Shopify Basic Plan Overview: Pricing, Features, and comparisons in 2024

What is Shopify Basic?

Shopify Basic is one of the main Shopify Pricing Plans, designed to help small merchants create their online store and manage their ecommerce business.

Using Shopify Basic Plan, merchants will be provided a Shopify Store with essential ecommerce functionality and can start selling online/offline on a small-medium scale.

How much is shopify basic plan?

How much does shopify charge monthly?

The shopify basic plan costs $39 per month (in the United States - the pricing can be different between regions). Starting from November of 2022, Shopify even offers $1 per month for the first month with Shopify Basic.

Moreover, you can use the 3-day Shopify Free Trial to experience this plan and test if the Basic Shopify Plan is suitable for your online store.

Shopify Basic transaction fees

Shopify Basic transaction fees can be lower with Shopify Payments. Learn more about Shopify Payments here.

Transaction fees with Shopify Payments.

The only fees will be the credit card rate which is included and varies based on your Shopify plans:

Shopify will only charge 2.9% + 30¢ per transaction with the Shopify Basic Plan. You don’t need to pay any other fees from your payment gateway providers.

Shopify Payments will also waive the 2% transaction fees Shopify would otherwise charge on each sale.

However, there will be a 1% additional transaction fee for purchases made by credit card issued outside the United States.

Transaction fees without Shopify Payments

Using a third-party payment gateway provider instead of Shopify Payments will incur transaction fees.

For third-party payment gateway services, Shopify charges 2% credit card fees for Shopify Basic Plan.

On the other hand, you still have to pay your gateway provider transaction fees. And there will also be a 1% fee for purchases made by credit card issued outside of the United States.

Tips: How to check Shopify Pricing for your store location

Shopify has different prices and transaction fees for different countries and regions.

If you want to sell to a specific country, it is recommended to locate your Shopify store there. However, make sure you check Shopify pricing for that country first.

Step 1: Visit https://shopify.com

Step 2: Scroll down to the footer section and choose where you want to locate your store.

Step 3: A list of available languages and countries will be shown. Click on any country to view the Shopify version for that country/region.

Step 4: Click on the Pricing section - usually in the header bar (in this example, I have chosen the Canada version). You might find the Shopify Pricing for Canada here different from the original United State ones.

Step 5: Click on Compare Pricing Plans (or similar section in your language of choice) to view transaction fees for your store location.

Note: Just to be sure, you can turn on your VPN (if you are outside of your target country), or turn off the VPN (if you are inside your target country).

Basic Plan Free Trial

Shopify basic plan features

Features similar to other Shopify plans

Basic Shopify Plan features include the following similar points:

• Unlimited products
• 24/7 support through live chat
• 60+ Reports including marketing reports, sales reports, and profit reports
• Mobile POS and hardware support
• Duties and import taxes
• 10 Store locations
• Abandoned cart recovery
• 3 markets for additional regional customization

Shopify Basic additional features

Online store

Using Shopify’s Basic or higher plan, you can easily make an online store, and customize and manage it from your Shopify account.

Shopify also has a built-in theme editor to customize the store’s appearance. Otherwise, you can access over 90 mobile-responsive themes (including 12 free Shopify Themes) from the Shopify Theme Store.

Blogs

The blogging engine built into your online store allows you to post articles, inform customers about events and promotions, and receive comments/feedback.

Staff

Two staff accounts can be added to the Basic Shopify plan.

SSL certificates

An SSL certificate is a security protocol that creates a safe server and browser connection to protect your customer’s information.

With Shopify, SSL certificates help you encrypt your online store’s content and publish it securely using “HTTPS” instead of “HTTP.” This displays the SSL padlock icon in the address bar beneath your online store’s URL.

Reports

You can track the business performance by using reports, including:

• Analytics page
• Finances reports
• Product analytics
• Live View
• Acquisition reports
• Inventory reports
• Behavior reports
• Marketing reports
• Order reports
• Sales reports
• Retail sales reports
• Profit reports
• Customers reports.

International commerce

The Basic Shopify plan supports your international growth with Shopify Markets, a global ecommerce management tool with multi-currency and multi-language features.

Shopify Shipping Discount

In addition to real-time shipping rates, Shopify Shipping offers significant discounts from major carriers and the ability to print bulk shipping labels.

Additional Shopify costs for Shopify Basic Plan

Domain for your Shopify Store

Your Shopify store will begin with a domain like “nameofyourstore.myshopify.com” - thus, it will be fully functional.

However, to gain customers’ trust and build your brand, you need your own domain name. Shopify offers domain name registration (starting at $14 per year), or you can look at other domain name registrars like Namecheap, Godaddy, etc.

You can transfer your domain to another registrar even if you leave Shopify.

Email Hosting

The Shopify Basic Plan review (and all of the Shopify Plans) does not include email hosting (while web hosting is included on almost every plan), so you must install apps to send emails from your store’s domain.

The Shopify Email app, for example, is free for the first 10,000 emails. After that, every 1000 emails sent will cost you $1.

Shopify Apps

The cost of Shopify Apps is separated from the Shopify Basic Plan. Therefore, consider the use cases you have for your business to decide which apps you should install.

Note: According to Shopify research, an average merchant installs six Shopify Apps with a subscription cost of $19.

Shopify Themes

Unfortunately, Shopify Themes are not included in the Shopify Basic Plan (or other Shopify Plans). However, many free and premium options are available inside and outside Shopify.

The cost for Shopify Themes might vary between $0 to $350 as a one-time purchase.

