Shopify Transaction Fees Compared: All Plans (2024)

Every dollar you pay in fees is a dollar out of your profit. If you’re picking a Shopify plan—or deciding whether to stay on your current one—you need the exact numbers: what you pay per transaction, how it shifts by plan, and where you can cut costs. This guide gives you the real numbers across every Shopify plan, compares them to competitors, and shows you the break-even math for your store size.

What Are Shopify Transaction Fees?

Shopify charges two distinct types of fees. Confusing them costs store owners real money. Credit card processing fees are what any payment processor charges to handle the transaction—Stripe’s 2.9% + 30¢, for example, or Shopify Payments’ equivalent rates. Shopify transaction fees are a separate, additional percentage Shopify charges on every sale when you use any processor other than Shopify Payments.

Here’s the key point: use Shopify Payments and Shopify drops its own transaction fee entirely. You still pay the card processing rate. But no extra Shopify percentage sits on top. Route payments through Stripe, PayPal, Authorize.net, or any other third-party gateway, and Shopify adds its own cut—anywhere from 0.15% to 5%, depending on your plan.

These fees hit every single sale. A 2% transaction fee on a $50 order is just $1. But across 500 orders a month, that’s $500 gone—before card processing costs.

Shopify Transaction Fees by Plan: 2024 Comparison Table

Here’s what each Shopify plan charges, as of 2024 (Source: Shopify Official Pricing Page, 2024):

The Starter plan’s 5% fee makes it viable only for low-volume social selling—not a real storefront. Going from Basic to the Shopify plan cuts the third-party transaction fee in half (2% → 1%) and also drops card processing rates by 0.2%.

Shopify offers up to 25% off monthly costs with annual billing (Source: Shopify Pricing, 2024). But annual billing does not change transaction fee percentages. You save on the subscription. The per-sale rates stay the same.

Example: A pet treat subscription brand starting on Shopify Basic Plan Features: What You Actually Get at $39/month will typically find upgrading to the Shopify plan worthwhile within six months once monthly revenue clears roughly $8,000. Merchants who make that switch often report the lower card processing rate saves around $16/month on its own—and if they’re on a third-party gateway, the 1% vs. 2% difference adds up much faster.

Shopify Payments vs. Third-Party Gateways: The $2,400/Year Difference

Here’s a concrete example. You run a store on the Basic plan doing $10,000/month, with a $50 average order value—200 transactions per month.

Scenario A: Using Stripe (third-party gateway)
– Stripe processing fee: 2.9% + 30¢ per transaction = $290 + $60 = $350
– Shopify transaction fee: 2.0% of $10,000 = $200
– Total fees: $550/month

Scenario B: Using Shopify Payments
– Shopify Payments processing fee: 2.9% + 30¢ per transaction = $290 + $60 = $350
– Shopify transaction fee: $0
– Total fees: $350/month

That’s $200/month—or $2,400/year—saved by switching your payment gateway. Card processing rates are identical in this example. The entire saving comes from removing Shopify’s additional transaction fee.

Shopify Payments works in the United States, Canada, UK, Australia, and over a dozen other countries (Source: Shopify Help Center, 2024). If you’re US-based, there’s no availability issue. Popular gateways like Stripe, PayPal, Authorize.net, Square, and 2Checkout all trigger the additional Shopify fee.

One thing worth knowing: PayPal can run alongside Shopify Payments as a secondary checkout option. In that setup, PayPal transactions still carry the Shopify transaction fee. Shopify Payments transactions do not. Many merchants who add PayPal as a secondary option only catch this when they actually audit their fee statements.

How to Eliminate or Reduce Shopify Transaction Fees

1. Switch to Shopify Payments. This is the single most effective move. It removes the Shopify transaction fee entirely. If you’re on Stripe or another third-party gateway and you’re in a supported country, the switch is simple: go to Settings → Payments in your Shopify admin and activate Shopify Payments.

2. Upgrade your plan when the numbers support it. If you must use a third-party gateway, here’s the break-even math between Basic ($39/mo, 2% fee) and Shopify ($105/mo, 1% fee):

• Extra monthly cost: $105 − $39 = $66
• Fee savings per dollar of revenue: 2% − 1% = 1%
• Break-even revenue: $66 ÷ 0.01 = $6,600/month

Above $6,600/month on a third-party gateway, the Shopify plan saves you money despite the higher subscription price.

