What are website builder transaction fees?

What it means

When you sell something online, two different companies can take a cut. The payment gateway charges for processing the card, often around 2.9% + $0.30. Some website builders then take their own percentage on top. That second cut is the transaction fee.

Builders use it to push sellers onto higher plans. The cheap plan has a fee; the pricier plan removes it. Whether upgrading is worth it depends on how much you sell.

How it works

The fee is a flat percentage of each order. It is taken automatically, so you may only notice it in your sales or billing reports. The gateway’s processing fee still applies even on a “0% transaction fee” plan.

Some platforms charge different rates for different kinds of sales. Squarespace, for example, has one rate for physical store sales and another for digital content and memberships.

Why it matters when you build a site

A 2% fee sounds small until you multiply it. At $40,000 a year in sales, 2% is $800 a year, or $2,400 over three years. That is why our true 3-year cost method always adds fees to the plan price.

The fix is usually a simple break-even check: divide the extra yearly cost of the 0% plan by the fee rate.

• Squarespace: Core costs $10 a month more than Basic billed yearly ($120 a year). At a 2% fee, Core pays for itself once you sell more than $6,000 a year.
• Webflow: Ecommerce Plus costs $45 a month more than Standard billed yearly ($540 a year). At 2%, Plus pays off above $27,000 a year in sales.
• Shopify: a third-party gateway on Basic adds 2%, or $800 on $40,000 of sales. Switching to Shopify Payments removes it. Moving to Grow cuts the fee to 1% but costs $50 a month more billed yearly ($600 a year), so on the fee alone Grow only pays off above $60,000 a year.
• WordPress.com: Business costs $21 a month more than Personal billed yearly ($252 a year). At 10%, Business pays off above $2,520 a year in payment-button sales.

How the big builders handle it

Notes from the platforms’ own pages:

• Squarespace lists Basic at $19 a month billed yearly ($25 billed monthly) and Core at $29 billed yearly ($39 billed monthly). The digital content rate covers Digital Content & Memberships sales.
• Shopify charges no extra fee when you use Shopify Payments. The third-party fee is added on top of that gateway’s own charges.
• Webflow Ecommerce Standard is $29 a month billed yearly ($39 billed monthly); Plus is $74 billed yearly ($99 billed monthly). Stripe or PayPal fees come on top.
• WordPress.com Personal and Premium only offer payment buttons. A full WooCommerce store needs Business ($25 a month billed yearly, $40 billed monthly) or Commerce.
• Framer has no built-in store, so there is no fee to compare.

Common mistakes

• Mixing up processing and transaction fees. A “0% transaction fee” plan still pays card processing.
• Forgetting digital products. Courses and memberships can carry a different, higher rate.
• Not rechecking as you grow. The cheap plan that made sense at launch can cost more than an upgrade a year later.
• Ignoring gateway lock-in. On Shopify, using PayPal or another provider as your main gateway triggers the extra fee.

Related terms

• Payment gateway: the processing side of every sale.
• Plugin: on WordPress, the store itself is a free plugin, WooCommerce.

Run your own numbers in our cost calculator or see the best builders for online stores.