The direct answer
Most established NZ businesses launching on Shopify should start on Grow, the plan Shopify used to call simply "Shopify". Basic suits a smaller operation with modest sales and one or two people running it. Advanced is worth the extra cost when you need third-party calculated shipping rates, custom reports or more than five staff accounts, or when your sales volume makes its lower fees pay. Shopify Plus is for high-volume retailers with specific requirements around checkout, trade pricing, multiple storefronts or store networks.
Shopify prices plans for NZ merchants in US dollars and charges card processing in NZ dollars. All figures below are Shopify's published rates as at October 2026, ex GST.
The four plans side by side
Basic
- US$39 a month billed monthly, or US$29 a month billed annually.
- Online card rate through Shopify Payments: 2.65% plus 30 cents. In person: 1.8%.
- Extra fee on third-party payment providers: 2%.
- No additional staff accounts beyond the store owner.
- Up to ten inventory locations.
Grow
- US$105 a month billed monthly, or US$79 a month billed annually.
- Online card rate: 2.45% plus 30 cents. In person: 1.65%.
- Extra fee on third-party payment providers: 1%.
- Five staff accounts.
- Up to ten inventory locations.
Advanced
- US$399 a month billed monthly, or US$299 a month billed annually.
- Online card rate: 2.35% plus 30 cents. In person: 1.5%.
- Extra fee on third-party payment providers: 0.6%.
- Fifteen staff accounts.
- Up to ten inventory locations, plus third-party calculated shipping rates and the custom report builder.
Plus
- From US$2,300 a month on a three-year term, or US$2,500 a month on a one-year term. Larger businesses move to a variable fee based on revenue.
- Online card rate: 2.25% plus 30 cents. In person: 1.3%.
- Extra fee on third-party payment providers: 0.2%.
- Unlimited staff accounts and up to 200 inventory locations.
- Checkout customisation, custom Shopify Functions, the full B2B toolset, nine expansion stores and POS Pro.
What actually changes between the plans
The plans share far more than the pricing page suggests. Every plan runs the same themes, the same checkout, the same app store and the same Shopify Flow automation tool. The differences fall into six areas, and most businesses only care about two or three of them.
Fees on every sale
Each step up lowers the percentage Shopify takes on card payments and on payments through third-party providers. At low volume the difference is a few dollars a month. As sales grow, the fee savings start to cover the higher monthly price, and at that point the cheaper plan becomes the more expensive one to stay on. We work through that arithmetic for Basic in when Shopify Basic starts costing you money.
Staff accounts
Basic has no additional staff accounts, Grow has five and Advanced has fifteen. Once more people need access than the plan allows, teams start sharing logins, which leaves no record of who changed a price, refunded an order or edited a product. For any business with staff handling orders, Basic runs out early on this point alone.
Shipping rates at checkout
Advanced and Plus include third-party calculated shipping rates as standard, which lets checkout show live rates from a courier or freight aggregator instead of flat rates set in Shopify. For NZ businesses shipping bulky goods, or sending to rural addresses where courier pricing varies widely, live rates stop you either overcharging customers or absorbing the difference. Our guide to getting Shopify shipping rates to match what you pay covers the setup options on each plan.
Reporting
Every plan includes Shopify's analytics and standard reports. Advanced adds the custom report builder, which matters when you need to slice sales by your own product attributes, customer tags or channels without exporting to a spreadsheet every week.
Trade and wholesale
Since 2026, Basic, Grow and Advanced include native B2B features: company profiles, payment terms, volume pricing and up to three custom catalogues. Plus removes the catalogue limit and adds deposits, partial payments and catalogues assigned to specific companies or locations.
Checkout, storefronts and locations
Plus is the only plan where the information, shipping and payment steps of checkout can be customised, where custom apps running Shopify Functions are available and where one contract covers several storefronts. It also lifts the inventory location limit from ten to 200, which matters for retailers with a network of stores, warehouses and 3PLs.
What stays the same on every plan
Your plan doesn't decide what your store looks like or how well it performs. A custom theme built for your business can run on Basic as easily as on Plus. Site speed depends on the theme and the apps installed. Search performance depends on content, structure and technical setup. Conversion depends on how well the store answers what your customers need to know before they buy. The design and build of the store sit with whoever builds it, which is why our Shopify website design projects scope the plan alongside the build without letting one drive the other.
