What a Shopify store costs in Pakistan
Every line item in a Pakistani Shopify store, which ones are fixed by Shopify and which ones a developer sets, and how to read a quote.
Ask three developers in Karachi what a Shopify store costs and you will get three numbers that cannot be compared, because each one prices a different store. The honest answer is a list, not a figure: a handful of costs Shopify sets and you cannot negotiate, and a handful a developer sets that you can.
What does Shopify itself charge?
A monthly plan fee, billed in US dollars to a card, with a cheaper rate if you pay for the year up front. The plans and prices are on Shopify's own pricing page, and Shopify adjusts them by country, so read that page from Pakistan rather than trusting a figure in an old blog post. Most small stores start on the lowest plan and only move up when staff accounts or reporting demand it.
How do payments work for a store in Pakistan?
Shopify's own card processing, Shopify Payments, is not offered to businesses in Pakistan. So a store here either connects a local payment gateway or takes cash on delivery, and most do both. Each gateway charges its own fee per transaction, and Shopify adds a small fee of its own on orders paid through an outside gateway. Cash on delivery costs nothing to switch on, but it brings returns and refused parcels, which are a real cost even if no invoice shows them.
| Line item | Who sets it | Paid how |
|---|---|---|
| Shopify plan | Shopify | Monthly, in dollars |
| Theme | Theme maker, or free | Once |
| Apps | Each app's maker | Mostly monthly |
| Domain | Domain registrar | Yearly |
| Payment gateway | The gateway | Per order |
| Courier and returns | The courier | Per parcel |
| Setup and product pages | Your developer | Once |
| Photographs | Your photographer | Per shoot |
What does a developer charge for, and what is it worth?
The build: choosing and setting up the theme, connecting the gateway and the courier, writing the product pages, setting shipping rules for cash on delivery, and making the checkout work on a cheap phone on a slow connection, because that is where most Pakistani orders are placed. A free theme set up well beats a paid theme set up badly. The part worth paying for is the product page: the words and pictures that make a stranger trust a store they found ten seconds ago.
Why do apps quietly double the bill?
Because each one is cheap on its own and billed monthly forever. Reviews, upsells, a WhatsApp button, a size chart, a currency switcher: a store can collect a dozen in its first year, each adding to the bill and to the page's load time. Before installing one, ask whether the theme already does it. Most good themes do more than their owners know.
How do we price a store?
We price a store build and its photography per project, under our Tailored tier, because a ten-product store and a store with hundreds of variants are different amounts of work. The ads that send people to it are Starter's ads option at $2,000 a month, with the spend separate and in your own account. Every account, the store, the domain and the ad account, is in your name from the first day.
What should a quote include?
- Every running cost you will pay after launch, listed, not just the build fee.
- Which apps it assumes, and what each one costs a month.
- Who owns the store, the domain and the theme licence when the work ends. It should be you.
- How the checkout handles cash on delivery and a local gateway together.
- Who writes the product pages and who takes the photographs.
When is Shopify the wrong choice?
When almost every sale closes in Instagram messages and is paid in cash at the door. A store then mostly serves as a catalogue, and a well-kept Instagram account with a clear order process may do the same job for less. Build the store when buyers want to check out without talking to anyone, or when the ads need a page to send people to.