Payhip vs Shopify
A source-aware comparison of pricing, documented capabilities and workflow fit.
Short answer
- Price: not directly comparable — Payhip is free tier available, Shopify is from $19/mo billed annually.
- How to start: Payhip is free tier available, Shopify is from $19/mo billed annually.
- Where they differ: only Shopify has public api, mobile app and sso (saml).
These lines are generated from the pricing we track, not from a paid placement. How we score tools.
What Payhip is
What Payhip isPayhip sells digital products, courses and memberships with the storefront, checkout and EU VAT handling included. It handles the part most creators get wrong on their own: EU VAT is calculated and remitted rather than left as a problem for later. It is a storefront rather than a marketing platform, so audience building still happens somewhere else.
What Shopify is
What Shopify isShopify is the world's most powerful e-commerce platform, designed for everyone from individual sellers to billion-dollar global brands. It lets you open a professional store without worrying about server management or security updates. The 'Shopify App Store' adds thousands of extra features, while 'Shop Pay' offers the world's fastest checkout experience. Shopify is not just software; it is the operating system for global internet commerce.
Side by side
| Payhip | Shopify | |
|---|---|---|
| Category | E-commerce | E-commerce |
| How to start | Free tiernot a monthly price | $19/moverified |
| Public API | No | Yes |
| Mobile app | No | Yes |
| Open source / self-hostable | No | No |
| SSO (SAML) | No | Yes |
| Visit | Payhip ↗ | Shopify ↗ |
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What Payhip is built to do
- Digital product delivery
- Hosts files and delivers them securely after payment.
- EU VAT handling
- Calculates and applies VAT rules on digital sales automatically.
- Courses and memberships
- Sells recurring access alongside one-off downloads.
What Shopify is built to do
- Online Store Builder
- Design professional, SEO-friendly stores using drag-and-drop tools.
- Shop Pay
- Reduce cart abandonment by offering customers a one-click checkout experience.
- Shopify Audiences
- Use AI data to spend your ad budget on the most accurate potential buyers.
- Global Commerce
- Instantly translate your site into different languages and local currencies.
Choose Payhip if
- Creators who want to launch without a monthly bill: the Free Forever plan carries a 5% transaction fee but has unlimited products and unlimited revenue
- Sellers who dislike feature gating — Payhip states every plan includes all features, so the plan only changes the transaction fee
- EU and UK sellers of digital goods: Payhip collects and remits EU and UK VAT on your behalf automatically
Skip Payhip if
- Your volume is high and steady — a percentage of every sale eventually costs more than a flat platform fee, and Plus still takes 2%
- You expect the platform fee to be the only cost: PayPal and Stripe charge their standard rates on top, on every plan
- You need a published price before deciding — the monthly figures on the pricing page render client-side; only the fee tiers are in the page text
Choose Shopify if
- Selling online without running your own infrastructure
- Starting cheaply — $1/month for the first 3 months after a 3-day trial
- Stores that will use Shopify Payments, which avoids the extra platform cut
Skip Shopify if
- You are budgeting from the offer — $1/mo lasts 3 months; Basic is $19/mo annual ($27 monthly) after that
- You use an external payment provider: Shopify takes an extra 2% on Basic on top of your processor's fee
- You want to own the platform; you are renting a hosted store
Evidence and freshness
Where a claim on this page comes from a vendor page, it is linked here.
Payhip: pros & cons
- Handles EU VAT for you
- No monthly fee on the free plan
- Covers downloads, courses and memberships
- Transaction fee on the free plan
- Storefront customisation is limited
- Smaller ecosystem than dedicated platforms
Shopify: pros & cons
- Rapid Start: Launch a professional store in minutes with no technical hurdles.
- Huge Ecosystem: There is a Shopify app for virtually every feature you might need.
- High Reliability: Your site remains stable even during the heaviest shopping holidays.
- Shopify POS: Manage your physical and digital stores from a single unified inventory.
- Transaction Fees: Charges extra commission if you don't use Shopify Payments.
- App Costs: Monthly subscription costs for apps can add up very quickly.
- Customization Limits: Deep design changes require knowledge of the 'Liquid' code.
Our verdict on Payhip
A practical starting point, and the VAT handling saves real work.
Our verdict on Shopify
The world's best platform for starting, growing, and scaling an e-commerce empire.
Published plans, side by side
Every figure below was read from the vendor's own pricing page and is shown with the sentence it came from. Where a vendor publishes no plan prices, we say so rather than guess.
Payhip
- Free Forever$0/mo
Free Forever: +5% transaction fee, all features, unlimited products, unlimited revenue
Shopify
- Basic$19/mo billed annually
Basic $19/mo annual, $27 monthly
- Grow$54/mo billed annually
Grow $54/mo annual, $72 monthly
- Advanced$299/mo billed annually
Advanced $299/mo annual, $399 monthly
Payhip vs Shopify: common questions
- Does Payhip or Shopify have a free plan?
- Payhip has a free tier with limits, while Shopify has no free plan listed.
- What is the difference between Payhip and Shopify?
- On the criteria we check, only Shopify has public api, mobile app and sso (saml). The table above lists every criterion side by side.