Best payment gateway picks by business type
Best no-code store, online and in person: Square
Square is the one to choose if you don’t have a developer and you also sell face to face. Its free plan gives you a hosted online store, payment links and an API with no monthly fee, and the same product catalogue runs your counter till, so your stock and sales sit in one place. UK cards cost 1.4% + 25p online.
Customers abroad cost you more here. Non-UK cards are 2.5% + 25p, so a shop selling mostly to buyers in Europe will pay a little less with Stripe or Airwallex, which both charge EEA cards at a lower fixed fee or percentage.
Visit SquareBest for a developer-built checkout: Stripe
Stripe suits a business with a developer building its own checkout. Its API handles one-off payments, subscriptions, split payments and marketplace payouts, and the documentation comes with working code a developer can copy straight into a build.
Its prices favour a customer base that is mostly UK and mostly personal cards. Standard UK cards cost 1.5% + 20p, while premium UK cards cost 2.8%, EEA cards 2.5% and other international cards 3.15%, and Stripe adds 2% whenever it converts a currency for you. Run a real month of your own sales through those bands before you commit.
Best for international and multi-currency: Airwallex
Airwallex charges 1.30% + 20p on UK cards, among the lowest of the seven, but you’d choose it for the way it handles currency. You can hold the money in 20+ currencies as it arrives, and it converts at 0.5% over the interbank rate only when you decide to.
For a business taking payment in euros or dollars, that is a real saving on a processor that converts for you at 2%, as Stripe does. Our international payment gateways guide has the cross-border detail.
Cheapest for UK and EU consumer cards: Mollie
Mollie charges the least of our seven on standard UK personal Visa and Mastercard cards, at 1.20% + 20p, with no monthly fee and plugins for most shop platforms.
That price only holds while your customers pay on personal UK cards. European cards and UK business cards cost 2.90% + 20p, and everything else 3.25% + 20p, so a shop with many trade or EU customers can end up paying Mollie more than it would pay Stripe.
Revolut Business charges less again on paper: 1% + 20p on UK personal cards online, 2.8% + 20p on business and international cards, and 1.7% + 20p on Amex. Card payments come with a Revolut Business account, though, and its plans start at £10 a month. If you already bank with Revolut, it’s worth pricing against Mollie. If you don’t, add the plan to the rate before you compare (revolut.com, checked 9 November 2026).
Best for Shopify stores: Shopify Payments
If you sell on Shopify, its own gateway is usually the cheaper choice, because Shopify says a third-party transaction fee may apply when you use anyone else: 2% on Basic, 1% on Grow, 0.6% on Advanced and 0.2% on Plus, on top of the other gateway’s own fee. On Basic, that 2% is more than Stripe’s whole percentage on a UK card.
Shopify Payments itself costs 2% + 25p on Basic, 1.7% + 25p on Grow, 1.5% + 25p on Advanced and 1.3% + 25p on Plus, so the plan you pay for sets your card rate as well as your features. Basic costs £19 a month paid yearly, or £25 paid monthly (shopify.com/uk, checked 9 November 2026).
Best established acquirer and gateway: Worldpay
Worldpay now publishes pay-as-you-go online rates: 1.3% + 20p on consumer Visa and Mastercard on its Full package, 1.5% + 20p on Essential, and 2.9% + 20p on business cards and American Express on both, with next-working-day settlement included.
The lower rate depends on what you already have. Worldpay offers Full only to businesses with a live, trading online shop and puts everyone else on Essential, so a new shop starts at 1.5% + 20p, the same as Stripe’s headline.
Larger merchants save with tailored interchange-plus pricing, where you pay the card schemes’ own costs plus Worldpay’s margin. That price is quoted rather than published, and the setup takes more work than a fintech provider’s.
Adyen, the other large name at that size, publishes its version: a fixed £0.11 per transaction, plus a fee set by the payment method, with card costs passed through at cost (interchange++). You can’t compare that with a flat headline rate until you know your card mix, which is why we’ve left Adyen out of the table.
Best wallet and BNPL second button: PayPal
As your only gateway, PayPal is expensive: 2.9% + 30p on a standard checkout payment, against Stripe’s 1.5% + 20p. It makes more sense as a second button beside your main checkout, for customers who’d rather pay from their PayPal account, or spread the cost with Pay in 3, than type card details into a site they don’t know.
PayPal prices each product separately. Its Advanced Credit and Debit Card Payments service charges 1.2% + 30p for cards, and the same rate applies when a buyer without a PayPal account pays by card. Since 1 October 2026 PayPal has also offered, on request, a tiered plan that cuts the 2.9% to 2.4% or 2.1% + 30p after a month above £4,000 or £8,000. Our Stripe vs PayPal comparison works out where each rate wins.
Best payment gateway providers
Square Payment ProcessingBest no-code online and in-person gateway
Airwallex PaymentsBest for international and multi-currency
StripeBest for custom checkout and developer control
Mollie Payments
Mollie charges the lowest UK card rate of any gateway on this list at 1.20% + £0.20, with no monthly fee and no contract.