3. Use annual billing. It won’t reduce transaction fees. But it cuts your monthly plan cost by up to 25%, which frees up margin elsewhere (Source: Shopify Pricing, 2024).

4. Negotiate on Shopify Plus. Plus merchants can negotiate both subscription fees and card processing rates directly with Shopify. Stores processing over $1 million annually usually have enough volume to get rates well below the published numbers.

5. Audit your transaction data monthly. Check your average order value and transaction count under Analytics → Reports in your Shopify admin. Higher order values mean fewer transactions for the same revenue—which reduces the weight of per-transaction flat fees (the 30¢ component). Merchants who push AOV up through bundling or Best Shopify Upsell Apps to Boost Your AOV in 2025 often see a measurable drop in their effective fee rate.

6. Think carefully before enabling Shop Pay Installments. When customers pay through Shop Pay Installments (Shopify’s buy-now-pay-later option), Shopify charges the merchant 5.9% + 30¢ per installment order (Source: Shopify Help Center, 2024). That’s much higher than standard processing. Build this into your cost model before you turn BNPL on.

Shopify vs. Competitors: Transaction Fee Comparison

Shopify isn’t the only platform charging—or not charging—transaction fees. Here’s how competitors compare, as of 2024:

BigCommerce is the closest direct comparison. Zero transaction fees on every plan, even with a third-party gateway. For a store doing $25,000/month on a third-party gateway, that’s $250–$500/month you’d pay on Shopify that you wouldn’t pay on BigCommerce. See more in our Shopify vs WooCommerce 2025: Which One Wins? guide.

But total cost matters more than any single fee line. Shopify has over 8,000 apps. According to a 2023 Shopify study, its Shop Pay checkout converts up to 50% better than guest checkout (Source: Shopify Engineering Blog, 2023). A merchant who saves $300/month in transaction fees but loses conversions at checkout hasn’t saved anything.

Example: BigCommerce’s zero-fee model appeals to merchants who need third-party gateway flexibility—DTC audio brand Skullcandy has publicly used the platform. But many brands at similar scale pick Shopify for the depth of its app selection and accept the transaction fee trade-off. The right call depends on whether gateway flexibility or app breadth drives more value for your specific business.

Real-World Cost Scenarios by Store Size

Scenario 1: New Store — $2,000/Month Revenue

Assumptions: 40 orders/month, $50 AOV, using Shopify Payments.

Verdict: Basic wins by $62/month. The card rate savings on the Shopify plan come to $4/month—nowhere near enough to justify the higher subscription. At this stage, that $62 is better spent on customer acquisition.

Scenario 2: Growing Store — $25,000/Month Revenue

Assumptions: 500 orders/month, $50 AOV, using Shopify Payments.

Verdict: Basic and Shopify cost nearly the same on Shopify Payments at this volume. Switch to a third-party gateway and the Shopify plan saves $250/month in transaction fees—that’s the clear winner. Many merchants at this revenue level don’t realize how much they’re giving up until they actually run these numbers.

Scenario 3: High-Volume Store — $100,000/Month Revenue

Assumptions: 2,000 orders/month, $50 AOV, using Shopify Payments.

Verdict: Advanced and Shopify plans cost nearly the same at $100K/month with Shopify Payments. Advanced earns its price through extra features—custom reports, 15 staff accounts, third-party calculated shipping rates. Plus only makes sense when you need enterprise-level tools: checkout customization via Checkout Extensibility, dedicated support, and negotiated card rates below 2.4%.

At around $50,000/month, upgrading from Basic to Advanced with Shopify Payments saves enough in card processing fees to cover most of the subscription increase. On a third-party gateway, the break-even threshold for upgrading is much lower.

Other Fees That Affect Your Shopify Margins

Transaction fees aren’t the only costs eating into your margins. Keep these on your radar:

App subscriptions add up fast. A 2023 Shopify partner ecosystem report found the average store runs 6 apps. Premium apps typically cost $20–$200/month each. See our guide to Best Free Shopify Apps 2025: Top Picks That Work to cut that spending without losing functionality. A $100/month app bill is common for stores needing email marketing, reviews, and upsell tools.

