Short answer: Any paid Shopify plan can sell subscriptions. Use the free first-party Shopify Subscriptions app for simple replenishment on one or a few products, or a third-party app like Recharge or Seal for build-a-box, prepaid plans, tiered pricing, and advanced retry logic. Run the charges through Shopify Payments so renewals do not fail on expired cards, and confirm every recurring order flows into your fulfillment and shipping tools before you launch.
Subscriptions are one of the most requested features we set up for Canadian merchants, and one of the most misunderstood. The question owners ask is usually "can Shopify do subscriptions," but the answer that matters is which of two paths fits the recurring model you actually sell. Pick wrong and you either pay for an app you do not need or you launch on the free app and hit a wall the week you try to sell a curated box.
We build recurring commerce for replenishment brands, seasonal products, and wholesale reorders, and the pattern is consistent: the platform is not the hard part, the operations are. This guide is the decision framework we use, written for a Canadian store choosing how to launch subscriptions without creating a support and reconciliation problem three months later.
01. Can Shopify Do Subscriptions?
Yes. Subscriptions are native to Shopify through a mechanism called selling plans. A selling plan defines the recurring terms, the cadence, any subscription discount, and how renewals are charged, and it attaches to a product so the recurring option appears on the product page and checks out through your normal checkout. You do not need a separate storefront or a custom build to start.
What creates and manages those selling plans is an app. You have two options: Shopify's own free Shopify Subscriptions app, or a third-party subscription app from the App Store. Both manage subscriptions inside your Shopify admin, and both use the same underlying selling plan model. The choice is about how much the app does on top of that foundation.
One requirement to know up front: your store needs a payment gateway that supports saving a payment method for future charges. In Canada that almost always means Shopify Payments, which we cover in section five.
02. Native App vs Third-Party App
Here is the honest comparison. The free app is not a crippled version of the paid apps; for a lot of stores it is genuinely all you need. The paid apps are not overkill; for a real subscription business they are the difference between growth and a churn problem.
| Dimension | Shopify Subscriptions (free) | Recharge, Seal, and similar |
|---|---|---|
| Cost | Free app; you still pay processing on each charge | Monthly fee, sometimes plus a percentage of subscription revenue |
| Best for | Simple replenishment on one or a few products | Subscriptions as a core, growing revenue stream |
| Bundles and boxes | Not supported | Build-a-box, curated boxes, mixed-product recurring |
| Plan types | Standard recurring and replenishment | Prepaid, gift, tiered, and trial plans |
| Dunning and retries | Basic, relies on gateway card updates | Configurable retry schedules and recovery flows |
| Customer portal | Managed in Shopify customer accounts | Branded, customizable subscriber portal |
| Integrations | Core Shopify surfaces | Klaviyo, analytics, and third-party tools |
The decision rule we use: start with the free app if your subscription is a single product on a fixed cadence and self-service is basic. Move to a paid app the moment your model needs bundles, prepaid or gift plans, tiered pricing, or serious churn recovery. Migrating subscribers between apps later is possible but disruptive, so it is worth being honest about your roadmap before you launch.
03. What the Free Shopify Subscriptions App Does
The first-party Shopify Subscriptions app is free, installs from the App Store, and runs inside your admin. It is built for the most common case: let a customer buy a product on a repeating schedule and save money doing it. What it covers well:
- Recurring and replenishment plans. Set a cadence, an optional subscription discount, and the recurring option shows on the product page.
- Customer self-service. Subscribers pause, skip, or cancel through Shopify customer accounts, based on the rules you set.
- Admin management. View and manage active subscription contracts alongside your normal orders, with no separate dashboard to learn.
Where it stops is just as important. Bundles are not compatible with the free app, editing a subscription order after the fact is limited, and the customer experience is whatever Shopify customer accounts provide rather than a portal you control. None of that is a flaw. It is the line between a simple tool and a subscription platform, and knowing where the line sits is what keeps you from paying for either the wrong thing or a rebuild.
04. When You Need Recharge, Seal, or Another App
Third-party subscription apps earn their monthly fee when your recurring model has real complexity. The clearest signals that you have outgrown the free app:
- You sell a box. Curated boxes, build-a-box, and mixed-product recurring need bundle support the free app does not have.
- You want prepaid, gift, or trial plans. Prepaid terms, gift subscriptions, and free trials are standard in paid apps and absent in the free one.
- Churn is a number you watch. Configurable dunning, retry schedules, and cancellation-flow offers recover revenue the free app leaves on the table.
- Marketing runs on the data. Deep Klaviyo and analytics integrations let you trigger flows on subscription events, which matters once recurring revenue is material.
Recharge, Seal Subscriptions, Appstle, and Loop are the names you will see most in the Canadian market. They differ on pricing model, portal flexibility, and how much they charge as a percentage of subscription revenue, so compare on the features you will actually use rather than the longest feature list. If your subscription logic is genuinely unusual, for example wholesale reorders tied to account terms or ERP-driven pricing, that is where a custom Shopify build or a Shopify B2B setup enters the conversation.
