Shopify Store Setup Cost in India: A Full Year-One Breakdown
By GOSHU Digital · Last updated:
In short
On our worked example, a Shopify store in India costs about ₹34,000 to ₹59,000 in year one if you set it up yourself on the Basic plan, and about ₹81,000 to ₹2.3 lakh if a freelancer or agency builds it on a premium theme, before payment and shipping fees. On top of that, every prepaid order carries two charges: your gateway's fee and, because Shopify Payments isn't available in India, Shopify's own third-party transaction fee (2% on Basic).
Shopify's plan price is the number everyone quotes, but it is rarely the biggest part of your Shopify store setup cost in India. For an Indian store the real bill is the plan plus 18% GST, a payment gateway fee on every prepaid order, Shopify's own fee on those same orders, a few app subscriptions, shipping, and whatever you pay someone to build the store.
This guide puts a rupee figure on each of those, using Shopify's India pricing page, Razorpay's published rates and price ranges published by Indian Shopify developers, all linked under Sources. Shopify changes its prices from time to time, so check Shopify's India pricing page before you commit. These are platform prices and market ranges, not GOSHU Digital's own prices.
Shopify plan prices in India
Shopify sells four main plans in India, priced in rupees. Paying yearly cuts roughly a quarter off the monthly price: on Basic you pay ₹1,499 a month instead of ₹1,994, a saving of ₹5,940 over a year.
| Plan | Billed monthly | Billed yearly (per month) | Fee on third-party gateway payments | Extra staff accounts |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Basic | ₹1,994 | ₹1,499 | 2% | Not included |
| Grow | ₹7,447 | ₹5,599 | 1% | Up to 5 |
| Advanced | ₹30,164 | ₹22,680 | 0.6% | Up to 15 |
| Plus | From ₹1,75,000 | Not listed | 0.2% | Unlimited |
Shopify's India pricing page also advertises a 3-day free trial, then ₹20 a month for the first 3 months on most plans, after which standard pricing applies. That is a cheap window to build and test your store, so do your setup work inside it.
Which plan should a new store start on?
Most new Indian stores should start on Basic. It includes a full online store with unlimited products, and it is the plan most small sellers stay on for their first year. Grow earns its higher price for one of two reasons: you need staff accounts for a team, or your prepaid sales are large enough that its lower transaction fee covers the bigger subscription. The break-even is worked out in the payment fees section below. Advanced and Plus are for established brands with high volumes or complex operations.
GST on your Shopify bill
Indian businesses pay 18% GST on top of Shopify's subscription, and on apps and transaction fees billed through Shopify. If you are GST-registered, add your GSTIN to your Shopify billing details so you can claim input tax credit; without a GSTIN, that GST is simply a cost.
With GST, Basic on yearly billing works out to about ₹1,769 a month, or ₹21,226 for the year. On monthly billing it is about ₹2,353 a month.
This is separate from the GST you charge your own customers. That is set up in the store's tax settings with your GSTIN and the HSN codes for your products, and an invoice app turns each order into a proper tax invoice.
Payment gateway and transaction fees
This is the cost that grows with your sales, and the one first-time sellers most often underestimate. Shopify Payments is not available in India, so every Indian Shopify store takes online payments through a third-party gateway such as Razorpay, Cashfree or PayU. That means up to three things to understand on each order:
- The gateway's fee. Razorpay's standard rate is 2% per successful domestic transaction (cards, UPI, netbanking and wallets), plus 18% GST on that fee, with no setup fee or annual maintenance charge. International cards cost up to 3%. Cashfree's published standard rate is similar, at around 1.95% plus GST, and gateways often run launch offers for new merchants.
- Shopify's third-party transaction fee. 2% on Basic, 1% on Grow, 0.6% on Advanced and 0.2% on Plus, charged on orders paid through an external gateway.
- No Shopify fee on cash on delivery. Shopify doesn't charge third-party transaction fees on manual payment methods such as COD. Your courier's COD handling charge and the cost of refused parcels still apply.
| Plan | Razorpay fee + GST | Shopify fee + GST | Total per ₹1,000 order |
|---|---|---|---|
| Basic | ₹23.60 | ₹23.60 | ₹47.20 (4.7%) |
| Grow | ₹23.60 | ₹11.80 | ₹35.40 (3.5%) |
| Advanced | ₹23.60 | ₹7.08 | ₹30.68 (3.1%) |
| Plus | ₹23.60 | ₹2.36 | ₹25.96 (2.6%) |
When upgrading to Grow pays for itself
Grow costs ₹4,100 a month more than Basic on yearly billing (₹5,599 against ₹1,499) but saves 1% on every prepaid rupee. The two lines cross at about ₹4.1 lakh of prepaid sales a month. On monthly billing the gap is ₹5,453, so the break-even rises to about ₹5.45 lakh. GST applies to both sides, so it doesn't change the answer.
