Picking the right ecommerce platform is the key to expanding your online business, and prices form an important part of such decisions. Shopify has prepared different pricing options for entrepreneurs operating in South Africa, from the small to large businesses. In this complete breakdown for 2025, we will go through Shopify South Africa pricing core plans and other additional fees you might want to be aware of.
Contents
Overview of Shopify South Africa Pricing
Shopify has a variety of pricing plans available in South Africa, each suitable for different business needs and budgets:
- Shopify Starter Plan ($5 USD/month): For those selling on social media or via messaging apps.
- Shopify Basic Shopify (R430/month): Suitable for small businesses or solo entrepreneurs.
- Shopify Plan (R1200/month): For growing small to medium businesses.
- Shopify Advanced Shopify (R4500/month): For international sellers and growing businesses.
- Shopify Plus Plan (from $2300 USD/month): For high-volume or complex businesses.
How Much is Shopify In South Africa
Shopify Starter Plan
Price: $5 USD / month
This Shopify South Africa pricing is best for:
- Entrepreneurs just started to sell online.
- Individuals who sell most often through social media and messaging.
Key features:
- Linkpop, the link in bio for commerce.
- Additional apps available on Shopify App Store to increase functionality.
- Shopify order management and fulfillment network.
- Mobile point of sale to take in-person orders with just your smartphone.
- A simple online store with product pages, a contact page, and Shopify’s secure checkout.
Limitations:
- Limited customization for store design.
- No advanced reporting or analytics tools.
- Lack of features for scaling or multi-channel selling.
- Not suitable for businesses requiring a full-fledged online store.
Shopify Basic Plan
Price: R430 / month
This Shopify South Africa pricing is best for:
- Small businesses or solo entrepreneurs starting an online store.
- Sellers looking for an affordable plan containing the essential e-commerce tools.
- Stores with minimal inventory that do not require advanced reporting or heavy management tools.
Key features:
- Basic reporting: Providing tools to track sales, orders, and traffic, enabling the store owner to analyze performance for data-driven decisions.
- Inventory management: With up to 10 inventory locations, your product management will be at ease, whether it is a single product or an ever-growing number of items.
- 24/7 support: Resolving any concerns or issues, ensuring seamless running of your online store.
- Unlimited Products: No limit on the amount of products which you can sell; therefore, many business opportunities.
- Secure shopping cart: Ensuring a smooth checkout experience for your customers.
Limitations:
- Has limited reporting when compared to the other higher tier plans.
- Has no advanced analytics or customization.
- Has only basic e-commerce functionalities that are not adequate for growing businesses needing stronger tools to handle business transactions.
- No international selling or scaling.
Shopify Standard Plan
Price: R1200 / month
This Shopify South Africa pricing is best for:
- Small to medium-sized businesses in South Africa that want to extend their reach online.
- Entrepreneurs who need more advanced tools to fuel growth, like inventory management and sales recovery.
- Multi-staff businesses that need secure access to manage the efficient running of the store.
Key features:
- Everything included in the Basic Plan for ease of transition to this level.
- Custom reports and analytics: Serving for deep insights, supporting data-driven decision-making.
- Staff accounts: It offers 5 staff accounts to help with better collaboration for the team and has ensured access control to critical store management functions.
- Enhanced inventory management: It manages up to 10 inventory locations efficiently.
- Abandoned cart messaging: Recover potential sales with automated messages targeting abandoned carts.
Limitations:
- Pricier than the Basic plan after the first month.
- It has only 5 staff accounts, which is quite small for big teams.
- Does not include some of the advanced international selling tools of higher-tier plans.
Shopify Advanced Plan
Price: R4500 / month
This Shopify South Africa pricing is best for:
- Established businesses with international shipping and tax needs.
- Companies with larger teams require more staff accounts.
- Merchants looking for advanced reporting tools to drive growth and optimize performance.
- Growing businesses ready to expand their operations globally.
Key features:
- All the features of the Shopify Plan ensure that merchants moving to this level have continued access to previous functionalities.
- Custom report builder: This lets businesses build customized reports to facilitate deeper dives into business analytics and performance metrics.
- Staff accounts: With a limit of 15 staff accounts, this plan is suited for larger teams working together.
- Third-party calculated shipping rates will enable real-time shipping price calculation depending on third-party shipping services with the ability to integrate shipping providers very effectively.
- Duties and import taxes will enable importing tax calculation so that it can be included at the check-out so that customers view the total amount clearly thus eliminating the chances of returning a parcel or rejection due to delivery failure.