05. Payments and Fees for Canadian Merchants
Subscriptions charge a saved payment method on a schedule, so your gateway has to support that. In Canada the practical answer is Shopify Payments, and there are two reasons beyond convenience.
First, fees. When you process through Shopify Payments, Shopify does not add its extra transaction fee. Use a third-party gateway and Shopify applies an additional per-order transaction fee, which is easy to underestimate with subscriptions because every renewal is another order. On a monthly plan, that fee lands twelve times a year per subscriber.
Second, failed renewals. Shopify Payments includes automatic card updates, which quietly re-authorize a renewal when a customer's bank reissues their card. Without that, a real percentage of your recurring revenue silently fails every month on expired or replaced cards, and you find out through a churn spike rather than an alert. Selling subscriptions through Shopify POS specifically requires Shopify Payments, so if you take recurring orders in person there is no alternative.
On pricing:
Shopify plan pricing, processing rates, and third-party gateway transaction fees change, and paid subscription apps set their own fees. Confirm the current numbers on Shopify's pricing page and the individual app listing before you model your margins. Do not build a subscription P and L on a fee you read in a blog, including this one.
06. What Most Merchants Get Wrong
The platform decision is the easy part. The problems we get called in to fix almost always live downstream, in the operations around the subscription. The recurring ones:
- Recurring orders that do not reach fulfillment. Every renewal creates a new order that has to flow into your shipping app, 3PL, or ERP the same way a normal order does. Not every shipping and fulfillment tool treats subscription renewals identically, and a mismatch means recurring orders quietly do not get picked, packed, or synced. Test a full renewal cycle end to end before launch, not just the first checkout.
- Seasonal and auto-renewing plans set up backwards. A fixed-length seasonal plan and an open-ended auto-renewing plan behave very differently at the end of the term. Merchants routinely configure one when they meant the other, then get either surprise renewals customers dispute or lapsed subscribers they expected to keep.
- Assuming bundles work on the free app. This is the single most common wall. A store launches a box on the free app, discovers bundles are unsupported, and has to migrate mid-launch. Decide box versus single product before you pick an app.
- No plan for pause, skip, and cancel. Rules that are too loose invite gaming and revenue leakage; rules that are too rigid drive support tickets and chargebacks. Set these deliberately, and make sure customers can self-serve so your team is not manually editing contracts.
The through-line is that subscriptions are a system, not a product setting. The checkout is one piece. Renewals, fulfillment sync, dunning, and the customer portal are the rest, and they are where recurring revenue is won or quietly lost. If you are also connecting orders to a CRM, the same discipline applies, which we cover in fixing order-to-CRM sync gaps, and lightweight automation around renewals is a good fit for Shopify Flow.
07. Frequently Asked Questions
Can Shopify do subscriptions?
Yes. Any Shopify store on a paid plan can sell subscriptions, either through the free first-party Shopify Subscriptions app for simple recurring products or a third-party app like Recharge or Seal for advanced models. Both are built on Shopify selling plans and check out through your normal checkout.
How much does a Shopify subscription cost to run?
The free Shopify Subscriptions app has no monthly fee, but you still pay your Shopify plan and processing on each recurring charge. Third-party gateways add a Shopify transaction fee per order, which compounds across renewals, and paid subscription apps add their own fees. Confirm current rates before you model margins.
What is the best subscription app for Shopify?
It depends on complexity. The free app suits simple replenishment on a few products. For boxes, prepaid or gift plans, tiered pricing, and strong churn recovery, a paid app such as Recharge, Seal, Appstle, or Loop fits better. Choose the cheapest reliable option that covers your specific model.
Do Shopify subscriptions require Shopify Payments?
Not always, but it is strongly recommended and required for subscriptions sold through Shopify POS. Shopify Payments is supported in Canada, avoids the extra third-party transaction fee, and adds automatic card updates that prevent renewals from failing when cards are reissued.
What is the difference between the native app and Recharge or Seal?
The native app is free and built for simple recurring products with basic self-service. Recharge, Seal, and similar apps are paid and add bundles, prepaid and gift plans, tiered pricing, configurable dunning, and a branded subscriber portal. Native is enough for one product on a fixed cadence; a paid app fits a real subscription business.
Do Shopify subscriptions work with bundles?
Not with the free Shopify Subscriptions app; bundles are not compatible with it. To sell a recurring box or build-a-box, you need a third-party subscription app that supports bundled recurring products. This is one of the most common reasons merchants outgrow the native app.
How do customers cancel a Shopify subscription?
With the native app, subscribers pause, skip, or cancel through Shopify customer accounts based on the rules you set. Third-party apps offer their own subscriber portal with more control. Define your pause, skip, and cancellation rules before launch to balance churn against support load.
Related Resources
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The wholesale and DTC automation workflows worth building first
Why online orders do not reach your CRM cleanly, and how to fix it
The fixes that actually move the needle on Shopify sales in 2026
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