Stripe vs Shopify Payments: Platform Decides the Processor (2026)

This looks like a choice between two processors. It is really a choice between two platforms, and the processor follows.

Shopify Payments only exists inside a Shopify subscription. Off Shopify, it is not on the table, and Stripe is the default for WooCommerce, Squarespace, a custom build, a SaaS or a marketplace.

On Shopify, one charge settles it. Shopify adds a penalty to every sale taken through a non-Shopify processor: 2% on Basic, 1% on the Shopify plan, 0.5% on Advanced. It stacks on top of whatever that processor charges.

So Stripe on Shopify Basic runs at an effective 3.5% + 20p against Shopify Payments’ 2.0% + 25p. On £15,000 a month that is around £3,600 a year leaving your account for nothing your customer ever sees.

The exceptions are narrow. A high-risk category Shopify declines, or a checkout that needs Open Banking, UnionPay, Alipay or Bacs Direct Debit, sends you to Stripe even on Shopify.

Both are FCA-authorised EMIs: Stripe Payments UK Ltd under FRN 900461 (since 2 May 2018), Shopify Payments under FRN 900645. Both are PCI DSS Level 1 and handle SCA/3DS2 for you, with no setup fee or minimum contract on standard tiers.

We checked every rate here against stripe.com/gb and shopify.com/uk on 20 May 2026. Before you compare headline rates, settle the platform question.

Which Is Better for UK Shopify Merchants?

If you’re already on Shopify, the arithmetic ends the conversation.

Take a UK D2C food brand on Shopify Basic doing £15,000/month at £40 average basket: 375 transactions a month. Shopify Payments costs you roughly £394 in fees (2.0% + 25p).

Stripe via Shopify costs £694 once you add the 2% Basic penalty on top of Stripe’s 1.5% + 20p. That’s £300/month more, or £3,600 a year, in exchange for nothing your customer ever sees.

Same checkout, same product, same support, just a worse fee. The number scales with volume: at £30k/month it’s £7,200/year, at £80k/month (a Shopify Plus retailer with UK and EU traffic) the penalty alone funds two part-time hires.

If you’re not on Shopify, the decision was already made before you reached this page. Shopify Payments doesn’t exist outside a Shopify subscription.

A Bristol WooCommerce store, a Birmingham SaaS founder billing 600 subscribers at £29/month, a Glasgow marketplace splitting payouts, all of them reach for Stripe by default. There isn’t a second option to weigh.

The one Shopify cohort that should run the numbers themselves: merchants with heavy EU card traffic on Basic. Shopify Payments charges 3.6% + 25p on international cards at Basic. Stripe charges 2.5% + 20p for EEA cards.

If 40% of your orders are German and Dutch buyers paying with EU-issued cards, Stripe’s EU rate partly offsets the Basic penalty.

Even then, the penalty usually wins by a margin. A Manchester ceramics maker with 70% UK / 30% EU traffic at £15k/month still pays roughly £120/month more on Stripe than on Shopify Payments Basic after the EU rate advantage. We’d build a transaction-level model here, not trust a headline-rate guess.

Stripe vs Shopify Fees and Charges

Card Transaction Fees

Stripe’s UK rate card is short. UK consumer Visa/Mastercard 1.5% + 20p, EU/EEA cards 2.5% + 20p, non-EEA international 3.25% + 20p, Amex 3.25% + 20p. No split between card-present and card-not-present online.

In-person via Stripe Terminal: 1.7% + 0p on standard UK cards. (Source: stripe.com/gb/pricing, 20 May 2026.)

