--- title: "Shopify plans compared: the real cost for Australian sellers" description: "Shopify's Basic plan is A$42 a month, but transaction fees and apps change which plan is cheapest. We compare total monthly cost across Shopify plans in A$." date: 2026-09-06 lastUpdated: 2026-09-08 author: "Chloe Marsden" url: https://aussiestoreguides.com/shopify-plans-australia/ site: "Aussie Store Guides (aussiestoreguides.com)" language: en --- # Shopify plans compared: the real cost for Australian sellers ![An abstract e-commerce workspace with a laptop, shipping boxes and a coffee cup, styled with clean editorial composition](https://aussiestoreguides.com/images/shopify-plans-australia-cover-1200.webp) > **The short answer:** Shopify's advertised plan prices are only half the story. Transaction fees, apps for local payments, and shipping discounts change which plan is cheapest for your order volume. Shopify's pricing page, checked on 25 August 2026, lists Basic at A$42 a month on annual billing, Grow at A$114, and Advanced at A$431. Card rates run from 1.75 % + 30c on Basic to 1.4 % + 30c on Advanced. For a store doing 500 orders a month at A$100 average, Basic and Grow land within A$30 of each other in total monthly cost. Past 500 orders, Grow becomes cheaper despite the higher plan fee. Most Australian sellers pick a Shopify plan by looking at the monthly fee. That's the number Shopify advertises. It is almost never the number that leaves your account. The plan fee is your starting point, not your total cost. On top of it you pay processing on every sale, the app subscriptions you add for Afterpay or shipping labels, and postage that varies by destination. If you're setting up for the first time, our [Shopify Australia: set up your store step by step](https://aussiestoreguides.com/shopify-australia-setup-guide/) walks through the admin. Heads up: this guide includes Shopify affiliate links. Sign up through one and we earn a commission — you pay exactly the same as you would otherwise. Shopify says a seller makes their first sale on the platform every 26 seconds, according to its [pricing page](https://shopify.pxf.io/WOzLvA?subId1=aussiestoreguides.com&u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.shopify.com%2Fau%2Fpricing) checked on 25 August 2026. That's a marketing figure, not a cost one. What matters for your store is which plan leaves the least in your account each month. Shopify plans, pricing and features change; always verify the current details on shopify.com before deciding. ## Table of contents - [Advertised price vs actual cost: why the Shopify plan fee is only half the story](#advertised-price-vs-actual-cost-why-the-shopify-plan-fee-is-only-half-the-story) - [Transaction fees: where the real difference shows up](#transaction-fees-where-the-real-difference-shows-up) - [Apps and themes: the hidden monthly costs](#apps-and-themes-the-hidden-monthly-costs) - [Shipping discounts and Australia Post rates](#shipping-discounts-and-australia-post-rates) - [Staff, POS, and international selling: when you need to upgrade](#staff-pos-and-international-selling-when-you-need-to-upgrade) - [Break-even: when upgrading to Grow or Advanced actually pays off](#break-even-when-upgrading-to-grow-or-advanced-actually-pays-off) - [The comparison table: total monthly cost across all Shopify plans](#the-comparison-table-total-monthly-cost-across-all-shopify-plans) - [How to choose your Shopify plans without overpaying](#how-to-choose-your-shopify-plans-without-overpaying) - [Frequently asked questions](#frequently-asked-questions) - [Sources](#sources) ## Advertised price vs actual cost: why the Shopify plan fee is only half the story The plan price is the headline. It's not the bill. Three numbers matter more than the monthly fee. These are the percentage you pay on each transaction, the apps you bolt on for Australian payments and shipping, and the shipping discounts that higher plans unlock. A store on Basic paying 1.75 % + 30c per order will spend more on processing fees than on the plan itself after roughly 50 orders a month. Here's the framework: total monthly cost equals plan fee plus transaction fees plus app subscriptions minus shipping discount savings. The plan fee is fixed. Everything else scales with your order volume. That's why a A$42 plan can cost more in total than a A$114 plan once you're processing enough orders. Shopify's [pricing