Shopify advertises plans from ₹1,994/month in India. That number is real, and it’s also about a sixth of what the platform actually costs to run a working store.
The gap isn’t hidden exactly — it’s just spread across several invoices that arrive from several different companies. Here’s the whole bill.
The short answer
Shopify costs an Indian store ₹12,000–₹33,000/month, depending on volume — at the small end, about six times the advertised ₹1,994. That figure covers the subscription, Shopify’s own transaction fee, 18% GST and the apps you have to buy to operate in India.
Payment processing sits outside that number. Razorpay’s ~2% is charged by Razorpay on any platform you choose, so it’s real money but it isn’t a reason to pick one platform over another — we show it separately throughout rather than folding it into the totals.
One assumption worth stating up front: the figures below use a ₹1,000 average order value. Shopify’s transaction fee is a percentage of revenue, so a brand selling at ₹2,500 AOV pays more than these numbers show.
The sticker price
Shopify’s India plans, billed monthly:
| Plan | Monthly | Who it’s for |
|---|---|---|
| Basic | ₹1,994 | Solo sellers — full store, unlimited products, basic reports |
| Shopify | ₹7,447 | Growing teams — 5 staff accounts, standard reports |
| Advanced | ₹30,164 | High volume — custom reports, 15 staff accounts |
| Plus | ~₹1,65,000+ (1.65 lakh) | Enterprise, priced on GMV and contract |
Annual billing discounts these, though most early-stage brands stay monthly for the flexibility.
That’s the storefront engine. Now the rest.
The four multipliers
1. 18% GST on cross-border SaaS
Shopify bills from outside India, so its invoices carry 18% integrated GST — and so does every app you install through it.
If you’re GST-registered and you’ve entered your GSTIN, you claim that back as input tax credit and it costs you nothing. If you haven’t registered yet, it’s 18% straight out of pocket on your entire software stack. A lot of first-year brands are in exactly that position.
2. The double transaction fee
This is the one that surprises people.
Shopify Payments doesn’t process domestic INR, so every Indian merchant connects an outside gateway — Razorpay, Cashfree, PayU. Shopify charges a third-party transaction fee for doing that:
| Plan | Shopify’s fee on every order |
|---|---|
| Basic | 2.0% |
| Shopify | 1.0% |
| Advanced | 0.5% |
On Basic you pay roughly 2% to Razorpay (itself plus 18% GST) and 2% to Shopify. That’s about 4% plus GST off the top of every prepaid order — not for processing the payment, but for processing it somewhere Shopify doesn’t own.
The fee is waived if you use Shopify Payments. You can’t.
3. The India app stack
Shopify’s core is built around Western retail workflows. Operating in India means buying the rest:
| What you need | Typical monthly cost |
|---|---|
| Automated GST invoicing with HSN | ₹800 – ₹2,500 |
| WhatsApp order updates | ₹1,500 – ₹5,000, plus Meta’s message charges |
| COD verification (OTP) | ₹1,200 – ₹3,500 |
| Logistics and NDR management | ₹1,000 – ₹3,000 |
COD verification is the one people skip and regret. Unverified COD is where return-to-origin losses come from, and RTO costs more than the app does.
4. Developer time
Themes are free at the basic end, but most D2C brands that convert well buy a premium theme (₹15,000–₹30,000 once) and then hire Shopify developers at ₹1,500–₹3,500/hour to edit Liquid — a festival banner, a checkout tweak, a pincode-serviceability block. It’s not constant spend, but it’s never zero either.
Work out your own number
Shopify India cost calculator
Change the inputs to see what your own store would cost per month.
Revenue assumes every order is prepaid. Payment processing is listed separately and kept out of the headline: Razorpay charges the same on any platform, so counting it against Shopify would inflate the number without telling you anything. Both platform figures exclude it, which makes them directly comparable. GST is applied to the Shopify subscription, its transaction fee and the apps — all claimable as input tax credit if you are registered. Your gateway’s fee carries 18% GST too, which this leaves out. The QuicShop line is the ₹2,999 Starter plan, GST inclusive: no platform transaction fee, no app subscriptions. The Shopify figure includes its 18% GST too, so the two are on the same basis.
What it actually adds up to
What the platform costs, at a ₹1,000 average order value:
| Cost component | Advertised “Basic” | Early D2C (300 orders/mo) | Scaling D2C (1,500 orders/mo) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Base subscription | ₹1,994 | ₹1,994 | ₹7,447 (Shopify plan) |
| Shopify’s transaction fee | Not shown | ~₹6,000 (2%) | ~₹15,000 (1%) |
| GST invoicing app | ₹0 | ₹999 | ₹1,999 |
| WhatsApp notifications | ₹0 | ₹1,800 | ₹4,500 |
| COD verification | ₹0 | ₹1,200 | ₹3,000 |
| 18% GST on subscription | Excluded | ₹359 | ₹1,340 |
| What Shopify costs you | ₹1,994 | ~₹12,352 | ~₹33,286 |
That’s the number worth comparing between platforms, and ₹15,000 of the scaling column is a fee charged purely because you couldn’t use Shopify Payments in the first place.
