Introduction
You are not restricted to using only PayPal on your Shopify store. While PayPal is the default payment provider for most new accounts, the platform supports hundreds of other payment gateways, including Shopify Payments, Stripe, and regional digital wallets. The question of whether you can use more than just PayPal is central to how you manage your customer experience and your transaction costs.
Merchants often start with PayPal because Shopify automatically creates a PayPal Express Checkout account using the email address associated with the store. This makes it the first visible option, but it is rarely the best long-term strategy to rely on it exclusively. This article explains how to expand your payment options, why you might want to hide certain methods in specific scenarios, and how our app, install HidePay, helps you maintain full control over your checkout logic. By the end of this guide, you will understand how to balance customer choice with your store’s operational needs.
Why PayPal Appears as the Only Option Initially
When you first open a Shopify store, you will likely see PayPal as the only active payment method. This happens because Shopify wants to ensure every merchant can accept money immediately. The platform uses the email address you used to sign up for Shopify to create a guest PayPal account.
Until you finish setting up Shopify Payments or integrate a third-party credit card processor, PayPal acts as the primary gateway. However, relying solely on this one method can be a mistake. Some customers do not have PayPal accounts, and while PayPal allows guest checkout with credit cards, the interface often pushes users to create an account. This extra step is a common point of friction that can lead to cart abandonment.
The Automated Setup Process
Shopify initiates the PayPal setup in the background. To actually receive your funds, you must complete the account setup on PayPal's end and link your bank account. If you do not do this, payments will sit in a pending state. If left unclaimed for too long, they are eventually returned to the customer. This automated setup is why many new merchants ask if they are stuck with just one provider; it is simply the starting point, not the limit.
Expanding Beyond PayPal with Shopify Payments
For the majority of merchants in supported countries, Shopify Payments is the most logical next step. It is the platform’s own payment processing solution, built on Stripe’s infrastructure but fully integrated into your Shopify admin.
Using Shopify Payments removes the additional transaction fees that Shopify usually charges when you use third-party gateways. It allows you to accept all major credit cards, Apple Pay, and Google Pay directly. When you enable this, you are no longer using "only PayPal." In fact, Shopify Payments often becomes the primary way your customers pay, while PayPal remains as a secondary option for those who specifically prefer it.
Key Benefits of Shopify Payments
- Integrated Reporting: You see your payouts and orders in one place.
- Lower Fees: You avoid the "subscription-based" transaction fees associated with third-party providers.
- Higher Trust: The checkout looks native to your store rather than redirecting to another site.
- Express Options: It enables Shop Pay, which is one of the fastest converting express checkout buttons available.
Hide, sort, and rename Shopify payment methods using powerful conditions. Customize your checkout and control payment options with HidePay.
Third-Party Gateways and Regional Providers
If your business is located in a country where Shopify Payments is not available, or if you sell products that fall under "high-risk" categories, you will need to look at third-party gateways. Shopify integrates with over 100 external payment providers globally.
Popular alternatives include Stripe (in specific configurations), Authorize.net, and 2Checkout. In regional markets, you might use Mollie for Europe, Razorpay for India, or PayFast for South Africa. These providers allow you to cater to local preferences. For instance, if you sell in the Netherlands, offering iDEAL is much more important for conversion than offering PayPal.
Transaction Fee Considerations
When you move away from a "PayPal only" or "Shopify Payments" setup and use a third-party provider, Shopify applies an additional transaction fee. This fee varies based on your Shopify plan level. It is important to calculate whether the conversion benefit of a specific local gateway outweighs the extra 0.5% to 2% fee you may incur.
The Problem with Having Too Many Payment Methods
While you can use many gateways beyond PayPal, there is a risk in offering too many. "Analysis paralysis" is a real phenomenon in e-commerce. If a customer reaches your checkout and sees a list of ten different payment buttons, they may hesitate.
Every additional button increases the cognitive load on the customer. While you want to provide choice, you specifically want to provide the right choice. This is where strategic management of your checkout becomes necessary. You might want PayPal available for international customers but prefer to hide it for local customers to avoid higher cross-border fees.
How to Control What Customers See
Once you have added multiple payment methods, you need a way to manage them. Shopify’s default settings generally show all active payment methods to all customers. This "one size fits all" approach is often inefficient.
We built HidePay to solve this specific problem. Built on native Shopify Functions, our app allows you to create rules that determine exactly when a payment method should appear — for example, you can hide payment methods when a product or collection is in the cart.