Shopify Payments tiers its rates by plan, so your monthly subscription buys you a better processing rate (shopify.com/uk/pricing, 20 May 2026):

• Basic (£25/month): UK cards 2.0% + 25p, in-person 1.7%, international 3.6% + 25p
• Shopify (£65/month): UK cards 1.7% + 25p, in-person 1.6%, international 3.4% + 25p
• Advanced (£344/month): UK cards 1.5% + 25p, in-person 1.5%, international 3.2% + 25p
• Starter (£5/month): 5.0% + 30p, built for link-in-bio and social selling, not a storefront

On UK domestic cards at Advanced tier, you’re paying 5p more per transaction with Shopify Payments than with Stripe. On a £50 average basket that’s 0.1% of the order, rounding error. On a £3 micro-payment, it’s 1.7% of the basket, which matters if you sell digital downloads or tipping.

Both charge +2% on currency conversion. Stripe shows it as a separate line on the dashboard. Shopify charges it when the transaction currency differs from your payout currency. Parity on FX, then. We took every rate here from the providers’ own pricing pages.

Monthly, Setup and Contract Costs

Stripe has no monthly fee, no setup fee, no PCI compliance charge, no minimum contract. You pay per transaction. That’s it.

Shopify Payments has no separate processing subscription either, but it isn’t free to access. You pay for the Shopify plan: £25 (Basic), £65 (Shopify) or £344 (Advanced) per month on annual billing.

Monthly billing adds roughly 25–30% on top. Shopify Plus starts around £1,600/month for the bracket above that.

That sounds like a clear win for Stripe on monthly cost. It isn’t, because you’re not buying the same thing. The Shopify subscription covers the storefront, hosting, inventory, the checkout itself, reporting, customer profiles, abandoned-cart recovery and Shopify Magic AI prompts.

Stripe doesn’t supply any of that. If you’re running Stripe, you’re paying separately for WordPress hosting plus WooCommerce, or you’re on Squarespace, or you have a developer maintaining a custom build. Compare like with like before you call £25/month expensive.

Other Fees to Watch

The penalty fee that decides this: Shopify charges 2.0% on Basic, 1.0% on the Shopify plan, 0.5% on Advanced for every transaction processed through a non-Shopify gateway. It stacks on top of whatever the other processor is charging. (Source: shopify.com/uk/pricing, 20 May 2026.)

On Basic, that turns Stripe’s 1.5% + 20p into an effective 3.5% + 20p. Your customer sees no difference at checkout. You see £3,600/year less in your bank account at £15k/month. That’s the whole problem in one line.

Chargebacks: Shopify Protect covers fraud-related chargebacks on eligible Shopify Payments orders for free, Shopify refunds you the disputed amount and the fee.

If you sell expensive products to a fraud-magnet category (electronics, jewellery), that protection is worth real money. Non-fraud disputes carry a separate fee; check current amounts at help.shopify.com/en/manual/payments/shopify-payments/chargebacks.

Stripe doesn’t bundle the same cover. Stripe Chargeback Protection adds +0.4% to every transaction (stripe.com/gb/radar/pricing, 20 May 2026). On £15k/month that’s another £60/month if you opt in.

Stripe extras most stacks end up paying for: Stripe Billing +0.5% (Starter) or +0.8% (Scale) on recurring charges, Stripe Radar 5p per screened transaction, Pay by Bank 0.8% capped at £5 (verify current rate at stripe.com/gb/pricing), instant payout 1% via Faster Payments.

None of these are forced on you, but a UK SaaS will end up paying for Billing within the first quarter.

Shopify Payments extras: Shop Pay Installments merchant fee is 5.99% per instalment payment, which is the cost of offering BNPL at checkout. Klarna and Clearpay sit on top of standard rates and are charged through their own merchant agreements.

Fee Verdict: Who Costs Less

If you’re on Shopify, Shopify Payments wins on total cost at every plan tier. We ran the totals at each plan tier, and the penalty fee is doing all the work.

On Basic a merchant saves 2 percentage points on every sale, which more than covers the 0.5% higher headline rate and 5p higher fixed fee. At Advanced the rates are near-identical on UK domestic cards, but Shopify Payments still wins by the 0.5% penalty.