Separately — payment processing. Razorpay takes roughly 2%: about ₹6,000/month at 300 orders and ₹30,000 at 1,500. We’re keeping it out of the total on purpose. It’s charged by Razorpay, not Shopify, and you pay it on whichever platform you’re on — including QuicShop. Counting it against Shopify would inflate the number and prove nothing. Add it back if you’re budgeting total cash out; leave it out if you’re comparing platforms.
Two caveats on the rest. The GST row covers the subscription only — apps carry 18% too, so both columns run a little higher. And the transaction fee scales with revenue, which means this bill grows every time you have a good month.
Two scenarios
The bootstrapped brand, under 300 orders/month. ₹12,352/month goes to the platform and the apps it doesn’t include — before a rupee of payment processing or ad spend. On 300 orders that’s roughly ₹41 of software cost carried by every order you ship. And ₹6,352 of it is fixed: the subscription, the apps and their GST land whether you sell 300 orders or 30. For a brand still finding product-market fit, that’s the part that hurts.
The manufacturer selling D2C and wholesale, 1,000+ orders/month. Here you hit a different wall. Shopify does have native B2B, with limits that vary by plan — but tiered distributor pricing and quotes past those limits means paid apps, a Shopify Plus upgrade at roughly ₹1,65,000/month (1.65 lakh), or running two stores with split inventory. For an Indian manufacturer selling retail and wholesale off the same stock, none of those is a good answer.
Two different architectures
Comparing platforms here is really comparing two design philosophies.
The plugin ecosystem. Shopify keeps its core lean and expects you to assemble 8–12 third-party apps around it. That buys enormous flexibility. It also buys you a dozen renewal dates, a slower storefront, and the specific misery of a theme update breaking an app on a Saturday. We broke that stack down line by line in what you’d pay for Shopify apps in India.
The unified engine. Platforms built for India — QuicShop among them — ship GST invoicing, UPI and COD, WhatsApp order updates and Shiprocket multi-carrier shipping inside one subscription, plus the essential wholesale building blocks (tier pricing, quotes/RFQ, credit accounts) on the same catalogue and stock when you start selling B2B. One bill, no per-order platform fee. The feature-by-feature version is in QuicShop vs Shopify, and the wider market view is in best Shopify alternatives for Indian sellers.
Neither is the correct answer in the abstract. They’re correct for different businesses.
When Shopify is worth it in India
Shopify is a serious platform and it wins outright in several situations. Stay with it if:
- You’re primarily selling cross-border in USD, EUR or GBP — the transaction fee problem largely disappears with Shopify Payments in those markets
- You have a developer who maintains custom Liquid
- You have an agency running a specialised app stack, and the ecosystem depth is the reason you’re there
Look at a unified alternative if:
- 80%+ of your customers are in India, paying by UPI and COD, and reachable on WhatsApp
- You need wholesale ordering alongside D2C without paying enterprise pricing for it
- You want the monthly number to be predictable instead of a function of last month’s order count
The honest summary
Shopify’s ₹1,994 isn’t a misleading price. It’s an accurate price for the thing it covers, which is the storefront and nothing else.
The number worth comparing is the one at the bottom of that table — and unlike the sticker price, it moves every month, in the same direction as your sales.
See what QuicShop costs — ₹2,999/month, GST, UPI, WhatsApp and shipping included, no per-order platform fee.
Frequently asked
Does Shopify India accept UPI payments?
Yes, but only through a third-party Indian gateway like Razorpay, Cashfree or PayU. Shopify doesn't process UPI directly, because Shopify Payments isn't available for domestic processing in India — and using an outside gateway is what triggers Shopify's own transaction fee on top.
Can I claim input tax credit on my Shopify subscription?
Yes. Enter a valid GSTIN on your Shopify billing profile and Shopify issues a compliant B2B tax invoice, so a registered seller can claim the 18% GST as input tax credit. Without a GSTIN it's an 18% cost you simply absorb.
Is it cheaper to upgrade to Advanced Shopify?
Past roughly ₹40,00,000–₹50,00,000 (40–50 lakh) in monthly revenue, usually yes. The subscription jumps to ₹30,164, but the third-party transaction fee drops from 2% to 0.5% — and on that volume the fee saving is larger than the subscription increase.
How much does a Shopify store actually cost per month in India?
Budget ₹18,000/month at around 300 orders and ₹63,000/month at around 1,500 orders, at a ₹1,000 average order value — higher if your AOV is higher, since the largest lines are percentages of revenue. Of that, ₹12,000–₹33,000 is attributable to the platform itself (subscription, Shopify's transaction fee, the India app stack and 18% GST); the remainder is payment processing you would pay on any platform.
Why does Shopify charge an extra transaction fee in India?
Shopify waives it when you use Shopify Payments, which isn't available in India. Every Indian merchant therefore uses an outside gateway and pays the fee: 2% on Basic, 1% on Shopify, 0.5% on Advanced — on top of what the gateway itself charges.
See QuicShop set up for your store
GST, UPI, WhatsApp and shipping built in — from ₹2,999/month. We onboard every seller personally.