View details →Worldpay OnlineBest established acquirer and gateway
Shopify PaymentsBuilt-in Shopify gateway
Avoids Shopify’s 0.6% to 2.0% third-party transaction fee, with payments, reporting and disputes all inside the Shopify admin.
View details →PayPal CheckoutBest for Customer Trust and BNPL
Which type of payment gateway do you need?
Before you compare rates, work out which kind of gateway fits the way your shop is built. A provider that does everything in one account, one built into your shop platform and a separate acquirer each price differently, and a bank-payment service isn’t a card gateway at all.
| Type | Examples | What it is | Best when |
|---|---|---|---|
| Full-stack PSP | Stripe, Square, Airwallex, Mollie, PayPal | Gateway, processing and acquiring in one account | Most SMEs wanting the simplest setup |
| Platform-native | Shopify Payments | Payments built into your store, priced by plan | You already sell on that platform |
| Acquirer + gateway | Worldpay, Adyen, Checkout.com | Separate acquiring relationship and underwriting | Higher volume, bespoke rates at scale |
| Bank-payment alternative | GoCardless | Direct Debit and Pay by Bank, not cards | Subscriptions and invoice collection |
A full-stack payment service provider (PSP) signs you up under its own merchant account, so you don’t arrange a separate acquiring contract. It still checks your business when you apply, and it can hold funds later if your sales change sharply. A separate acquirer is a contract of your own, slower to set up, and it can work out cheaper once your volume is high.
Whichever type you pick, a hosted or embedded checkout keeps card numbers off your own server, which keeps your share of the card industry’s security standard (PCI DSS) to the shortest self-assessment. Every gateway here also runs the 3D Secure checks that UK rules on strong customer authentication require on most online card payments.
Payment gateway fees compared
Which gateway costs you least depends on three things about your sales: how much each order is worth, where your customers’ cards were issued, and whether they pay on personal or business cards. A business taking mostly company or overseas cards will pay well above the advertised rate with almost every provider here, because those cards sit in the dearer bands.
The sums below use published rates from 5 October 2026, rechecked on 9 November, and leave out chargebacks, payouts and currency conversion unless we say otherwise.
Square versus Stripe: at which transaction value does each become cheaper?
On standard UK personal cards, Square charges 1.4% + 25p online and Stripe 1.5% + 20p, and the two cost exactly the same on a £50 sale.
Below that, Stripe is cheaper because its fixed fee is 5p lower, and that outweighs its percentage being 0.1 points higher. Above £50, Square’s lower percentage starts to count for more than the extra 5p, so Square becomes the cheaper of the two.
| Transaction value | Square (1.4% + 25p) | Stripe std UK (1.5% + 20p) | Cheaper |
|---|---|---|---|
| £10 | £0.39 | £0.35 | Stripe |
| £20 | £0.53 | £0.50 | Stripe |
| £30 | £0.67 | £0.65 | Stripe |
| £50 | £0.95 | £0.95 | Tie |
| £100 | £1.65 | £1.70 | Square |
| £200 | £3.05 | £3.20 | Square |
Formula: cost = (percentage × transaction value) + fixed fee. Standard UK consumer Visa and Mastercard only. For premium/business UK cards, Stripe rises to 2.8% + 20p; for EEA cards to 2.5% + 20p; Square’s non-UK rate is 2.5% + 25p.
Rates verified from provider pricing pages, 5 October 2026. For the full comparison including in-person and B2B card rates, see our Stripe vs Square guide.
Low-volume UK-only service business
Take 100 payments a month at £60 each, all on standard UK personal cards, so £6,000 of sales. Mollie at 1.20% + 20p costs about £92, Worldpay about £98 on Full or £110 on Essential, Square about £109 and Stripe about £110. When every card is a standard UK one, Mollie’s low rate wins among our seven. Revolut Business would cost about £80 in card fees, and with at least £10 for its plan it still undercuts Mollie by about £2.
Ecommerce with a mixed card base
Now take 500 payments at £45 each (£22,500): 70% on standard UK personal cards, 10% on premium or business UK cards and 20% on EEA cards, with the last two at each provider’s higher rate.
Stripe comes to about £510 and Mollie about £485, so Mollie is still around £25 cheaper. That gap closes as the share of premium, business and European cards grows, because both charge well above their 1.2% to 1.5% headline for those. Revolut Business, at 1% + 20p and 2.8% + 20p on the rest, would come to about £447 plus its plan.
International seller needing multi-currency settlement
Here we took 300 payments at £80 each (£24,000), split 40% UK, 30% EEA and 30% international, with the money kept in more than one currency. Stripe runs to about £900 once its 2% conversion fee applies to the 60% of sales taken in other currencies. Airwallex comes to about £585 if you keep that money in the currency it arrived in; convert all of it at Airwallex’s 0.5% and add about £72.
Before you trust any advertised rate, run a month of your own sales through these bands. Our payment gateway fees guide explains each type of fee in full.