If you’re not on Shopify, Stripe is cheaper. 1.5% + 20p with no monthly floor beats anything Shopify offers, because Shopify isn’t a payment processor you can use without buying the storefront too.

The one place Stripe still has an edge for some Shopify merchants: EU card traffic. Shopify Payments’ 3.6% + 25p (Basic) or 3.2% + 25p (Advanced) on international cards is steep compared to Stripe’s 2.5% + 20p on EEA cards.

If half your buyers are German or Dutch on Basic, the penalty’s win shrinks and you should model it transaction-by-transaction.

Stripe vs Shopify Payment Methods and Checkout Options

Cards, Wallets and Alternative Payment Methods

Shopify Payments UK accepts Visa, Mastercard, Amex, Discover, Diners Club and JCB at the card level. Wallets: Shop Pay, Apple Pay, Google Pay. BNPL: Shop Pay Installments, Klarna, Clearpay. EU methods: Bancontact, iDEAL, SOFORT.

What you won’t find: Open Banking, UnionPay, Alipay, WeChat Pay, Bacs Direct Debit.

Stripe’s list is longer. Same six card schemes plus UnionPay. Wallets: Apple Pay, Google Pay, Link, Click to Pay. BNPL: Klarna, Clearpay, Zip. Open Banking via Pay by Bank at 0.8% capped £5.

EU methods: iDEAL, SEPA Direct Debit, Bancontact, EPS, giropay, P24, SOFORT, BLIK. Plus Bacs Direct Debit, Alipay and WeChat Pay.

For most UK Shopify merchants this gap doesn’t matter. Your customers want to pay with a UK Visa, Apple Pay or Shop Pay, and Shopify Payments covers every one of those.

It matters in three specific cases. If you sell to Chinese tourists visiting London, Alipay and WeChat Pay are real conversion drivers and Stripe is the only way to surface them.

If you run a Birmingham B2B Shopify store taking 200 wholesale invoices a month, Bacs Direct Debit at 1% capped £4 (via Stripe or GoCardless) is dramatically cheaper than card.

If you sell high-ticket items where 2–3% on a £500 order hurts, Stripe Pay by Bank lets the buyer pay from their bank account for 80p flat. That’s a saving of £6.70 per order vs Shopify Payments Basic.

Checkout Experience

Shop Pay is Shopify’s conversion lever. One-click wallet, address and card details stored across every Shopify store the buyer has used.

Shopify quotes up to 50% higher conversion vs standard guest checkout and 4x faster time-to-pay. That’s Shopify’s own number, but the directional point holds: a buyer who’s already paid through Shop Pay anywhere is one tap away on yours.

Stripe Link is the platform-agnostic version. Stripe claims 7%+ conversion lift for returning customers and up to 90 seconds saved per checkout. Works across any Stripe integration regardless of platform. No extra merchant fee.

Both handle SCA/3DS2 automatically with exemption logic for low-value, recurring and merchant-initiated transactions, so you don’t have to wire step-up authentication yourself.

The difference is what sits around the wallet. On Shopify Payments you get Shopify’s hosted checkout with the Checkout Editor for branding tweaks. Custom checkout code is Shopify Plus only (£1,600+/month).

On Stripe you pick your shape: hosted Checkout for no-code, Elements if you want to design the form yourself, Payment Links if you just need a URL to share.

If your brand demands a fully bespoke checkout and you aren’t on Shopify Plus, Stripe is the only path.

Methods Verdict

If you’re on Shopify, Shop Pay is the stronger wallet because it’s embedded in every other Shopify store your customers already buy from. Shop Pay Installments BNPL at no extra rate is a useful bonus on higher-ticket orders.

Off Shopify, Link does the same job in a more platform-agnostic way across every Stripe checkout.

We rate Stripe ahead on method breadth. If your customer mix includes Chinese tourists, B2B buyers paying by Bacs, or a meaningful share of bank-transfer-curious consumers, the Shopify Payments gap is a real cost or conversion hit you should model before deciding.