page](https://shopify.pxf.io/WOzLvA?subId1=aussiestoreguides.com&u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.shopify.com%2Fau%2Fpricing), checked on 25 August 2026, lists four plans: Basic, Grow, Advanced, and Plus. On annual billing, Basic is A$42 a month, Grow is A$114, and Advanced is A$431. On monthly billing, the same page lists Basic at A$56, Grow at A$149, and Advanced at A$575. Annual billing saves you roughly 25 % across all three tiers. Plus is custom-quoted for enterprise volumes. Shopify's global pricing page, checked on 25 August 2026, lists Plus from €2,100 a month. Australian merchants negotiate directly with Shopify for an AUD rate rather than picking from a published price. ## Transaction fees: where the real difference shows up Transaction fees are the line most sellers underestimate. They're also where plan choice actually matters. Shopify's pricing page, checked on 25 August 2026, lists the online card rate at 1.75 % + 30c on Basic. It is 1.6 % + 30c on Grow and 1.4 % + 30c on Advanced. Plus carries the lowest rate at 1.3 % + 30c. These apply when you use Shopify Payments, which is available in Australia and is the gateway we recommend. Our [Shopify Payments in Australia: fees and setup](https://aussiestoreguides.com/shopify-payments-australia/) covers the details. Use a third-party gateway instead and Shopify adds a surcharge on top of the gateway's own fees: 2 % on Basic, 1 % on Grow, and 0.6 % on Advanced. That surcharge alone can exceed the savings from a cheaper plan. Afterpay and Zip are the big ones for Australian stores. They're buy-now-pay-later services that integrate separately from Shopify Payments. Afterpay charges its own per-transaction fee, set by your merchant agreement with Afterpay, not by Shopify. The rate isn't published on Shopify's pricing page. Budget for it as a separate line. Let's do the arithmetic. At 500 orders a month with an average order value of A$100: - Basic: 1.75 % × A$50,000 + 500 × A$0.30 = A$1,025. - Grow: 1.6 % × A$50,000 + 500 × A$0.30 = A$950. - Advanced: 1.4 % × A$50,000 + 500 × A$0.30 = A$875. The gap between Basic and Grow is A$75 a month. The plan fee difference is A$72. They almost cancel out — and that's before counting shipping discounts. ## Apps and themes: the hidden monthly costs Apps are where the monthly bill creeps up. Most Australian stores need at least three: a shipping app for Australia Post labels, an accounting integration like Xero, and a buy-now-pay-later extension for Afterpay. Some features that require apps on Basic are built into Grow and above. Abandoned cart recovery is available on all plans, but professional reports — which replace paid analytics apps — start on Grow. That's a saving of maybe A$20 to A$40 a month on app subscriptions if you upgrade. Our editorial estimate for typical app costs: A$50 to A$70 a month on Basic, dropping to A$30 to A$50 on Grow as built-in features replace paid apps. These are our judgments based on common Australian store setups, not Shopify's published figures. Themes are a one-off cost. Paid themes in Shopify's theme store typically cost A$400 to A$500 once. You don't need one — the free Dawn theme handles most Australian store needs. Domain registration runs about A$20 a year through Shopify, or less through a registrar like VentraIP. Email hosting is often overlooked. Shopify Email is included with your plan up to 10,000 sends a month. Beyond that, you'd add Klaviyo or similar, which starts free and scales with your contact list. ## Shipping discounts and Australia Post rates Shopify's pricing page advertises discounted shipping rates on Grow and above. The exact percentage varies by carrier and destination. Shopify does not publish a single Australia Post discount figure on its pricing page. What we can say is that the discount applies to Australia Post rates, and it increases on higher plans. For our worked example, we've estimated the shipping discount value at A$0 on Basic, A$50 on Grow, and A$120 on Advanced for a store doing 500 orders a month. These are editorial estimates based on typical Australia Post parcel rates, not published figures. The practical takeaway: if you're sending 500 parcels a month, the shipping discount on Grow can offset most of the plan fee difference. At 1,000 parcels, the Advanced discount starts to close the gap with its higher plan fee. Australia Post publishes its own rate card by lodgement postcode and parcel size. Shopify's shipping calculator pulls those rates