Limitations:
- Involves much more cost than Shopify plans.
- Some businesses will not need most of these additional features.
- The high monthly charges could be too costly for small or emerging businesses.
Shopify Plus
Price: From $2300 USD / month
This Shopify South Africa pricing is best for:
- Big businesses or institutions generate huge sales volume.
- Companies with very complicated operational needs and desire to personalize.
- Businesses interested in expanding its e-commerce sales to international platforms.
- Businesses interested in enhancing its customer experience through personalized solutions.
Key features:
- Massive infrastructure support of large volumes of traffic, large catalogs, and high transaction processing with no sale glitch at peak seasons.
- Automation: Shopify Flow and Script Editor enable customized business processes.
- Dedicated APIs for advanced integrations and customizations.
- Custom checkouts for enhanced brand identity and customer satisfaction.
- Omnichannel: Boost your sales on more channels and markets.
- International tools: Sell everywhere with currency conversion, translation, and local marketing.
- Transporter: Transfer store data to Shopify Plus faster.
- Advanced security: Protect data and ensure regulatory compliance.
- Reliability: Remain up and running during high-traffic events like Black Friday.
- Headless commerce: Manage custom storefronts across channels from one backend.
- ERP integration: Seamlessly integrates with top ERP and CRM platforms.
- Performance dashboard: Monitor real-time store metrics and shopper behaviors.
Limitations:
- High monthly prices might be out of the range for small businesses.
- Operational maturity is required to utilize it to its full potential.
- Setup and configuration can be tricky.
Additional Shopify Fees South Africa
App Costs
Apps provide additional functionality to your Shopify Store, ranging from SEO optimization right through to email marketing to even stock control. Apps can be free or very expensive, depending on what the app does and who the developer is. Some have a once-off and then a monthly fee.
Theme Costs
The look and feel of your online store is one of the most critical elements of acquiring and retaining customers. Themes are the templates that will give your shop its look and feel. Although Shopify does have some free themes, to acquire a more distinctive and professional appearance, premium themes can cost between approximately R2750 and R6620 or more.
Domain Name
A personalized domain name plays a very significant role in having an online presence and personal brand. A matching domain name builds trust in the mind of your customer and even enhances brand consistency. Domain names range from R180 to R360 or more annually depending on the extension, i.e.,.com,.co.za,.net, etc.
Email Hosting Fees
With Shopify email hosting templates, you have the ability to manage your email campaigns directly from Shopify. You are provided with 10,000 emails per month absolutely free of cost. Then, you must pay a very small amount of R18 per unit for another 1000 emails.
Shipping Costs and Discounts in Shopify Cost South Africa
Discount and shipping charges are not technically hidden but they eat into your margin and have to be factored in when pricing. There are a myriad of apps that can help you with your fulfillment and shipping. One of these apps is Shiprocket that will help you print labels from a vast number of carriers like FedEx, BlueDart, Delhivery, DHL, Gati, and many more. Shipping cost varies with courier service, distance, and size of shipment.
Comparison: Shopify Pricing South Africa vs. Global Pricing
The following are some of the reasons, which most probably make Shopify pricing vary between South Africa and internationally:
- Local taxation and law: In every country, there may be different laws and legislations on tax that could impact Shopify prices in South Africa. Value Added Tax (VAT) or some other local tax could be levied on the price in South Africa, and because of that, it could be different from international prices.
- Payment processing charges: Since Shopify Payments is not supported in South Africa, third-party payment gateways will be utilized, and they may have different transaction charges compared to Shopify Payments, and thus it has an impact on the cost of doing business of the Shopify prices in South Africa. Some of the payment service providers in South Africa include 2Checkout, BitPay, Payflex, PayGate, Ozow (Automated EFT), PayFast, PayPal Express Checkout, Paystack, and Paymentwall. However, consider selecting Paystack due to cost-effective payments and ease of use.
- Promotions and offers: Shopify may be operating varying promotions and offers within the other countries, which may result in temporary or permanent variations in cost.
Final Thoughts
The consideration of Shopify pricing in South Africa is crucial in making a perfect choice of plan. Shopify, with its affordable plans and advanced features, thus enables South African entrepreneurs to take over the world of eCommerce. Having read all the above content, we are sure that you would have confidence in selecting the best Shopify pricing South Africa plan for your business. If you find the above blog helpful, you can freely visit more eCommerce blogs at BSS Commerce. CONTACT NOW and inform us of your issues, and we will assist you at any time you require our services.
