In today’s digital age, establishing a Shopify online store is an essential skill for merchants. Shopify is renowned for its user-friendly interface, flexible design options, and robust e-commerce features, enabling merchants to quickly set up professional online shops. Shopify not only is easy to use but also helps create a professional-grade online store, allowing your business to thrive online.
However, choosing the right plan is crucial. It should neither be too expensive, wasting your money, nor too basic, limiting your business growth. Therefore, finding a plan that meets your current needs and can grow with your business is important.
In this article, we will compare Shopify’s three different plans—Basic, Shopify, and Advanced. This comparison focuses on Shopify’s online store platform services. If you have multiple physical retail locations and wish to address retail business management challenges such as inventory, ordering, shipping, and customer service through Shopify’s database and platform, please refer to our introduction article on Shopify POS: Introduction and Q&A for Shopify POS Offline Sales Terminals.
Advantages of Different Shopify Plans and Suitable Merchant Types
Basic Plan
Advantages:
The Basic plan is Shopify’s entry-level offering, suitable for merchants just starting online sales. It provides essential features needed to create an online store, such as unlimited product sales, customer segmentation, and marketing automation. Additionally, the Basic plan includes basic sales channels, discount codes, and gift card functionality to help attract and retain customers.
Suitable for:
The Basic plan is ideal for small merchants, startups, and individual entrepreneurs, especially those who are new to online sales, have limited budgets, and do not require advanced features.
Shopify Plan
Advantages:
The Shopify plan is Shopify’s standard offering, suitable for more established merchants. It includes additional employee accounts, enhanced online chat support, and API PII access. The Shopify plan also offers lower credit card fees and shipping insurance, helping merchants reduce costs and improve efficiency.
Suitable for:
The Shopify plan is suitable for medium-sized merchants, rapidly growing businesses, and brands, particularly those needing more employee accounts, API access, and lower credit card fees.
Advanced Plan
Advantages:
The Advanced plan is Shopify’s premium offering, designed for larger merchants and brands that handle a significant volume of cross-border orders. It includes more employee accounts, enhanced online chat support, and API PII access, along with higher checkout capacity and lower credit card fees to help manage large order volumes and reduce costs.
Suitable for:
The Advanced plan is appropriate for large merchants, brands, and enterprises, especially those that need to process a high volume of orders, require more employee accounts, and advanced features.
Detailed Feature Comparison of Shopify Plans
Common Features Across All Shopify Plans
The following features are available in all three Shopify plans (Basic, Shopify, and Advanced):
Online Store: Easily create an online store, allowing customers to check out with a single click.
Unlimited Product Sales: Sell an unlimited number of products and services.
Collaborator Accounts: Provide limited access to designers, developers, and marketing experts.
24/7 Support: Access Shopify’s support team around the clock via online chat.
Sales Channels: Promote and sell your products across multiple sales channels.
“Headless” Storefront: Use Shopify’s React-based toolkit to build custom storefronts.
Analytics: Access over 60 reports to track your store’s performance.
Locations: Track inventory, ship orders, and sell products across multiple locations.
Manual Order Creation: Create new orders directly from the Shopify admin and enter payment details.
Custom Apps: Develop apps using Shopify’s API.
Checkout Capacity: Support more shoppers checking out simultaneously during high-traffic events.
Discount Codes: Offer customers fixed-value, percentage, or shipping discounts.
Gift Cards: Expand your customer base by offering gift cards.
Abandoned Checkout Recovery: Automatically send emails to customers who leave without completing their purchase.
Free SSL Certificate: Encrypt your online store’s content.
Customer Segmentation: Filter and group customers into hundreds of segments.
Marketing Automation: Build custom automations to engage customers at every stage of their journey.
Unlimited Contacts: Add unlimited contacts to your Shopify account.
E-commerce Automation: Use Shopify’s built-in e-commerce automation platform to automate manual tasks, build workflows, and grow your business.
Shopify POS Lite: A lightweight solution for temporary sales at pop-up shops and markets.
Shipping Discounts: Receive competitive shipping rates from DHL Express, UPS, or USPS.
Shipping Labels: Purchase shipping labels individually or in bulk through Shopify Payments.
Accurate Sales Tax Calculation: Automatically charge the correct sales tax based on product-specific rates and customers’ accurate addresses at checkout.
Localized Sales for Custom Markets: Customize your store for each market to provide a high-conversion shopping experience for global customers.
Market-Specific Product Pricing: Set specific prices for products or product variants in each market.
Market Domains and Subfolders: Assign custom URLs to each market.
Language Translation: Enable multiple languages from the Shopify admin to offer translated languages for customers in different markets.
Currency Conversion: Automatically convert prices to customers’ local currencies.
Features Exclusive to the Shopify Plan
The following features are exclusive to the Shopify plan (not available in the Basic plan):
Additional Employee Accounts: Create up to 5 employee accounts to help operate your store.
Enhanced Online Chat Support: Access more advanced online chat support.
API PII Access: Use Shopify’s API to develop apps and access Personally Identifiable Information (PII).
USPS Small Parcel Discounts: Obtain discounted rates for smaller/lightweight packages through USPS Parcel Select Cubic® and USPS Priority Mail Cubic®.
Shipping Insurance: Merchants can get up to $200 insurance per eligible Shopify Shipping label.
Standard Online Card Fees: Automatically accept all major card issuers with a fee of 2.7% + 30¢.
Advanced Online Card Fees: Cover commercial, corporate, and business cards, including all cards issued by American Express, with a fee of 3.3% + 30¢.
Third-Party Transaction Fees: Apply a 1% fee when using third-party providers if not using Shopify Payments.
Features Exclusive to the Advanced Plan
The following features are exclusive to the Advanced plan (not available in the Basic or Shopify plans):
Additional Employee Accounts: Create up to 15 employee accounts to help operate your store.
Enhanced Online Chat Support: Access more advanced online chat support.
API PII Access: Use Shopify’s API to develop apps and access Personally Identifiable Information (PII).
Checkout Capacity: Support ten times more shoppers checking out simultaneously during high-traffic events.
Third-Party Shipping Rate Calculation: Display shipping rates calculated by third-party apps at checkout.
Tariffs and Import Taxes: Estimate and charge tariffs and import taxes at checkout, providing customers with a clear understanding of total costs.
About Alstra Solutions
Alstra Solutions is a registered Shopify partner offering comprehensive online store construction services. We provide not only Shopify but also other e-commerce platforms such as WooCommerce and Square Online, ensuring we can meet the specific needs of different merchants. Our services include inventory management, online ordering, automatic invoice generation, financial management, and integration with online payment platforms, creating an efficient and complete e-commerce solution. This ensures your e-commerce website is not only visually appealing but also user-friendly.
Alstra Solutions always considers problems from the customer’s perspective, striving to help clients choose the most cost-effective plan without wasting money. We are committed to ensuring your investment yields the maximum return. Whether you are a startup or a large merchant, we offer tailored solutions to help you succeed in the e-commerce field.