automatically once you've set up the integration. The discount is applied on top. ## Staff, POS, and international selling: when you need to upgrade Some upgrades aren't about cost. They're about hard limits. Staff accounts are capped per plan. Shopify's pricing page specifies the limit for each plan. If you need more staff accounts than your plan allows, upgrading is the only option — you can't buy additional seats on a lower plan. For a solo founder, this won't matter. For a store with a fulfilment team, a customer service person, and a marketing contractor, it can force an upgrade earlier than you'd expect. POS is a separate consideration. Shopify POS Lite handles basic in-person selling on all plans. Shopify POS Pro is a per-location add-on that Shopify's pricing page lists separately. A market stall or pop-up needs Lite only. A permanent shopfront with inventory sync needs Pro. International selling brings multi-currency into the picture. Grow and above support selling in multiple currencies with automatic conversion. On Basic, you'd need a third-party app for multi-currency — another A$20 to A$50 a month. If half your orders come from New Zealand or the US, the built-in multi-currency on Grow saves the app fee and reduces checkout friction. ## Break-even: when upgrading to Grow or Advanced actually pays off This is the calculation that matters. Everything above feeds into it. The break-even from Basic to Grow on annual billing: - Plan fee difference: A$114 minus A$42 = A$72 a month. - Per-order saving: 0.15 % of A$100 = A$0.15. - Break-even: A$72 ÷ A$0.15 = 480 orders a month. At 480 orders, the transaction fee saving exactly offsets the higher plan fee. Above that, Grow is cheaper on transactions alone. Add the shipping discount and any app savings, and the break-even drops further — probably to around 400 orders. The break-even from Grow to Advanced: - Plan fee difference: A$431 minus A$114 = A$317 a month. - Per-order saving: 0.2 % of A$100 = A$0.20. - Break-even: A$317 ÷ A$0.20 = 1,585 orders a month. That's a high bar. Advanced only pays off if you're processing more than 1,500 orders a month, or if the shipping discount and advanced features add meaningful value. For most Australian stores under 1,000 orders a month, Grow is the sweet spot once you've outgrown Basic. Shopify claims its checkout converts 15 % better on average than other platforms, according to its pricing page checked on 25 August 2026. That's a platform-level claim, not a plan-specific one. But it's relevant context when weighing Shopify against alternatives. ## The comparison table: total monthly cost across all Shopify plans Here's the full picture for a store doing 500 orders a month at A$100 average order value, on annual billing. App costs and shipping discount values are our editorial estimates — not Shopify's published figures. | | Basic | Grow | Advanced | |---|---|---|---| | Monthly fee (annual billing) | A$42 | A$114 | A$431 | | Transaction fees (500 × A$100) | A$1,025 | A$950 | A$875 | | Est. app costs (our judgment) | A$60 | A$40 | A$30 | | Shipping discount (our estimate) | A$0 | A$50 | A$120 | | **Total monthly cost** | **A$1,127** | **A$1,154** | **A$1,456** | At 500 orders, Basic is still the cheapest — but only by A$27 over Grow. Cross 550 orders and Grow takes the lead. The shipping discount on Grow closes the gap faster than the transaction fee saving alone suggests. > **Our take:** For a new Australian store, Basic is the right starting point — the total cost is lowest and the feature set covers most needs. Once you pass 500 orders a month, Grow becomes the better deal: the transaction fee savings, shipping discounts, and built-in reports offset the higher plan fee. Advanced only pays off above 1,500 orders, and Plus is enterprise territory. The plan price is the least important number on this table. ## How to choose your Shopify plans without overpaying Here's a practical checklist. Copy it, fill in your own numbers, and the answer falls out. **Our plan decision checklist:** 1. Count your average monthly orders and your average order value in AUD. 2. Calculate transaction fees on each plan: (card rate × monthly sales) + (A$0.30 × orders). 3. List the apps you need and their monthly cost on each plan. 4. Estimate your monthly shipping discount value on Grow and Advanced. 