The monthly fee is also a small part of what a store costs to run. Apps, payment processing, theme maintenance and the time your team spends on it all sit on top, and we break those costs down in the true cost of running a Shopify store.
Choosing a plan by stage
Launching an established business on Shopify
Start on Grow in most cases. The five staff accounts cover a small team from day one, the lower fees pay back the difference over Basic at modest volume and nothing in the plan limits the build. If you already know you need live courier rates at checkout or more than five staff, start on Advanced and skip a plan change later.
Moving from Grow to Advanced
Move when one of three things happens: you need live shipping rates, you need more than five staff accounts or your sales have grown enough that the fee savings cover the extra US$294 a month on monthly billing. Advanced's online card rate is 0.1 points lower than Grow's, so card savings alone cover that gap at around US$294,000 a month in online card sales. For most retailers the move to Advanced is driven by staff numbers or shipping, and the fee saving is a bonus.
Moving from Advanced to Plus
Move when the business has a specific problem that only Plus solves: checkout rules your team currently enforces by editing orders, trade pricing beyond three catalogues, more than one storefront or more than ten locations. Revenue on its own makes a weak trigger, because Plus adds around US$2,000 a month over Advanced and the card rate saving is small. We set out how to calculate the break-even in why Shopify Plus makes sense at scale.
Signs you are on the wrong plan
Plan problems show up in day-to-day operations long before anyone looks at the pricing page. Most of them are visible in the admin or in how your team works, and each points in a specific direction.
- Several people log in with the same account. You have outgrown the staff limit, and the shared login is already a security and accountability problem.
- Customers regularly email to say the shipping charge at checkout was wrong, or your team refunds shipping differences by hand. Live calculated rates on Advanced would remove most of that work.
- Someone exports orders to a spreadsheet every week to build the report the business runs on. The custom report builder on Advanced does that inside Shopify.
- Trade customers order by email because the store can't show them their pricing. Native B2B on your current plan may cover it, and Plus covers it once you need more than three catalogues.
- You pay for several apps whose only job is to work around checkout limits. A stack of checkout workaround apps is the clearest sign it is time to look at Plus.
The opposite problem exists too. A business on Advanced that uses none of its features beyond the lower fee, with sales too modest for that fee to matter, is paying for headroom it doesn't use and can drop back to Grow.
Monthly or annual billing
On Basic, Grow and Advanced, annual billing saves roughly a quarter of the monthly price: US$29 against US$39 on Basic, US$79 against US$105 on Grow and US$299 against US$399 on Advanced. If you are confident in the plan for the next twelve months, annual billing is the cheaper option. If you expect to move up a plan within a few months of launch, stay on monthly billing until the store settles.
Common questions
What is the difference between Shopify and Shopify Plus?
Shopify Plus adds checkout customisation, custom Shopify Functions, the full B2B toolset, nine expansion stores, 200 inventory locations, unlimited staff, POS Pro and 24/7 priority support, with slightly lower processing fees. It starts at US$2,300 a month on a three-year term, against US$399 a month for Advanced on monthly billing. For most growing retailers, the standard plans cover requirements until complexity makes Plus pay.
What happened to the standard Shopify plan?
Shopify renamed its middle plan from "Shopify" to Grow. The plan sits between Basic and Advanced, costs US$105 a month on monthly billing or US$79 a month billed annually, includes five staff accounts and has an online card rate of 2.45% plus 30 cents in New Zealand. Older articles and quotes that refer to the "Shopify plan" mean Grow.
Can I change Shopify plans later?
Yes, at any time. Shopify lets you change plans from the admin at any time, and upgrades take effect immediately. Before downgrading, check that every feature the store relies on is available on the lower plan, including staff accounts, calculated shipping rates and reports. Moving onto or off Plus works differently, because Plus is a contract on a one-year or three-year term.
Does my Shopify plan affect my website design?
It only affects checkout. The plan controls backend features, staff accounts, reporting and fees and has no effect on what a custom-built theme can look like or how fast it loads. The one exception is checkout: only Plus allows the information, shipping and payment steps to be customised. Every other part of the design is set by the theme and the build.
Are Shopify transaction fees charged on top of payment processing fees?
Only if you use a third-party payment provider. Shopify Payments charges its card rate and no separate transaction fee. A third-party provider charges its own processing fee, and Shopify adds 2% on Basic, 1% on Grow, 0.6% on Advanced or 0.2% on Plus. For most NZ stores that makes Shopify Payments the cheaper option unless a specific provider is required.