Only prepaid orders count. If 40% of your orders are COD, you need total sales of around ₹6.8 lakh a month before Grow pays off on fees alone. The same maths puts the move from Grow to Advanced at roughly ₹42.7 lakh of prepaid sales a month on yearly billing, which is why few Indian stores need Advanced for the fee saving alone.
Theme cost
Shopify's Theme Store includes a set of free themes made by Shopify, which are well built and enough for many new stores. Paid themes on the Theme Store are listed at roughly $150 to $450 and billed in US dollars, so the rupee price moves with the exchange rate. Indian pricing guides put premium themes at about ₹10,000 to ₹30,000 as a one-time purchase.
A fully custom theme, designed and coded for your brand, is a different budget: Indian developers publish ranges of roughly ₹80,000 to ₹3.5 lakh for custom theme development. Most new stores are better off customising a good free or paid theme and spending the difference on product photography.
Buy the theme from your own Shopify account. A theme bought on someone else's account or licence can't always be moved to your store, and you may end up paying for it twice.
Apps: the cost that keeps growing
Shopify's core is deliberately lean, so most extra features come from apps, and most useful apps charge monthly. Indian guides put individual paid apps at roughly ₹500 to ₹5,000 a month each, and a typical stack of five to eight apps at ₹8,000 to ₹40,000 a month for an established store. Many apps are priced in US dollars, and GST is added to app charges billed through Shopify.
Apps that Indian stores commonly add:
- GST invoice generation with HSN codes and the CGST, SGST and IGST split
- COD verification by OTP or WhatsApp confirmation
- Shipping aggregator integration for labels, pickups and tracking
- WhatsApp order and delivery notifications
- Product reviews, and a pincode or delivery-date checker
Every app adds scripts that can slow your store on mobile. Install apps for problems you actually have, review the list every few months, and remove leftovers completely. A slow Shopify store is usually an app problem first, which is where our website speed optimization work starts.
Domain, shipping and other running costs
Domain. A .com or .in domain costs roughly ₹800 to ₹1,500 a year, depending on the registrar and its renewal price. Register it in your business's name and keep the login yourself.
Shipping. Shipping aggregators let you compare courier rates in one dashboard. Shiprocket, for example, lists a free Lite plan and paid plans from ₹199 to ₹799 a month, with average shipment costs on its pricing page of about ₹36 to ₹45. Your real rate depends on parcel weight, distance and whether the order is COD, so budget per order rather than per month.
Email and marketing. A branded business inbox and email or WhatsApp marketing tools are usually separate subscriptions. Leave room for them in the monthly budget even if you start without them.
Upkeep. Shopify looks after hosting and security, so there are no server updates to pay for, but someone still has to add products, update banners, fix app settings and keep policies current. Count either your own time or a small monthly support arrangement.
Build cost: doing it yourself vs hiring a developer
The biggest one-off cost is getting the store built. Published ranges from Indian Shopify developers vary widely, because 'set up a Shopify store' can mean anything from installing a free theme to a fully custom headless build. These are market ranges, not GOSHU Digital's prices.
| Type of build | What it usually covers | Published range |
|---|---|---|
| Do it yourself | Free or paid theme, your own product uploads and settings | No build fee; your time plus the theme |
| Basic theme setup | Theme installation, branding, collections, payment and shipping connections | ₹25,000 to ₹80,000 |
| Customised theme store | A paid or free theme with custom sections, layouts and integrations | ₹80,000 to ₹1.5 lakh |
| Custom theme or custom store | A theme designed and coded for your brand, with custom features | ₹80,000 to ₹3.5 lakh; advanced stores ₹3 lakh to ₹6 lakh and up |
| Headless or Shopify Plus build | A custom storefront, for example in Next.js, on top of Shopify, or Plus-level work | ₹6 lakh to ₹15 lakh and up |
Freelancers often quote 30 to 50% below agencies for the same theme customisation, according to Creator City. The difference usually shows up around the build: payments, COD rules, GST invoices, testing and support after launch. Compare quotes on scope, not just the headline number.
