - PayPal, Stripe, a regional gateway - Basic adds a flat 2% Shopify transaction fee on top of whatever the processor charges. On $10,000/month in sales, that's an extra $200 going to Shopify just for not using their checkout. Switching to Shopify Payments removes the fee entirely in supported countries.

Grow Plan: $79/Month (formerly "Shopify")

This is the plan formerly called "Shopify" - Shopify renamed the middle tier to Grow in 2026 but the underlying plan is the same. At $79/month annually, you get five staff accounts, lower credit card rates, professional reports, USPS Priority Mail Cubic shipping, and the third-party transaction fee drops from 2% to 1%.

The math says you should upgrade from Basic to Grow once your monthly sales pass roughly $5,000 and you don't use Shopify Payments. The 1% transaction fee savings ($50/month at that volume) plus the additional staff accounts and reporting usually more than cover the $50/month price difference. If you only sell through Shopify Payments, the upgrade is more about staff count and reports than fee savings.

Advanced Plan: $299/Month

Advanced is built for stores in the $50,000–$500,000/month range. The headline features beyond Grow: 15 staff accounts, the lowest credit card rates Shopify offers without going Plus, third-party transaction fees of 0.6%, real-time carrier-calculated shipping rates from UPS/FedEx/DHL displayed at checkout, custom report builder, and regional pricing (different prices for different markets in one store).

The single biggest reason to move from Grow to Advanced is shipping. Live carrier rates eliminate the guesswork on heavy or international orders - you charge customers exactly what shipping actually costs, instead of estimating and either undercharging or scaring buyers off with a fixed flat rate. Stores that ship 200+ orders per month usually save more on accurate shipping than the $220/month price increase costs them.

Plus Plan: $2,300/Month and Up

Shopify Plus starts at $2,300/month on a 1-year or 3-year contract. Once your store does over roughly $800,000/month in revenue, the price flips to a percentage of sales (0.25%) capped at $40,000/month. That's the published structure - actual deals are negotiated, especially for headless commerce builds, B2B-only setups, and brands with multiple regional storefronts.

What you get for the jump from $299 to $2,300: unlimited staff accounts, fully customizable checkout (including Shopify Functions for custom logic), up to 200 POS Pro locations, B2B/wholesale selling with negotiated pricing, the lowest transaction fees on the platform (0.2% with third-party processors), and 24/7 priority support with a dedicated launch manager. For a deeper breakdown, see our complete guide on What is Shopify Plus?.

Special-Purpose Plans Most Guides Skip

Shopify Starter ($5/month)

Starter is the social-selling tier. You get product pages, payment processing, and the ability to share buy links across Instagram, TikTok, WhatsApp, and email - but no full online store. It's designed for creators who already have an audience on social platforms and just need a checkout. Card rates run around 5% + $0.30, which is much higher than the standard plans, so Starter only makes sense at low volume.

Pause and Build ($9/month)

If you need to step away from your store for a season, vacation, surgery, or any extended break - don't cancel and start over. Switch to Pause and Build at $9/month. Your storefront goes hidden from customers, but you keep full admin access to edit products, themes, and settings. When you reopen, every product, customer, and order is exactly where you left it. Shopify hides this option two clicks deep in account settings, which is why most merchants don't realize it exists - our walkthrough on how to pause your Shopify store covers exactly where to find it.

Retail/POS Pro ($89/month per location)

Every standard plan comes with the basic POS Lite app. POS Pro is the upgrade for physical retail and adds in-store analytics, custom register staff permissions, exchanges, omnichannel selling rules, and unlimited registers - for $89/month per physical location. Two stores = $178/month on top of your subscription. For single-location retail, Lite is usually fine until you hit a specific feature wall.

Agentic Plan (Free)

Brand new in 2026: Shopify's Agentic Plan is $0/month and lets brands sell through AI agents and chat-based commerce channels without an online store subscription. It's narrowly scoped - agentic-only checkout, no full storefront - but it's a real option for headless brands experimenting with the new AI-shopping channels.

Hidden Costs Almost Every Guide Underestimates

The plan price is the floor, not the ceiling. Here are the costs most published Shopify pricing guides either skip or undercount, with realistic numbers.