Stripe vs Shopify Hardware, POS and In-Person Payments

Card Readers and Terminals

Shopify’s UK hardware line-up is short and deliberate. The Tap & Chip Reader is £49 (Bluetooth, pairs with your phone).

The POS Go is £249, an all-in-one Android device with barcode scanner and built-in card reader, the right shape for a Friday Faire pop-up where you don’t want to drag a tablet and a separate reader.

Both support Tap to Pay on iPhone for hardware-free contactless. (hardware.shopify.com, 20 May 2026.)

Stripe Terminal’s range is broader. BBPOS WisePad 3 at £49 + VAT (Bluetooth, PIN pad, roughly 15-hour battery), BBPOS WisePOS E at £179 (touchscreen Android, countertop).

Stripe Reader S700/S710 sits around £229–£300 (smart Android, Wi-Fi, customisable). All bought outright, no rental. Tap to Pay on iPhone is supported here too. (stripe.com/gb/terminal, 20 May 2026.)

One Shopify POS constraint that catches people out: to accept in-person card payments through Shopify POS hardware, you have to use Shopify Payments.

You can technically bolt a third-party terminal onto a Shopify POS shop, but it breaks the unified inventory and sales report, which is the main reason you picked Shopify POS in the first place.

If your shop floor matters and you’re running Shopify online, Shopify Payments isn’t really optional.

POS Software and Hardware Add-ons

Shopify POS Lite ships with every Shopify plan: basic till functions, order management, customer profiles. Enough for a one-shop, one-staff setup.

Shopify POS Pro is £69/month per location on annual billing (or £89/month on monthly), adding unlimited staff permissions, smart inventory, staff roles, advanced reporting and local pickup management.

If you’re a UK retailer on Shopify with more than two staff or stock split across online and a physical shop, POS Pro is usually worth the £69.

One inventory, one customer record, one reporting view feeding both the online store and the till is the whole point. A Manchester ceramics maker running a Shopify website plus a Friday Faire stand can ring up a market sale and watch the stock decrement live.

Stripe Terminal isn’t a POS. It’s an SDK-based payment layer that your developer plugs into a custom till stack or compatible third-party software (Lightspeed, Loyverse, your own build).

The WisePad 3 and WisePOS E work plug-and-play with most compatible software, but expect more setup than downloading the Shopify POS app, signing in and trading.

In-Person Verdict

For UK Shopify merchants selling in person, Shopify POS with Shopify Payments is the answer we’d give almost every time. Unified inventory, a polished £249 all-in-one in the POS Go, and no separate app stack to keep in sync. That’s the call.

For non-Shopify merchants, Stripe Terminal wins on hardware range and developer flexibility. The WisePad 3 matches Shopify’s entry price; the WisePOS E and Stripe Reader S700 cover countertop-grade smart terminals you can drop into a custom build or compatible POS.

Stripe vs Shopify Online Payments and Integrations

Hosted Checkout, Payment Links and APIs

Stripe gives you three shapes of checkout to pick from: hosted Checkout (125+ payment methods, no front-end work), Elements for a fully custom form your developer styles to match your brand, or Payment Links if you just need a URL to share.

The REST API has SDKs in seven server-side languages. The docs and Stripe CLI are why a developer can integrate Stripe in an afternoon rather than a sprint.

Shopify Payments doesn’t publish a standalone API for payment processing. Everything sits behind Shopify’s platform. You customise the look of checkout through the Checkout Editor on standard plans; fully custom checkout code is gated to Shopify Plus.

You can issue payment links through Shopify Draft Orders or the Buy Button, but you can’t bolt Shopify Payments into a WooCommerce site, a mobile app or a headless build. The processor lives inside Shopify or not at all.

Platform Integrations

Shopify Payments works inside Shopify. That’s the entire list. No integration with WooCommerce, Magento, Squarespace, BigCommerce, custom checkouts or anything else.

