Shopify vs Payly: what you really pay to sell online
Shopify is the best-known name in ecommerce, and it is a good product. It is also a monthly bill, and an extra fee on every sale if you pay with anything other than Shopify Payments. Payly does the core job of an online store for free. Here is how the two compare on cost, payments and features, and which one suits which kind of seller.
The short answer
- Shopify starts at $39 a month, or $29 a month billed yearly. If you use PayPal or another provider instead of Shopify Payments, Shopify adds a 2% fee on the Basic plan.
- Payly is free: no monthly fee, no transaction fee and no commission. You pay only PayPal's or Stripe's standard processing fee, straight to them.
- Choose Shopify if you need point-of-sale for a physical shop, a large app marketplace or selling in many currencies.
- Choose Payly if you want a complete online store, with subscriptions, memberships and digital downloads included, without paying for the platform.
What Shopify costs in 2026
Shopify's plans, as published in October 2026:
| Plan | Billed monthly | Billed yearly | Fee if you use another payment provider |
|---|---|---|---|
| Basic | $39 a month | $29 a month | 2% |
| Grow | $105 a month | $79 a month | 1% |
| Advanced | $399 a month | $299 a month | 0.6% |
| Plus | From $2,300 a month | 0.2% |
New stores get a 3-day free trial, then $1 a month for the first 3 months. After that the plan price applies.
The fee for using your own payment provider
Shopify's own card processing, Shopify Payments, charges 2.9% + 30¢ per online card payment on the Basic plan. If you use it, Shopify adds no further transaction fee. If you use a different provider instead, Shopify charges its third-party transaction fee on every order, on top of what that provider charges: 2% on Basic, 1% on Grow and 0.6% on Advanced. PayPal orders are exempt only when Shopify Payments is your main payment provider.
On $2,000 a month of sales, that 2% is $40 a month, or $480 a year, on top of the plan.
Apps
Shopify's core plan covers the basics. Many stores add paid apps from the Shopify App Store for features such as subscriptions, product reviews, memberships or wholesale pricing, and many of those apps have their own monthly fees. It is worth adding up the apps you would need before comparing plans.
What Payly costs
Payly is free. There is no paid plan, no trial that ends, no transaction fee and no commission, and every feature is available to every store. Customers pay your own PayPal or Stripe account directly, so the money goes straight to you, and the only fee on a sale is the processor's standard rate:
- PayPal: 3.49% + 49¢ for a PayPal Checkout payment in the US.
- Stripe: 2.9% + 30¢ for a standard US card.
Your store is hosted in your own free Cloudflare account, which comfortably covers most stores: about 5,000 visitors a day. If a store ever outgrows it, Cloudflare's paid plan costs $5 a month, paid to Cloudflare. Payly stays free either way.
Payly can work this way because it is an official PayPal and Stripe partner, and that partnership lets Payly run the platform without charging you.
A year of selling, side by side
Take a store selling $2,000 a month in 40 orders of $50. Card processing at 2.9% + 30¢ comes to about $70 a month on either platform, so the difference is what the platform itself charges:
| Platform cost a year | |
|---|---|
| Payly | $0 |
| Shopify Basic, billed yearly, with Shopify Payments | $348 |
| Shopify Basic, billed monthly, with Shopify Payments | $468 |
| Shopify Basic, billed yearly, with PayPal or another provider | $828 ($348 plan + $480 in 2% fees) |
Paid apps would add to the Shopify figures. The gap grows with your sales whenever the 2% fee applies.
Features compared
| Shopify | Payly | |
|---|---|---|
| Monthly fee | From $29 a month (billed yearly) | None |
| Fee on top of payment processing | None with Shopify Payments; 2% on Basic with other providers | None |
| Payments | Shopify Payments, PayPal and many other providers | PayPal (PayPal, Pay Later and cards) and Stripe (cards) |
| Hosting | Included | Your own free Cloudflare account |
| Your own domain | Yes | Yes, free to connect |
| Products and variants, stock | Yes | Yes |
| Subscriptions | Through apps | Built in, with free trials, sign-up fees and plan switching |
| Memberships and members-only pages | Through apps | Built in |
| Digital downloads | Through an app | Built in |
| Product reviews | Through an app | Built in |
| Discount codes | Yes | Yes |
| Shipping zones and sales tax rates | Yes | Yes |
| Buy shipping labels | Yes | No; add the carrier and tracking number yourself |
| Point of sale for in-person selling | Yes | No; record in-person sales as manual orders |
| App marketplace | Thousands of apps | No; the features above are built in |
| Export your products | CSV | Shopify or WooCommerce file |
Where Shopify is the better choice
Shopify has been around for about 20 years, and it shows in a few places. If you sell in person as well as online, its point-of-sale system ties the two together. Its app marketplace covers almost any special need, and there is a large community of designers and developers who know it well. If you sell to many countries in their own currencies, or you need a feature only an app provides, Shopify is a strong choice and its monthly fee buys real things.
Where Payly is the better choice
Most small and growing stores need a good-looking storefront, a fast checkout, products with options and stock, shipping and tax, discount codes and a way to see their sales. Payly includes all of that, plus subscriptions, memberships, digital downloads and reviews, which on many platforms mean paid add-ons. If that covers what you sell, there is no reason to pay a monthly fee for it, or to give up a percentage of every order for using PayPal or Stripe.
Payly is built by a team that has been making ecommerce software since 2014.
Moving from Shopify to Payly
You can bring your products over in a few minutes: type your Shopify store's address, or upload the product file Shopify exports. Payly shows you every product, variant and photo before anything is added, copies your photos into your own store, and changes nothing on your Shopify store. See Switch to Payly or the step-by-step guide, Move from Shopify.
Questions
Is Payly really free?
Yes. There is no monthly fee, no transaction fee and no commission. PayPal and Stripe charge their own standard processing fees, as they would on any platform.
Can I keep my domain name?
Yes. You can point a domain you already own at your Payly store, and connecting it is free.
Does Shopify charge a fee for using Stripe?
Shopify Payments is Shopify's own processing. If you use a different provider instead, Shopify charges its third-party transaction fee on each order: 2% on Basic, 1% on Grow and 0.6% on Advanced, on top of that provider's own fee.
Shopify prices and fees as published by Shopify in October 2026 (US plans). PayPal and Stripe rates as published by each company for US payments. Prices can change; check each company's own pricing page.