Apps: $40–$300/Month for the Average Store

Almost no Shopify store runs on the bare platform. Email marketing (Klaviyo: $20–$200/month based on contact list), reviews (Judge.me: $15/month, Yotpo: $79+/month), upsells (ReConvert: $15–$80/month), advanced shipping (Shipstation: $10–$160/month), and SEO tools (Plug in SEO: $20/month) add up fast. A typical established store runs 4–7 paid apps and pays $80–$200/month total. Browse the app store carefully - there are free alternatives for most categories, but they almost always have a "Pro" upgrade you'll need within a year.

Themes: $0 or $250–$400 (One-Time)

Shopify includes 13 free themes, including Dawn (the modern reference theme). Premium themes from the official Shopify Theme Store run $250–$400 as a one-time purchase, not a subscription. Themes from third-party marketplaces like ThemeForest cost $50–$200 but can have compatibility issues with Shopify updates and don't include direct Shopify support. The honest answer: Dawn is enough for most new stores, and you can switch to a paid theme later when you actually have something to optimize.

Domain: $11–$20/Year

Buying your custom domain through Shopify costs roughly $14/year for a .com. Buying it elsewhere (Cloudflare Registrar, Namecheap, Porkbun) and pointing DNS to Shopify costs $9–$11/year - and Cloudflare Registrar specifically charges at-cost with no markup. Domain pricing is small money but it's the easiest place to stop overpaying. If your store is already registered, see our guide on how to stop paying for your domain on Shopify.

Credit Card Processing: 2.5%–2.9% + $0.30

Shopify Payments rates start at 2.9% + $0.30 per online transaction on Basic and drop to roughly 2.5% + $0.30 on Advanced. International cards add roughly 1.5% on top. American Express runs higher than Visa/Mastercard on every plan. Use Shopify Payments and you avoid the additional Shopify transaction fee; use anything else and you pay both the processor's rate and the third-party fee.

Third-Party Transaction Fees: The Big One

If you use any payment processor other than Shopify Payments, Shopify charges a separate transaction fee on every order: 2% on Basic, 1% on Grow, 0.6% on Advanced, 0.2% on Plus. On $50,000/month in sales, that's an extra $300–$1,000/month going to Shopify on top of what your processor charges. This single line item is why most stores in supported countries default to Shopify Payments - the fee is unavoidable on third-party processors and it scales linearly with revenue. The most common exception is PayPal: many stores add it as a secondary option for buyers who prefer wallet checkout, but integrating PayPal into Shopify alongside Shopify Payments lets you avoid fee stacking on the bulk of your transactions.

POS Hardware: $49–$459 One-Time

If you sell in person, the Shopify Tap & Chip Reader is $49, the Tap & Chip Reader Bundle with dock is $89, and the full POS Go (a built-in handheld) runs $459. Add receipt printers, cash drawers, and barcode scanners and a basic in-store setup is roughly $400–$800 one-time. POS Pro at $89/month per location is the recurring cost on top. For a full breakdown of every device, see our guide to Shopify POS hardware.

Real Monthly Cost: Three Common Scenarios

Plan price alone doesn't tell you what your bill will actually be. Here are realistic monthly totals for three common store types, including the apps, themes, and processing fees most stores actually use.

Side-Project Store on Basic

• Basic plan (annual): $29/month
• Free Dawn theme: $0
• Klaviyo Email (free under 250 contacts): $0
• Judge.me reviews: $15/month
• Custom domain: $1/month ($14/year)
• Card processing on $2,000/mo sales (Shopify Payments, 2.9% + $0.30): $73
• Total: ~$118/month

Growing Store on Grow

• Grow plan (annual): $79/month
• Premium theme (one-time, amortized): $25/month for first year
• Klaviyo Email (5,000 contacts): $100/month
• ReConvert upsells: $30/month
• Yotpo reviews: $25/month
• Card processing on $25,000/mo (Shopify Payments, 2.7% + $0.30): $750
• Total: ~$1,009/month (with $750 of that being processing on revenue)

Established Store on Advanced

• Advanced plan (annual): $299/month
• Premium custom theme (amortized over 2 years): $15/month
• Klaviyo + Smile.io loyalty + custom apps: $400/month
• Shipstation Pro: $99/month
• Card processing on $150,000/mo (Shopify Payments, 2.5% + $0.30): $3,900
• Total: ~$4,713/month

The takeaway: subscription cost is rarely the biggest line. Card processing is. That's why moving to a higher-tier plan with lower processor rates often pays for itself before the staff-account or feature differences even matter.