Alternatives for recurring and invoice payments
GoCardless takes payment from your customer’s bank account rather than a card, so we’ve kept it out of the card table above.
For subscriptions, memberships and invoices it is usually cheaper than taking a card. Direct Debit costs 1% + 20p on the Standard plan, capped at £4, and once a customer has signed the mandate you can collect each payment without asking them again.
Its Pay by Bank service, formerly Instant Bank Pay, handles one-off bank payments through open banking, with no card fee. Stripe sells a Pay by Bank option too, at 0.5% + 20p capped at £5 (stripe.com, checked 9 November 2026).
Allow for one delay. The first collection on a new mandate can take up to a week to arrive, so if you move a customer from card to Direct Debit, plan your cash flow around that gap.
If most of your revenue is recurring, read our subscription payment gateways guide next.
Visit GoCardlessFees verified against provider pricing pages, 5 October 2026. This is editorial content, not regulated financial advice.
Frequently asked questions
Do I need a separate merchant account for a payment gateway?
Usually not. Stripe, Square, Airwallex, Mollie and PayPal sign you up under their own merchant account, so you don’t arrange a separate acquiring contract, although each still checks your business when you apply and can hold funds later. An acquirer such as Worldpay gives you a relationship of your own, which takes longer to set up and can work out cheaper once your volume is high.
What is the cheapest payment gateway for my transaction mix?
If almost every card you take is a personal UK card, Mollie at 1.20% + 20p is the cheapest of the seven gateways in our table. Revolut Business charges 1% + 20p, but only with a paid Business plan, so add that in before you compare. If much of your revenue arrives in foreign currencies, Airwallex usually costs less, because it doesn’t force a conversion. Run a real month of your own sales through the rates before you choose.
Is Stripe cheaper than Square for UK online payments?
Below £50 a transaction, Stripe. Above it, Square. For standard UK consumer cards the two cost exactly the same at £50 per transaction: Square at 1.4% + 25p comes to £0.95, and Stripe at 1.5% + 20p also comes to £0.95. At £100, Square costs £1.65 against Stripe at £1.70. At £10, Stripe costs £0.35 against Square at £0.39. If you take many premium, business or EEA cards, compare those rates separately: Stripe’s premium UK rate is 2.8% + 20p, which changes the calculation. Our full Stripe vs Square comparison covers more transaction values and card types.
Which payment gateway is cheapest for business and premium cards?
The cheapest advertised rate rarely holds for these cards. Stripe charges 2.8% + 20p on premium and business UK cards against 1.5% + 20p on standard ones, and Mollie 2.90% + 20p against its 1.20%. Square doesn’t publish a separate domestic premium rate; its non-UK rate is 2.5% + 25p. If most of your customers pay on company cards, check each provider’s business-card rate, because that is the rate most of your sales will pay.
Can I change gateways without rebuilding my website?
On most platforms, yes. WooCommerce, Wix and similar carts let you switch the gateway plugin without touching the rest of the site. A fully custom checkout built on one gateway’s API takes developer work to move. Shopify is the exception: leaving Shopify Payments can add a third-party fee of 0.2% to 2%, depending on your plan, on whatever gateway you switch to.
Can I use more than one payment gateway?
Yes. One setup that works well is Stripe or Square on the website, PayPal as a second button for customers who prefer it, and GoCardless for regular invoices. Running three is manageable as long as each one has its own job.
Which gateways work with Shopify, WooCommerce and Wix?
Shopify stores are usually cheapest on Shopify Payments, because any other gateway can add a platform fee. WooCommerce and Wix support Stripe, Square, Mollie and PayPal through official plugins, so on those carts the choice comes down to fees and features.
What should a high-risk business use?
Mainstream PSPs decline restricted sectors such as CBD, gambling, adult content and some financial services, and can freeze accounts that drift into them. Those businesses need a specialist acquirer. See our guide to payment gateways for high-risk businesses.
How we researched the best UK payment gateways
What we verified. We checked every provider’s published pricing page on 5 October 2026, recording rates by card origin and class: standard UK consumer, premium and commercial UK, EEA, and international.
We do not quote a single blended rate because the effective cost depends on your card mix, and a blended number hides that.
What we did not test. We did not process real transactions or access any provider’s API directly.
Where we describe integration complexity or payout timelines, we draw on each provider’s own published documentation and publicly available accounts. We flag any claim that could not be verified from a primary source.
Ranking criteria. Cost transparency and fee structure are weighted first: a provider whose pricing is clear and complete scores higher than one whose effective rate depends on undisclosed factors.
Secondary criteria are integration options, payout speed, supported payment methods, currency handling, and FCA regulatory standing.
Update cadence. We re-verify every provider when a pricing, eligibility or product change is announced. The verification date reflects the most recent full pass. If you spot a rate or policy that has changed, contact us at businessexpert.co.uk/contact.
Affiliate disclosure. Square, Airwallex and GoCardless are affiliate partners: BusinessExpert earns a commission if you sign up through those links.
Rankings and recommendations are set independently of commercial relationships. See our editorial policy for the full detail.