Stripe has official integrations for WooCommerce, Magento, Squarespace, Wix, BigCommerce, Salesforce B2C Commerce Cloud and Shopify itself (as a third-party gateway, with the penalty fee attached).

If you’re building a marketplace, multiple sellers, split payouts, platform takes a slice, Stripe Connect offers Standard, Express and Custom account types. Shopify Payments has no marketplace product at all.

Worth knowing: Stripe powers the underlying infrastructure for Shopify Payments. Shopify Payments is effectively a Stripe white-label with a different commercial agreement and a different brand on the dashboard. That’s why the rate structures rhyme.

Online Verdict

Off Shopify, Stripe wins on everything that matters online. API depth, Connect for marketplaces, Billing for SaaS, the ability to plug into any platform or build, none of that exists in Shopify Payments.

On Shopify, Shopify Payments wins by being already wired in. No API to configure, Shop Pay live at checkout, Shopify Protect already covering fraud-related chargebacks. If you’re a non-technical merchant and you’re on Shopify, we rate it the right choice the day you switch it on.

Stripe vs Shopify Payouts, Contract Terms and Account Risk

Settlement Speed and Payout Schedule

Stripe’s UK payout schedule starts slow and speeds up. New accounts wait 7–14 days for the first payout while Stripe verifies your business.

After that you settle on a 3-day rolling basis, Monday’s sales land in your bank Thursday morning. The minimum payout is £10, and you can request manual payouts if you prefer to control timing.

For weekend cash-flow pinches, Stripe Instant Payouts move money in minutes over Faster Payments, 24/7 including bank holidays. The fee is 1% (minimum 50p, maximum £10).

Useful if you run a Friday Faire pop-up and need takings available before Saturday’s supplier run. (stripe.com/gb/features/instant-payouts, 20 May 2026.)

Shopify Payments pays out to your business bank account within roughly 3 business days for established UK accounts. No minimum threshold. Verify the exact timeline and any instant payout option at help.shopify.com/en/manual/payments/shopify-payments/getting-paid before you rely on a specific window.

If you depend on a faster settlement window, that’s the gap worth confirming with Shopify support before you commit to the platform.

Contract Length and Exit Terms

Neither provider locks you into a minimum term or charges exit fees on standard tiers. You can leave at any month.

The asymmetry is what leaving costs you. Walk away from Stripe and you swap your gateway out. Technical work for your developer, a sprint of testing, but your storefront, products and customer data are untouched. Stripe is the processor; your platform is yours.

Walk away from Shopify and you lose Shopify Payments entirely. The processor is welded to the storefront. If you migrate from Shopify to WooCommerce, you rebuild the store, port the products, redirect old URLs and integrate a brand-new card processor from scratch.

That’s a quarter of engineering work, not a sprint. Worth weighing before you build your business on Shopify Payments.

Reserves, Holds and Account Stability

This is the part nobody talks about in the sales pages. Stripe’s Trustpilot sits at roughly 1.1/5 from 15,000+ reviews (uk.trustpilot.com, 20 May 2026).

The pattern is consistent: automated risk systems flag an account, freeze the funds, and the merchant can’t get a human on the phone to fix it. We read the recent reviews, not just the score: it is among the lowest for any major UK processor.

Shopify is marginally better at roughly 1.6/5 across 10,000+ reviews, though many of those complaints are about the platform broadly, theme bugs, app support, billing, rather than payments specifically.

The payment-tagged complaints look familiar though: payout freezes, chargebacks decided in the buyer’s favour, account terminations with funds withheld.

Both reserve the right to hold funds for high-risk industries, sudden volume spikes and AML/KYC reviews. Neither publishes a standard rolling-reserve policy for new UK merchants.

If you’re in a high-risk category, CBD, supplements, adult, anything refund-heavy, neither is the right pick. A specialist acquirer is worth the rate premium for the peace of mind.