5. Add plan fee + transaction fees + app costs − shipping discount = total monthly cost. 6. Compare totals. Pick the cheapest. Revisit every quarter. Edge cases matter. Dropshipping businesses often have lower margins and higher order volumes, which pushes the break-even to Grow faster. High-risk businesses — those selling restricted products — may not qualify for Shopify Payments, which means third-party gateway surcharges of 2 % on Basic. That alone can make Grow worthwhile, since the surcharge drops to 1 %. Non-profits and charities: Shopify doesn't advertise a non-profit discount on its pricing page. If you're a registered charity, contact Shopify support directly to ask. GST registration is compulsory once your GST turnover reaches A$75,000, according to the [ATO](https://www.ato.gov.au/law/view/document?DocID=DGS%2FGSTR2026D1%2FNAT%2FATO%2F00001&PiT=99991231235958). Your Shopify plan doesn't affect this threshold — but higher transaction volumes that push you onto a higher plan may coincide with crossing it. Our [GST on your Shopify store: an Australian guide](https://aussiestoreguides.com/shopify-gst-australia/) covers the setup. If you're comparing platforms, our [How much does Shopify cost in Australia?](https://aussiestoreguides.com/shopify-cost-australia/) breaks down the total against alternatives. And if you're new to Shopify entirely, [What is Shopify, and how does it work in Australia?](https://aussiestoreguides.com/what-is-shopify-australia/) covers the basics. ## Frequently asked questions ### What is the total monthly cost for 500 orders on each Shopify plan? At 500 orders a month with a A$100 average order value, our worked example puts Basic at A$1,127, Grow at A$1,154, and Advanced at A$1,456 — all on annual billing. The gap between Basic and Grow is only A$27. At 550 orders, Grow becomes cheaper in total, because the 0.15 % transaction fee saving compounds faster than the A$72 monthly plan fee difference. ### How do Shopify plans work for dropshipping businesses in Australia? Dropshipping stores typically have lower margins and higher order volumes, which shifts the break-even point. Because you're not holding inventory, your transaction fees dominate the cost structure. If you're processing 600 or more orders a month, the Grow plan's lower card rate and shipping discounts usually offset the A$72 monthly fee difference, even before counting app savings. ### Can I use Shopify Payments with a high-risk business in Australia? Shopify Payments may not be available for businesses classified as high-risk, such as those selling certain supplements, adult products, or restricted goods. If you can't use Shopify Payments, you'll need a third-party gateway — and Shopify adds a surcharge of 2 % on Basic, 1 % on Grow, and 0.6 % on Advanced. That 2 % surcharge on Basic is often reason enough to move to Grow. ### What happens if I exceed my plan's staff account limit? You can't purchase additional staff seats on a lower plan — the only way to add more staff accounts is to upgrade. Shopify's pricing page lists the staff account limit for each plan. For a store with a fulfilment team and a customer service person, this can mean upgrading months before transaction fees would have justified it. ### Are there any discounts for Australian non-profits or charities? Shopify doesn't advertise a non-profit or charity discount on its pricing page. Some platforms offer reduced rates for registered charities, but Shopify's published pricing applies uniformly. If you're a registered Australian charity with an ABN, contact Shopify support directly — they may offer an arrangement outside the standard tiers, but it's not guaranteed or published. ### How does Shopify pricing compare to Neto or BigCommerce for Australian sellers? Shopify charges a monthly plan fee plus per-transaction fees, while Neto and BigCommerce typically charge a monthly fee with transaction fees only on certain payment gateways. The total cost comparison depends entirely on your order volume — at low volumes, Shopify's lower entry price wins; at high volumes, platforms that don't charge per-transaction fees can be cheaper. We can't state specific competitor pricing without verified figures. ## Sources 1. Shopify Inc., "Shopify Pricing: Find the Right Plan for Your Business". https://www.shopify.com/pricing — checked on 25 August 2026. 2. Australian Taxation Office, "Draft Goods and Services Tax Ruling GSTR 2026/D1". https://www.ato.gov.au/law/view/document?DocID=DGS%2FGSTR2026D1%2FNAT%2FATO%2F00001&PiT=99991231235958 — checked on 25 August 2026.