What Is the Shopify Starter Plan?
The Shopify Starter plan is the most affordable of Shopify's pricing plans, letting you add cart functionality to an existing website or social media presence, or build a simple online store.
It's also useful if you want to sell products "temporarily" or "on a trial basis" through your own social media or website before building out a full e-commerce site.
Shopify Starter Plan Pricing and Payment Fees
- Monthly fee: $5
- Transaction fee: 5%
The blog article below thoroughly compares Shopify's pricing, fees, and features by plan. Please use it as a reference.
What You Can Do on the Shopify Starter Plan
- Sell products on an online store (Spotlight theme only)
- Sell products via the Linkpop app
- Sell products via a buy button
- Create coupon codes
- Unlimited product listings
- Unlimited file uploads
- Manage brand assets (logo, brand colors, etc.)
- Store analytics
- Fraud analysis
- Create orders manually
- Automatic notifications such as order confirmation emails
- Country-specific pricing adjustments and local currency price display
And more.
For details, please refer to the Shopify Help pages below.
Features on All Plans｜Shopify Help Center
Starter Plan Features｜Shopify Help Center
Benefits of the Shopify Starter Plan
You Can Start Cheaply
The biggest benefit is probably being able to use it at a low cost. You can access features like selling products, unlimited product data management, and order management for $5.
You Can Test Whether Your Product Sells
Since you can start from $5 a month, you can keep fixed costs low while cheaply testing whether your product actually sells online (whether there's demand).
You Can Upgrade Your Plan at Any Time
Once you start selling on a trial basis and find that your product sells, you'll likely need to further customize your online store or reduce your selling fees, which means upgrading.
When that time comes, you can upgrade to a higher-tier plan such as Basic at any time. Your order data and settings carry over as-is when you upgrade.
You Can Sell Through External Channels or Embed a Cart Elsewhere
If you already have a large following on Instagram or X (formerly Twitter), you can use the Linkpop sales channel to showcase your products. And if you already have a lot of visitors to a site built with something like WordPress, you can use the Buy Button feature to embed a simple cart function directly into your WordPress site.
Drawbacks of the Shopify Starter Plan
Only the Spotlight Theme Is Available
Even on the Starter plan, you can build an online store and sell products. However, you can only use the Spotlight theme, a Shopify theme that's simple and offers only the minimum necessary components.
You Can't Create Blog Posts or Pages
To attract customers from search engines like Google to your online store, you need to do SEO work. You may also need to create content to convey information that a product page alone can't cover, such as product comparisons. This is where content creation using a blog feature (content marketing) becomes necessary.
The blog article below introduces the benefits of writing blog posts on a Shopify store, along with recommended Shopify apps. Please use it as a reference.
You Can't Create Collections
On the Starter plan, you can't use the collections feature that lets you group products together.
Source: Collections｜Shopify Help Center
Collections are explained in detail in the blog article below. Please use it as a reference.
Fees Are High
A drawback is that the transaction fee charged on orders is a flat 5%, which is higher compared to other plans. For example, on the Basic plan, paying with a Visa card (via Shopify Payments) incurs a fee of 3.9%. Once your sales reach a certain scale, it may be worth considering an upgrade to another plan.
You Can't Register Multiple Staff Members
If you're running your Shopify store with multiple people, this is difficult on the Starter plan, since you can't add staff accounts beyond the owner account.
You Can't Use Shopify Apps That Extend the Online Store
Part of Shopify's appeal is being able to freely extend your online store using its wide range of Shopify apps. However, on the Starter plan, Shopify apps that extend the online store are not compatible and cannot be installed.
Source: RuffRuff 予約販売｜Shopify App Store
The blog article below introduces reasons to use Shopify beyond its apps. Please use it as a reference.
The blog article below also introduces "recommended Shopify apps." If you're interested in extending your online store, be sure to check it out.
Who We Recommend the Shopify Starter Plan For
- Those who just want to get an e-commerce site up and running for now
- Those who want to test the market and see how customers respond to their product
- Influencers and others who want an easy way to showcase and sell products on social media
- Those who already have a separate website, such as one built with WordPress, and want to sell products right on that site
- Those who already run their own e-commerce site but want to avoid putting extra load on their own server from a tie-in or special-promotion product
In Closing
If you're selling "on a trial basis," "temporarily," or if you "already have an established customer base or website," the Starter plan is worth considering. Otherwise, we recommend signing up for the Basic plan or above, which lets you build a more full-featured, extensible online store.
If you're having trouble choosing a Shopify plan, please also refer to the blog article below.