If you process £30k/month and Friday’s settlement pays Monday’s supplier, build a working-capital buffer either way.

Stripe vs Shopify Customer Reviews and Reputation

Trustpilot and Independent Review Themes

Stripe’s positive reviews mostly come from developers: clean docs, reliable APIs, painless integration. The negatives cluster around one theme.

Your account gets flagged by an automated risk system, funds are held, and the only support channel available won’t move you up to a human who can actually unfreeze them. We weight 1.1/5 across 15,000+ reviews as a pattern, not bad luck.

Shopify’s reviews are messier to read because the platform is doing so many things. Positives praise the all-in-one model.

The payment-specific negatives sound familiar: payout freezes, chargeback decisions that go the buyer’s way, account terminations with funds still in escrow. At 1.6/5 across 10,000+ reviews, slightly better than Stripe.

Take both with weight. Trustpilot skews to angry customers and self-selected complainers, and both platforms process billions in transactions without incident.

But if your business can’t survive a two-week funds hold while support tickets cycle, build the buffer or pick a specialist acquirer. The risk is real either way.

Support Channels and Response Times

Shopify runs 24/7 live chat, email and phone callback across every plan tier, free Starter included. Your Shopify Plus account manager picks up at 3am on Black Friday. The same is not true of Stripe.

Stripe’s support is async-first: email tickets, in-dashboard chat, Discord for the developer community. Phone exists for critical issues and higher-tier accounts but isn’t consistently 24/7 for everyone.

The docs are some of the best in the industry, which is fine if you have a developer to read them. It’s thin if you’re a sole trader whose account is frozen on a Saturday evening and rent is due Monday.

If you run a non-technical Shopify store, Shopify’s support model is a significant advantage. If you run a SaaS with an in-house engineering team, Stripe’s async model is fine and the developer experience is a net win.

Reputation Verdict

Shopify wins on support if your business can’t wait for a ticket queue. 24/7 phone and chat across every plan, plus Shopify Protect bundled for free, is a material advantage for merchants without an in-house engineer. We note Stripe charges +0.4% for the equivalent fraud cover.

Stripe’s edge is documentation depth and developer community. If your team integrates payment APIs regularly, the docs save real time. If your team is you, your accountant and a Shopify store, that advantage doesn’t apply.

Stripe vs Shopify for Recurring Billing and Subscriptions

Subscription billing is the place the platform choice bites hardest. The right tool depends on what you’re actually selling and how the price changes between renewals.

If you’re a Bristol skincare brand on Shopify Subscriptions selling monthly serum refills, Shopify’s native Subscriptions app is the zero-friction path.

Flexible billing frequencies, a customer self-management portal, failed-payment dunning and subscription analytics all wired into the same Shopify admin you use for one-off orders. It processes through Shopify Payments at no extra fee on top of the standard rate.

For more complex subscription logic on Shopify, build-a-box, swappable products, prepaid plans, the established route is a paid app like Recharge, Bold Subscriptions or Seal.

You pay an extra monthly app fee (typically £30–£200 depending on tier) plus, in some cases, a transaction surcharge. Mature ecosystem, plenty of migration support, but no longer zero-friction.

If you’re a UK SaaS business, per-seat plans, metered API usage, annual contracts with mid-cycle plan changes, prorations, dunning that works at scale, Stripe Billing is the right answer.

Shopify isn’t built for SaaS at all, and Shopify Payments isn’t available without a storefront you don’t need.

Stripe Billing costs 0.5% (Starter) or 0.8% (Scale) of recurring charges, on top of Stripe’s 1.5% + 20p UK card rate. Verify the current tier structure at stripe.com/gb/billing/pricing before integrating.

A UK SaaS billing 600 subscribers at £29/month (£17,400 MRR) pays roughly £348/month in Stripe processing + Billing fees. The same business on Shopify isn’t a valid configuration, so the comparison doesn’t apply.