How to Reduce Your Shopify Costs (Without Limiting Growth)

1. Switch to Annual Billing

Annual billing saves 25% on Basic, Grow, and Advanced. On Grow that's $240/year saved; on Advanced it's $897/year. The catch: if you downgrade or cancel mid-year, the savings are not refunded. Worth it once you're confident you'll stay on a plan for at least eight months.

2. Use Shopify Payments If You're Eligible

This is the biggest single lever. Shopify Payments is available in 23+ countries and removes the third-party transaction fee entirely. On $50,000/month in sales, that single decision saves $300–$1,000/month depending on your plan.

3. Audit Your Apps Quarterly

App spend creeps. Every quarter, list every paid app and its monthly cost, then ask whether it earned its keep - through measurable revenue, time saved, or a feature you'd actually pay for again. Most stores find one or two apps they forgot they were paying for. Replace anything underperforming with a free alternative or remove it entirely.

4. Pause Instead of Cancel

Going on hiatus, dealing with seasonal slowdowns, or moving warehouses? The Pause and Build plan at $9/month keeps your store intact for a fraction of any standard plan. Don't pay $79+/month while not actively selling. And if you've already been billed for a plan you weren't using, our guide on how to get a refund from your Shopify subscription walks through what's actually eligible.

5. Buy Your Domain Outside Shopify

Cloudflare Registrar charges domain registries at cost - typically $9–$11/year for a .com versus $14 through Shopify. Small money, but free money.

6. Don't Upgrade for Features You're Not Using

The most common mistake: upgrading to Advanced for "the lower transaction fees" when the merchant is already on Shopify Payments and pays $0 in third-party fees. Read what specifically changes between plans before paying $220/month more.

7. Take the 0.5% Cashback Credit

Shopify pays back 0.5% of your sales as account credit on Grow and above. It's automatic - you don't have to enroll - but you'd never know unless you check your billing statement. On a $50k/month store, that's $250/month in credit toward your subscription, apps, or themes purchased through Shopify.

Free Trial: 3 Days, Then $1/Month for 3 Months

Shopify dropped its long-running 14-day free trial down to a 3-day free trial in 2026, and added a $1/month promotional rate for the first three months on Basic, Grow, and Advanced. That means you can fully build, test, and even launch a store for under $5 before paying real money. No credit card is required to start the 3-day trial; you only enter card details when you transition to the $1/month period.

If you want to try Shopify on the current $1/month for three months promo, you can start a free trial here. Three days isn't long, so prep your products, branding, and import lists before signing up - that way you spend the trial actually testing, not setting up.

How Shopify Pricing Compares to Competitors

At face value, Shopify is more expensive than Wix ($17–$159/month for ecommerce plans) or Squarespace Commerce ($23–$72/month). If you are specifically deciding between these two, our Shopify vs Wix comparison walks through the transaction fees and feature gaps that matter most. It's roughly comparable to BigCommerce ($29–$299/month) and far cheaper than enterprise platforms like Salesforce Commerce Cloud or Adobe Commerce. The honest comparison is what you get per dollar: Shopify's app ecosystem (10,000+ apps), POS integration, B2B features on Plus, and headless commerce options aren't matched at the lower-tier price points by Wix or Squarespace.

For a closer side-by-side, the comparison guides on Shopify vs Squarespace walk through the trade-offs feature by feature.

Marketplace selling is a different decision entirely. If you are choosing between building your own Shopify store and selling on Amazon's marketplace, our Shopify vs Amazon comparison walks through the fee math, branding trade-offs, and the case for using both.

Conclusion: How Much Does Shopify Cost?

Shopify costs $29 to $2,300 per month for a subscription, and $50 to $5,000+ per month all-in once you add the apps, themes, and processing fees an actual store needs. The plan you start on matters less than the two decisions that drive most of your bill: whether you use Shopify Payments (which removes the third-party transaction fee) and how disciplined you are about app spend. Pick the smallest plan that covers your current needs, switch to annual billing once you've decided to stay, and revisit the math every six months as sales grow. For the broader picture of how Shopify works as an ecommerce platform, see our complete guide on What Is Shopify And How Does It Work?. If you're still weighing the platform itself rather than just the cost, our honest review of Shopify covers who the platform actually fits, who should pick something else, and the real strengths and weaknesses worth knowing before you commit. New stores can follow our step-by-step walkthrough on how to start a Shopify store to get from signup to first sale in under a day, then come back here when you're weighing the upgrade math.