Currency conversion fees apply when you sell internationally through Shopify Payments. Shopify charges 1.5% for currency conversion in the US and 2% in most other countries (Source: Shopify Help Center, 2024). If 30% of your $10,000/month revenue comes from international buyers, that’s $45–$60/month in conversion fees alone.

Chargeback fees cost $15 per dispute in the United States—win or lose (Source: Shopify Help Center, 2024). High chargeback rates can also trigger account reviews. Baymard Institute (2024) puts roughly 1.5% of ecommerce transactions ending in chargebacks. A 2,000-order store matching that rate faces 30 disputes and $450 in fees every month.

Shopify POS fees for in-person sales vary by plan. Card-present rates (2.4%–2.6% + 10¢) are lower than online rates, but you may need the Shopify POS Pro add-on at $89/month per location for full retail features like staff permissions and inventory management.

Shopify Capital offers merchant financing. But the repayment structure includes a fixed borrowing cost—not a traditional interest rate—that typically runs 10%–17% of the borrowed amount (Source: Shopify Capital, 2024). Factor this in before taking financing for inventory or ad spend.

Which Shopify Plan Is Right for Your Store?

Start with two questions: How much monthly revenue do you generate? And will you use Shopify Payments or a third-party gateway?

On Shopify Payments, plan choice comes down to card processing rates and features—not transaction fees, because those are waived. The rate differences between plans only matter at higher volumes. Below $10,000/month, Basic is almost always the right call.

On a third-party gateway, transaction fees become the dominant cost variable. The 2% fee on Basic, 1% on Shopify, and 0.5% on Advanced create clear break-even points. Those numbers should drive your decision.

Here’s a quick reference:

• Starter ($5/mo): Social media selling only, very low volume, testing a product idea
• Basic ($39/mo): New stores under $10,000/month, using Shopify Payments
• Shopify ($105/mo): Growing stores at $7,000–$50,000/month, or any store on a third-party gateway above $6,600/month
• Advanced ($399/mo): Scaling stores above $50,000/month, or those needing advanced reporting and lower card rates
• Plus (~$2,300/mo): Enterprise stores above $500,000/month needing checkout customization, dedicated support, and negotiated rates

Run your own numbers with this formula:

Total monthly fee cost = (Card processing rate × monthly revenue) + (Per-transaction fee × number of orders) + (Shopify transaction fee % × monthly revenue) + monthly subscription

Plug in your actual revenue, order count, and preferred gateway. The plan with the lowest total is your answer. Revisit this every quarter as your volume shifts—what’s cheapest at $5,000/month rarely stays cheapest at $20,000/month.

Frequently Asked Questions

Does Shopify charge transaction fees if I use Shopify Payments?

No. Shopify drops its transaction fee entirely when you use Shopify Payments. You still pay card processing rates (2.4%–2.9% + 30¢ depending on your plan, as of 2024), but no extra Shopify percentage sits on top.

What is the Shopify transaction fee on the Basic plan?

On Basic, Shopify charges 2% when you use a third-party gateway like Stripe or PayPal. This is on top of whatever the gateway itself charges for processing.

How do I avoid Shopify transaction fees without using Shopify Payments?

You can’t fully remove the fee while on a third-party gateway. Even Shopify Plus still charges 0.15%. The only path to zero is using Shopify Payments as your primary processor. Higher-tier plans reduce the fee—but none of them eliminate it.

Is Shopify cheaper than WooCommerce for transaction fees?

WooCommerce charges no platform-level transaction fee. You only pay your payment gateway’s rates. Shopify adds its own fee on top when you use a third-party gateway. But WooCommerce requires self-hosting—typically $20–$50/month for reliable managed WordPress hosting—plus ongoing costs for security, maintenance, and premium plugins. When you add up total cost of ownership, including developer time and plugin fees, the gap shrinks. For stores under $25,000/month using Shopify Payments, Basic plan Shopify is often comparable or cheaper than a fully equipped WooCommerce setup.