Ultimate Guide to Shopify Product Fees

Product fees are additional charges which you can add on top of your existing Shopify products or services prices, making it easy to collect additional revenue to cover a wide range of business expenses. There are many types of fees, and a wide range of reasons why you would choose to apply fees to your products or services. Our guide breaks down the essentials so that you can better understand how to get started with charging and collecting product fees on your Shopify store. We even compare the best Shopify apps so that you can choose the app which is a perfect fit for your store.

Table of Contents

1. What is a product fee?
2. How to add product fees on your Shopify store
3. Why using a Shopify app is the best way to add product fees
4. How to set up product fees with Magical Mandatory Product Fees
5. Magical Mandatory Product Fees FAQs
6. Compare the best Shopify product fees apps

What is a product fee?

A product fee is an add-on charge which is applied on top of the retail price of a product or service.

These fees can be mandatory – sometimes required by law – or optional. Retailers can choose to make these fees visible to the customer, hidden until checkout, or simply build the cost of these fees into the selling price of their products or services. 

In our beginners guide to product fees, learn about not only what they are, but what categories of them exist, what types merchants use, and common reasons for why they are used.

Types of product fees

There are a wide range of ways in which a product fee can be added to a Shopify Product in your store. You can choose to apply these fees as required, optional and even decide whether or not to make the fees visible to your customers. Explore the types of Shopify product fees in the list below;

1. Mandatory Product Fees
2. Optional Product Fees
3. Visible Product Fees
4. Hidden Product Fees
5. Visible Inclusive Fees

Examples of product fees

The type of product fee determines how and when the fee is charged, but the cost and reasoning for the existence of a product fee can vary wildly. Explore the top five examples of Shopify product fees in the list below;

1. Eco Fees
2. Deposit Fees
3. Handling Fees
4. Installation Fees
5. Processing Fees

Reasons to use product fees

The reasons to use product fees on Shopify generally fall into one of three categories wavering between legally required fees and self-directed, optional fees. Explore the top three reasons to use product fees in the list below;

1. Comply with local laws
2. Collect donations
3. Cover processing fees

How to add product fees on your Shopify store

There are two distinct paths to adding product fees onto a Shopify store including some built in options (native solutions), and more flexible options which use Shopify Apps to better manage your product fees.

Native Shopify solutions for product fees

While Shopify lacks true native support for product fees due to their lack of a wide range of options merchants require to properly manage them, some basic and manual solutions do exist that may work for you:

1. Mark up or discount calculated shipping rates
2. Add the fee into the cost of the product
3. Add fee into product variants
4. Add fee products and ask customers to manually add them

Shopify app solutions for product fees

Shopify Apps enable sophisticated and customized solutions to be developed that fit the needs of any merchant. There are a few distinct approaches that can be taken when considering how to add product fees with a Shopify app:

1. Develop a new app
2. Use a Product Option app to add product fees
3. Use apps that support adding product fees (Recommended)

Apps that support adding product fees

1. Magical Mandatory Product Fees App
2. Order Surcharge & Product Fees App
3. Canteen Deposits and Fees App

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Discover why ecommerce experts say adding product fees to Shopify with an app is the easiest way to save money and stay compliant

If you run a Shopify store and are trying to figure out the best way to charge product fees, look no further: the answer is to use a Shopify app.

Senior ecommerce experts on our team at Magical apps have compiled the top five reasons to use a Shopify app to add product fees, describing why it is the best way to help your business make more money and stay compliant with local laws.

Top 5 reasons to use a Shopify app to add product fees

1. Add fees to cover business expenses
2. Charge fees to stay in compliance with local laws
3. Improve communication and transparency with your customers
4. Lack of native Shopify support for fees
5. It’s easy to charge fees with apps

How to set up product fees with Magical Mandatory Product Fees

Magical Mandatory Product Fees allows you to add fees to your products and build fees based on conditions you set. It works with any theme.

Install and setup is easy. This guide will walk you through how to setup product fees on Shopify with Magical Mandatory Product Fees from beginning to end, including:

1. App install instructions
2. App setup instructions with videos
3. All App features instructions
4. Possible solutions to common issues

Magical Mandatory Product Fees FAQs

Discover answers to frequently asked questions about Magical Mandatory Product Fees for Shopify.

1. Can I charge percentage-based fees?
2. How does this app work?
3. Can I control how fees are applied?
4. What kind of fees can I add to my products?

Compare the best Shopify product fees and surcharges apps

Shopify’s lack of true native support for the addition of product fees on their stores often pushes merchants to consider using a purpose-built Shopify app instead. But with several options available, which app is the best app for charging product fees on Shopify?

The 5 Best Shopify Apps for Surcharges

Discover the five best Shopify apps for surcharges that stores can use to meet all of their product fee needs. Get detailed overviews about these apps, and see what users have to say about them.

The Best Product Fees Shopify Apps:

1. Magical Product Fees – Best overall app but doesn’t provide deactivation of fees
2. UpCharge: Surcharges & Fees – Most customizable but isn’t integrated with POS
3. Canteen ‑ Integrated with Zapiet and Recharge but requires HTML and CSS competency
4. Pfand ‑ Deposit & Cart Fee – Prevents fees from removal but fees are visible as products in cart
5. CHARGIFY Surcharge & Order Fee – More affordable but lacks customization

Magical Mandatory Product Fees vs. Canteen

In this comparison, see which is the best app for charging fees on Shopify: the Magical Mandatory Product Fees app or the Canteen Deposits and Fees app.

We compare their features, pricing, and reviews and outline how you can determine which one is right for your store:

1. Compare the differences
2. Which offers the most value?
3. Read the reviews
4. Our recommendation

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Magical Product Fees

The Magical Product Fees app is a fast and easy way to build, customize, and attach fees to products or entire orders.

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