Shopify pricing: TCO calculator

What makes up the result

Four things make up the cost of a Shopify shop: the platform subscription, the payment provider commission, the Shopify transaction fee and extra costs. The calculator shows each one separately, net and gross side by side. Note one detail: payment commissions are VAT exempt, so their gross figure equals their net one.

Sales model

Selling only to end customers? Then every plan is open to you. B2B on Shopify only works on the Plus plan, which is where customer catalogues, separate price lists and payment terms live. The business profile seeds typical order counts and basket values, which you are free to change afterwards.

Payment provider

With Shopify Payments you pay only the payment processing commission. Choose another provider and Shopify adds its own fee on top: 2% on Basic, 1% on Grow, 0.6% on Advanced and 0.2% on Plus. That fee, not the subscription price, usually decides which plan pays off. At 100,000 PLN in turnover the gap between Basic and Grow comes to 1,000 PLN a month from this alone.

Within Shopify Payments the local Polish methods are cheaper than cards. BLIK costs 1.30% on any plan, Przelewy24 between 1.30% and 1.60%. The calculator uses the card rate because it is the highest. We would rather show a figure that turns out lower than the other way round.

Shopify plans

Basic, Grow and Advanced differ in subscription price, number of staff accounts and the size of the transaction fee. Plus is for high volume stores and for anyone who needs B2B or several storefronts. The subscription price alone tells you little: a more expensive plan only pays off once the saving on fees exceeds the extra you pay. The break-even chart shows exactly where that happens.

Extra costs and apps

Polish law requires three things of every shop that are usually paid for as apps: a cookie consent banner, the 30 day lowest price history from the Omnibus directive, and manufacturer and product safety data required by GPSR. Together that is typically around 90 PLN a month. The calculator does not pick specific tools for you, since those depend on the shop, but it is worth entering that amount under other costs.

Count email marketing and a loyalty programme separately. These two vanish from Shopify cost breakdowns more often than anything else, yet in a larger shop they can cost more than the platform itself, because their price grows with the number of contacts and orders. Build costs go in separately, as one-off.

Why an accurate TCO matters

The subscription is usually the smallest part of the bill. At 250,000 PLN of monthly turnover the fees can cost several times more than the platform itself, yet platform comparisons rarely show them. Working out the full cost before you decide saves unpleasant surprises in month three and gives you a reference point when it is time to negotiate rates with a provider.