What a setup quote should include
- The store created on your own Shopify account, with the developer added as a collaborator
- The theme bought on your account, and a list of every paid app with its monthly cost
- Payment gateway, COD rules, shipping and GST invoice setup, not just the design
- How many products and collections they will upload, and the format you supply them in
- Policy pages, domain connection, Google Search Console and analytics setup
- Testing of prepaid, COD, refund and cancellation orders before launch
- Training for your team, and what support is included after launch
Red flags in very cheap Shopify setups
- The store is created on the developer's account and will be 'transferred later'
- A very low price that leaves out product upload, payments or shipping setup
- A long list of apps installed on free trials that start billing after launch
- No mention of COD, RTO or GST, which suggests a template quote not written for India
- Theme files from outside the Shopify Theme Store with no licence or updates
Worked example: a year-one Shopify budget
Here is how the numbers add up for a small Indian store selling 100 orders a month at an average of ₹1,000, with 60% paid online and 40% by cash on delivery. The first column is a store you set up yourself; the second is a store built for you on a premium theme.
| Cost item | Lean, set up yourself | Built by a freelancer or agency |
|---|---|---|
| Shopify Basic, yearly billing, incl. 18% GST | ₹21,226 | ₹21,226 |
| Domain for one year | ₹800 to ₹1,500 | ₹800 to ₹1,500 |
| Theme | ₹0 (free theme) | ₹10,000 to ₹30,000 (premium theme) |
| Apps for 12 months | ₹12,000 to ₹36,000 (2 apps at ₹500 to ₹1,500 a month) | ₹24,000 to ₹96,000 (4 apps at ₹500 to ₹2,000 a month) |
| Store build | ₹0 (your own time) | ₹25,000 to ₹80,000 (theme-based setup) |
| Total before payment and shipping fees | About ₹34,000 to ₹59,000 | About ₹81,000 to ₹2.3 lakh |
Then add payment fees
At ₹1 lakh of monthly sales with 60% prepaid, ₹60,000 a month goes through Razorpay on the Basic plan. That costs about ₹1,416 a month in gateway fees and another ₹1,416 in Shopify's transaction fee, both including GST: roughly ₹2,832 a month, or about ₹34,000 a year. The 40 COD orders carry no Shopify fee, but courier COD charges and any refused parcels come out of your margin.
So a realistic first-year budget for this store is the fixed costs above, plus around ₹34,000 in payment fees, plus shipping. The payment line grows with your sales; almost everything else stays flat.
Shopify vs WooCommerce: how the costs compare
WooCommerce, the free ecommerce plugin for WordPress, is the main alternative for Indian sellers. It charges no monthly platform fee, but you pay separately for the things Shopify bundles in.
| Cost item | Shopify | WooCommerce |
|---|---|---|
| Platform fee | Monthly plan, from ₹1,499 a month on yearly billing, plus GST | None; WordPress and WooCommerce are free |
| Hosting and security | Included in the plan | You arrange hosting, SSL, backups and security monitoring |
| Fee on online payments | Gateway fee plus Shopify's 2% to 0.2% third-party fee | Gateway fee only |
| Software updates | Handled by Shopify | WordPress, theme and plugin updates are your job |
| Themes and add-ons | Theme Store themes; apps mostly billed monthly | Many free plugins; premium themes and extensions are paid |
| Who can work on it | Shopify developers | WordPress developers, widely available in India |
On fees alone, WooCommerce usually comes out cheaper once prepaid sales are significant, because there is no platform cut. Shopify wins on time: no servers, plugin conflicts or security patches to manage. If you choose WooCommerce, budget for good hosting and ongoing maintenance from the start; our website maintenance cost guide explains what that typically involves.
How to keep Shopify costs under control
- Pay yearly once you are sure about Shopify; it saves about a quarter on the plan.
- Use the low-cost introductory months to build and test the store before full billing starts.
- Start on a free theme or one premium theme, not a custom design.
- Add apps one at a time, for problems you actually have, and cancel trials you don't keep.
- Add your GSTIN to Shopify billing so the GST on your Shopify charges becomes claimable input tax credit.
- Recheck the Basic vs Grow break-even every quarter as prepaid sales grow.
- Nudge COD buyers towards UPI with a small prepaid discount; fewer refused parcels can easily outweigh the discount.
Getting your store built
If you would rather hand the setup to someone else, our ecommerce website development service covers platform choice, payments, COD rules, shipping and GST setup for Indian stores, on Shopify, WooCommerce or a custom storefront. For website budgets beyond Shopify, see our website development cost guide.
Sources
- Shopify — Plans and pricing (India)
- Shopify Help Center — Shopify Payments supported countries
- Shopify Help Center — Manual payment methods
- Shopify Theme Store
- Razorpay — Pricing
- Cashfree Payments — Payment gateway charges
- PayGlocal — Shopify price in India guide (GST, apps, themes, domain)
- Creator City — Shopify website development cost in India
- First Launch — Shopify website cost in India
- Shiprocket — Pricing
- WooCommerce — Platform overview