For the in-between case, a DTC brand on Shopify with complex subscription rules, we find Recharge on Shopify Payments stays cheaper than Stripe Billing once you account for the Shopify penalty Stripe would attract.

Downsides of Stripe and Shopify

Downsides of Stripe

Stripe has five problems worth knowing about before you commit. First, the decisive one if you’re on Shopify: Stripe triggers the 0.5–2% third-party penalty on top of its own rate. On Basic that’s an extra £300/month at £15k of sales. We could not find a workaround at the platform level.

Second, account stability. Stripe’s 1.1/5 Trustpilot across 15,000+ reviews documents a real pattern: automated risk systems flag accounts, freeze funds and leave merchants chasing tickets. If your business depends on payment continuity, that’s a structural risk.

Third, no free chargeback protection. Stripe Chargeback Protection costs +0.4% per transaction, which Shopify Payments includes free via Shopify Protect on fraud cases.

Fourth, no storefront. You’re running Stripe on WordPress, Squarespace or a custom build, so factor that hosting and maintenance cost in.

Fifth, support is async-first with no consistent 24/7 phone channel for everyone. Fine if you have engineers; thin if you don’t.

Downsides of Shopify

Shopify Payments has four structural constraints to weigh. First and most fundamental: platform lock-in. The processor won’t follow you to WooCommerce, Magento or a headless build.

If you ever move off Shopify, you integrate a new gateway from scratch. That’s a quarter of engineering work, not a sprint.

Second, the Shopify subscription is part of the price of admission. You pay £25–£344/month for the storefront whether you process £500 or £50,000 of card volume.

A “Shopify Payments is cheaper” argument that ignores the floor is incomplete, it’s only true once your platform-value calculation already justifies Shopify.

Third, international card rates. Shopify Payments charges 3.6% + 25p (Basic) or 3.2% + 25p (Advanced) on non-UK cards. Stripe charges 2.5% + 20p on EEA.

For a Shopify Plus retailer at £80k/month split 50/50 UK and EU, the international premium adds up: roughly £5,000/year more than Stripe’s EEA rate would be.

Fourth, no standalone developer API. If you want to take Shopify Payments into a mobile app, a headless front-end or a custom checkout, you can’t.

Alternatives to Stripe and Shopify

Square is the right pick if you want a free POS app, a cheap reader and a flat in-person rate without a monthly subscription. The Square Reader is £19. In-person rate: 1.75% flat across every card type (verify current pricing at squareup.com/gb/en/payments).

If you’re a Manchester market trader, a mobile dog groomer or a small-batch food producer at a Friday Faire pop-up, Square ships you a working reader by post and you’re taking cards in a week.

Don’t pick Square if you need complex subscriptions, marketplace payouts or SaaS billing, different shape of business entirely.

GoCardless is the right call for any UK subscription business whose customers are happy to pay by bank account rather than card. Bacs Direct Debit at 1% + 20p, capped at £4 per payment (verify current pricing at gocardless.com/gb).

Run the numbers. A Birmingham B2B Shopify store with 200 wholesale accounts paying £150/month by Direct Debit pays roughly £300/month in GoCardless fees (cap-bound) vs £490/month on Stripe at the same volume. That’s £2,280/year saved.

GoCardless doesn’t replace your card processor. Most subscription businesses run it alongside Stripe or Shopify Payments for customers who insist on card.

PayPal Braintree earns a look if you want global payment method breadth plus the PayPal wallet at checkout. PayPal is used by over 350 million consumers globally, and for D2C brands with an over-45 customer base, “do you take PayPal?” still comes up in customer support tickets.

Braintree’s API depth is broadly comparable to Stripe’s, so a technical team won’t be hamstrung. The downside is wallet pricing.

The standard PayPal wallet button charges 2.9% + 30p, more than double Shopify Payments Advanced and well above Stripe’s card rate. Bolt it on as a secondary wallet, not as your primary processor.

