| Shopify plan | Plan, billed monthly | Third-party transaction fee | Fee on $20,000 of monthly sales |
|---|---|---|---|
| Basic | $39 | 2% | $400 |
| Grow | $105 | 1% | $200 |
| Advanced | $399 | 0.6% | $120 |
| Plus | From $2,300 | 0.2% | $40 |
Flint charges 3.79% + 35¢ per card payment, which covers the Stripe processing, with no plan fee and no gateway fee on top. Checkout, orders, the catalog and inventory, discounts, fulfillment, returns, and the buyer account are included.
Shopify's billing help gives the formula for each billing period:
[(cost of products - discounts) + tax + shipping charges] x rate
Take a store with $20,000 a month in sales: 400 orders averaging $50, each total including tax and shipping, all paid through a third-party provider charging 2.9% + 30¢ per order. That provider fee is $580 plus $120, or $700 a month.
| Setup | Plan | Third-party fee | Processing | Total per month |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Shopify Basic with a third-party provider | $39 | $400 | $700 | $1,139 |
| Shopify Grow with a third-party provider | $105 | $200 | $700 | $1,005 |
| Shopify Advanced with a third-party provider | $399 | $120 | $700 | $1,219 |
| Flint | $0 | $0 | $898 | $898 |
Flint's $898 is 3.79% of $20,000, $758, plus 35¢ on 400 orders, $140. Turning on Flint's automatic US sales tax adds 0.50% to payments that carry tax, at most $100 here, for $998. None of the rows include apps, themes, or Shopify's own tax pricing. For your own store, Shopify's cost is the plan, plus the plan's rate and your provider's percentage on sales, plus the provider's fixed fee per order. Flint is 3.79% of sales plus 35¢ per order, and above $50,000 a month you can ask Flint for negotiated terms.
The usual next idea is to keep Shopify for the catalog and send buyers to a cheaper checkout. Shopify's API terms close that door: section 2.3.18 says that, without Shopify's express written authorization, an API user may not "use an alternative to Shopify Checkout for checkout or payment processing for Shopify Merchants." Headless Shopify storefronts end the same way: Shopify's docs say the Cart API "redirects to Shopify's Web Checkout."
So the choice is between Shopify Payments and leaving the fee behind with the platform. Flint takes the second path: the store's backend moves to Flint, and your storefront keeps its design. The headless Shopify checkout page walks through it for a Hydrogen, Next.js, or Remix storefront.
Flint is a commerce API for ecommerce with a hosted checkout and a buyer account. Export your products from Shopify as a CSV and create each one with its options, variants, and stock. Keeping the Shopify handle in metadata lets your existing URLs resolve:
curl -X POST https://api.withflintpay.com/v1/products \
-H "Authorization: Bearer YOUR_API_KEY" \
-H "Idempotency-Key: import-shopify-tee-classic" \
-H "Content-Type: application/json" \
-d '{
"name": "Classic tee",
"product_type": "physical",
"metadata": {"shopify_handle": "classic-tee"},
"options": [{
"name": "Size",
"values": [
{"value": "M"},
{"value": "L"}
]
}],
"variants": [
{
"sku": "TEE-CLASSIC-M",
"unit_price_money": {"amount": 2800, "currency": "USD"},
"line_item_tax_category": "clothing",
"selected_options": [{"option_name": "Size", "value": "M"}],
"inventory_item": {"name": "Classic tee, M", "sku": "TEE-CLASSIC-M"}
},
{
"sku": "TEE-CLASSIC-L",
"unit_price_money": {"amount": 2800, "currency": "USD"},
"line_item_tax_category": "clothing",
"selected_options": [{"option_name": "Size", "value": "L"}],
"inventory_item": {"name": "Classic tee, L", "sku": "TEE-CLASSIC-L"}
}
]
}'The cart becomes an order. Flint prices each line from the catalog, applies promotions, calculates US sales tax for the address, and holds the stock when the buyer pays. Checkout is Flint's hosted page, which takes cards, Apple Pay, Google Pay, ACH debit, and Affirm, or your own page with Stripe Elements:
# The cart is an order. Send the buyer to hosted checkout with your
# shipping and pickup methods; or pay it on your own page with Stripe Elements.
curl -X POST https://api.withflintpay.com/v1/checkout-sessions \
-H "Authorization: Bearer YOUR_API_KEY" \
-H "Idempotency-Key: checkout-cart-5521" \
-H "Content-Type: application/json" \
-d '{
"order_id": "ord_1kmn0aExample",
"delivery_method_ids": ["dmet_1kmn0aShipping", "dmet_1kmn0aPickup"],
"redirects": {"success_redirect_url": "https://shop.example.com/thanks"}
}'| On Shopify | On Flint |
|---|---|
| Products and variants | Products with options and variants, POST /v1/products |
| Inventory | Stock per location, held at payment |
| Discount codes and automatic discounts | Promotions with codes, automatic discounts, and stacking rules |
| Shipping rates and local pickup | Delivery methods: rate tables, free shipping thresholds, pickup, local delivery |
| Checkout | Hosted checkout, or your own page with Stripe Elements |
| Customer accounts | A hosted buyer account with order history and returns |
| Returns and refunds | Returns with policies and restocking; refunds by line item |
| Subscriptions | Plans that ship, with each renewal as an order |
| Shopify with a third-party provider | Flint | |
|---|---|---|
| Monthly plan | $39 to $399, Plus from $2,300 | None |
| Fee for the processor you use | 2% to 0.2% by plan, on tax and shipping too | None; Stripe processing is built in |
| Card processing | Your provider's fee, such as 2.9% + 30¢ | Included in 3.79% + 35¢ |
| Checkout for a headless storefront | Redirects to Shopify's web checkout | Hosted checkout or your own page |
Flint is for US businesses that sell on their own website or app and get paid in US dollars. Buyers can pay from anywhere with a card. It is an API and hosted checkout, not a store builder: there are no themes or app store, and your storefront is your own code or site. Flint handles online and in-app payments, not card readers.
2% on Basic, 1% on Grow, 0.6% on Advanced, and 0.2% on Plus, for orders paid through a provider other than Shopify Payments. The fee is on top of the provider's own processing fee and the monthly plan, and Shopify doesn't return it when you refund an order.
A US store can't use Stripe as its Shopify payment gateway. Shopify's help says that where Shopify Payments is supported in your country, Stripe won't be available to activate, and standalone Stripe isn't an alternative even if you can't activate Shopify Payments. Orders paid through any other third-party provider carry Shopify's fee for your plan: 2% on Basic, 1% on Grow, 0.6% on Advanced, or 0.2% on Plus, on top of the provider's own processing fee.
Shopify's billing help gives the formula: the cost of products minus discounts, plus tax, plus shipping, multiplied by your plan's rate. So the fee applies to the tax and shipping you collect, not only to the merchandise.
Within Shopify, accept payments through Shopify Payments; orders paid with Shopify Payments, Shop Pay, or manual methods such as cash on delivery carry no third-party fee. Outside Shopify, run the store on a commerce API that includes payments. Flint has no monthly fee and no gateway fee: cards cost 3.79% + 35¢ per payment, with Stripe processing included.
No. Shopify's API terms don't allow an alternative to Shopify Checkout for Shopify merchants without Shopify's written authorization. Flint replaces the store's backend instead: products, variants, stock, orders, tax, and checkout move to Flint, and your storefront keeps its design.
No. Flint is a commerce API with a hosted checkout, payment links, and a buyer account. Your storefront is your own site or app, such as a Next.js or Hydrogen front end, and it reads products and creates orders through the API.
For a US business with its own storefront that wants to stop paying a monthly plan and a gateway fee, yes. Flint includes the catalog with variants, inventory held at payment, promotions, shipping and pickup, returns, and a hosted checkout in one per-payment rate, with automatic US sales tax (+0.50% on taxed payments) and subscriptions (+0.40%) as add-ons. If you rely on Shopify's themes and app store, Flint doesn't replace those.
All sources accessed October 15, 2026.