Shopify POS Pricing

Shopify POS Lite is free on the Shopify Basic Plan, while Shopify POS Pro will cost $89 per store location.

You should expect these costs for using Shopify POS on your store:

• Shopify POS Lite: from $1094 per store as a 1-time investment, covering your Shopify POS system.
• Shopify POS Pro: from $2133 per store for year-1 investment. From the second year on, Shopify POS Pro will only cost $1068 per store.

The initial investment for Shopify POS hardware may differ for each merchant, and this estimation might only be accurate for some. To give you an idea of the minimum Shopify POS spending, we have selected the cheapest option for each type of hardware.

Shopify Basic Plan comparison

What is the difference between Shopify Basic Plan and Shopify Starter Plan?

Pricing: Shopify Starter plan vs Basic Shopify plan

The Shopify Starter Plan is eight times cheaper than the Shopify Basic Plan uk, but the transaction fee is almost twice as much.

Features: Shopify Starter vs Shopify Basic

Furthermore, you won’t be able to have the following features if you use Shopify Starter Plan:

• Online Store & SSL certificate: User experience, branding, and security may not be optimal for your customers using Shopify Starter Plan. You will not have your own ecommerce website and be unable to use other sales channels.
• Blog: This keeps you from doing SEO and content marketing, which are crucial in driving your search traffic to your product pages.

Speaking of driving traffic, Shopify Basic offers the whole package for an ecommerce store wherever your traffic comes from. Meanwhile, Shopify Starter is feature-wise for organic visitors from your social media platforms.

You can still run ads and do SEO to drive traffic to your Shopify Starter Linkpop profile, but they would not be optimized and often perform much worse than having your own existing website on the Shopify Basic Plan.

Conclusion

Shopify Starter could be a bargain, depending on your business size and model. In most cases, you’ll eventually want to upgrade to another Shopify plan when your business expands.

Moreover, even if you use Shopify Payments with the Shopify Starter Plan, the 5% transaction fee is still painful and cuts deep into your profit margin when you scale up.

What is the difference between Shopify Basic Plan and Shopify Plan?

Pricing: Shopify Basic plan vs Shopify Plan

The Shopify Basic Plan price is three times cheaper than the Shopify Plan while having 0.3% higher transaction fees.

Feature: Shopify Basic vs Shopify Plan

Besides owning five staff accounts to help you plan for growing sales, the feature that makes Shopify Plan outshine the Shopify Basic Plan is Shopify Flow’s functions. With Shopify Flow, you can use the Send HTTP Request task to connect your workflow to a web server or URL, saving thousands of work hours annually.

Conclusion

Shopify Basic Plan can be more favorable if you are new to Shopify and still trying to explore this ecommerce platform.

However, Shopify Plan comes with Shopify Flow, a game changer for ecommerce businesses. With Shopify Flow, you can optimize your operation inside and outside of your businesses while having an autonomous ecommerce website with less human manual work and errors.

Who should use Shopify Basic Plan?

Merchants who are looking for a functional stand-alone store that fits their budget

The Shopify Basic plan is recommended for merchants who are exploring the ecommerce field. This Basic Shopify option provides the essential features that you can use for many business models, whether it is drop shipping, print-on-demand, services, or retail.

More importantly, with Shopify Basic, you will be able to activate almost all of the sales channels, making your ecommerce business ready to integrate with many social media platforms, other ecommerce platforms, and search engines.

Merchants whose sales volume is not high

The Shopify Basic Plan transaction fee is 2.9%, which is a considerable amount for your cost structure if you have significant sales volume.

While it is recommended for merchants to use Shopify Payments to avoid credit card processing fees, you should consider upgrading to higher Shopify pricing plans to lower your Shopify transaction fees.

Shopify Basic Plan FAQs

What are other Shopify Pricing Plans besides the Shopify Basic Plan?

• Starter Shopify Plan: $5 per month + 5% transaction fees
• Shopify Plan: $105 per month, with 2.6% + 30¢ per transaction
• Advanced Shopify Plan: $399 per month, with 2.4% + 30¢ per transaction
• Shopify Plus: Starting at $2000 per month

The differemt among shopify basic vs shopify plus is huge so you can choose the plan that matches your preference.

Will I lose my data for upgrading or downgrading my Shopify pricing plans?

Answer: No

Your data will always be available for all of the Shopify Pricing Plans you choose. It does not matter whether you upgrade or downgrade your plan.

Is there a free Shopify plan?

Answer: Yes

Shopify does offer a free plan for newbies to experience their platform at first. Then, you can upgrade to a higher plan for advanced features.

Do I get free hosting when I use the Shopify Basic Plan?

Answer: Yes

With all plans except Starter, Shopify includes secure, unlimited ecommerce hosting. You may also use the Buy Button to integrate ecommerce into an existing website.

How much does Shopify charge for the bandwidth with the Shopify Basic Plan?

Answer: Zero

The Shopify plans all include unlimited bandwidth for free.

Which Shopify plan is best with my store?

Answer: There is not a clear answer for this

It depends mainly on the budget you are willing to spend on this, along with the features available on each Shopify plan. If you can answer the question on how much do you pay for shopify a month, you

Can I use my own domain name with the Shopify Basic Plan?

Answer: Yes

You can purchase a domain name within Shopify or use an existing one that you own.

When you sign up with Shopify, you will receive a free domain name myshopify.com that will remain yours forever.

Is Basic Shopify Worth It?

Answer: Yes, it is

The Shopify Basic Plan is suitable with either newbies or experienced Shopify store owners.

Related articles:

• Shopify Fee Calculator: How Much Does A Shopify Store Cost?