Final Verdict: Stripe or Shopify?

If you’re on Shopify, use Shopify Payments. The 2% Basic, 1% Shopify plan, 0.5% Advanced penalty makes anything else economically indefensible in almost every scenario. Shopify Protect, Shop Pay’s checkout lift and 24/7 support all reinforce the call.

The exceptions are narrow: high-risk categories Shopify Payments declines, or merchants who need Open Banking, UnionPay or Alipay at checkout.

If you’re not on Shopify, Stripe is the default. WooCommerce, Magento, Squarespace, custom checkouts, SaaS billing, marketplace payouts, the API, Connect and Billing are built exactly for these jobs. Shopify Payments isn’t an option you can pick.

That’s why this is a platform decision dressed up as a processor decision. Pick your storefront first; the processor follows the storefront.

On Shopify, the penalty fee makes Shopify Payments the only rational choice on standard tiers. Off Shopify, the choice was already made the day you picked your platform. The arithmetic is doing the work.

Frequently Asked Questions

Can I use Shopify Payments without a Shopify store?

No. Shopify Payments only works for merchants with an active Shopify storefront subscription. There’s no standalone access and no API to plug in elsewhere.

If you’re on WooCommerce, Magento, Squarespace or a custom build, you use Stripe (or PayPal Braintree, GoCardless, Worldpay or another acquirer). Shopify Payments isn’t in the conversation.

What happens if I use Stripe on Shopify?

Shopify charges a third-party transaction penalty when you use a gateway other than Shopify Payments: 2.0% on Basic, 1.0% on Shopify, 0.5% on Advanced. It sits on top of whatever Stripe charges you.

So a Basic merchant using Stripe pays an effective 3.5% + 20p per sale, against Shopify Payments at 2.0% + 25p. On £15k/month that’s £300 a month, £3,600 a year, lighter in your bank account. For most Shopify merchants, Stripe is the more expensive configuration despite the lower headline rate.

Is Shopify Payments or Stripe cheaper?

It depends entirely on which platform you’re on.

If you’re on Shopify, Shopify Payments is cheaper. The third-party penalty makes Stripe more expensive even though Stripe’s headline 1.5% + 20p looks lower than Shopify Payments Basic at 2.0% + 25p.

If you’re not on Shopify, Stripe at 1.5% + 20p with no monthly floor is competitive and Shopify Payments isn’t available. Comparing rates without accounting for the penalty is meaningless.

Is Shopify Payments FCA regulated?

Yes. Shopify International Limited (trading as Shopify Payments) is authorised by the FCA as an Electronic Money Institution, FRN 900645 (FCA register, 20 May 2026).

Stripe Payments UK Limited is FCA-authorised as an EMI too, FRN 900461, authorised since 2 May 2018. Both are PCI DSS Level 1 compliant and handle SCA/3DS2 automatically on UK transactions.

Does Shopify Payments support subscriptions?

Yes, for the right kind of subscription. Shopify’s native Subscriptions app handles subscribe-and-save, monthly serum refills, replenishment boxes and membership models, all running through Shopify Payments at no extra processing fee.

Third-party apps like Recharge, Bold and Seal cover more complex logic for an extra monthly app fee.

For metered billing, per-seat SaaS pricing or annual contracts with mid-cycle plan changes, Stripe Billing is the stronger product, and Shopify isn’t the right platform for SaaS in the first place.

Is Shopify Capital available in the UK?

Yes. Shopify Capital has been available to eligible UK merchants since 2020. It’s a merchant cash advance: you receive a lump sum upfront and repay it as a fixed percentage of daily sales until the advance plus a fixed fee is cleared. Stripe Capital is also available in the UK on similar terms.

Neither is a business loan in the traditional sense, both are revenue-based financing tied to your processing volume. Eligibility depends on your processing history with the provider, not on a standard credit check.