Sorting and Renaming for Better UX
Control isn't just about hiding. Sometimes, you want to keep PayPal but make it less prominent. The app allows you to reorder the list of payment methods. You can put your preferred gateway at the top and push higher-fee options to the bottom. You can also rename methods to make them clearer for your specific audience. Instead of "PayPal Express Checkout," you might rename it to "PayPal / Venmo" to signal to younger shoppers that their preferred app is supported. See our video guide on how to sort or rename payment methods for a walkthrough.
Use Cases for Hiding or Sorting Payment Methods
Understanding the "why" behind managing your payment methods is as important as the "how." Here are several practical scenarios where merchants benefit from moving away from a static checkout.
Reducing High Fees and Chargebacks
Certain payment methods carry higher risks or costs. PayPal, for example, is often favored by customers but can sometimes be more prone to disputes in certain industries. If you are selling digital goods or high-ticket items, you might want to hide PayPal for orders over a certain dollar amount and force a more secure credit card transaction. For a step-by-step example of hiding high-risk options like Cash on Delivery for expensive orders, see our guide on hiding COD for expensive orders.
Market-Specific Optimization
If you sell globally, you shouldn't show the same checkout to a customer in New York and a customer in Berlin. A German customer may prefer Klarna or a SEPA bank transfer, while the New York customer wants Shop Pay or PayPal. By using geography-based rules, you can ensure that the most relevant, high-converting options are the only ones visible to each user. If you want a broader perspective on pairing payment and shipping controls for multi-market optimization, our post introducing HideSuite explains how HidePay and HideShip work together.
B2B and Wholesale Restrictions
If you run a store that serves both retail and wholesale customers, you likely have different payment expectations for each group. Wholesale orders are often large, and the percentage-based fees on a credit card or PayPal transaction can eat your entire margin. In this case, you can use customer tags to hide PayPal and credit card options for "Wholesale" tagged customers, showing them only "Bank Transfer" or "Net 30" options. For more advanced order validation and checkout blocking (useful for B2B workflows), consider CartBlock on the Shopify App Store.
Delivery Method Alignment
Certain payment methods only make sense with certain delivery types. Cash on Delivery (COD) is a prime example. You should only show COD as a payment option when the customer has selected a local delivery or "Pick up in store" option. Showing it to a customer who selected international shipping is a recipe for operational headaches. See our help article on how to hide payment methods for Local Pickup for the exact steps.
Optimizing for Mobile Shoppers
Mobile commerce now accounts for the majority of Shopify traffic. Mobile users have a very low tolerance for manual data entry. This is why PayPal is popular—it allows for a quick login. However, other "Express Checkout" buttons like Apple Pay, Google Pay, and Shop Pay are equally effective.
When you ask "Can I only use PayPal?", you should also be asking "Which express button converts best for my mobile users?" Often, having both PayPal and Shop Pay is a strong combination. However, if you have too many express buttons at the top of your checkout, it can look cluttered on a small screen. If you need to hide express checkout buttons in certain scenarios, our guide on how to hide the Express Checkout with HidePay explains the available options (note: some express-button controls require Shopify Plus).
Technical Foundations: Shopify Functions
It is worth noting how these customizations happen. In the past, changing the checkout required "Shopify Scripts," which was only available to Shopify Plus merchants. This often left smaller merchants stuck with whatever default payment list Shopify provided.
With the introduction of Shopify Functions, the ability to hide, sort, and rename payment methods is now available to all Shopify plans. We developed our tool specifically to leverage these native functions. For background on moving from Scripts to Functions and building codeless functions, see our article on SupaEasy and codeless Shopify Functions. This means the logic runs inside Shopify’s own infrastructure. There is no external script slowing down your page load, and the experience is stable across all devices. This technical shift has made "Smart Checkout" strategies accessible to every merchant, regardless of their store's size.
Practical Steps to Manage Your Payments
If you are currently only seeing PayPal and want to expand or optimize, follow this logical progression:
- Complete PayPal Setup: Ensure your current PayPal account is fully linked so you don't lose existing funds.
- Enable Shopify Payments: If available in your region, this is the most effective way to accept credit cards and express options like Shop Pay.
- Evaluate Regional Needs: If you have significant traffic from a specific country, research their preferred local payment method and add it via a third-party provider.
- Audit Your Margins: Look at which payment methods cost you the most in fees and disputes.
- Implement Rules: Use a tool like HidePay — see the HidePay help docs for step-by-step guides on creating cart-total, country, product, and delivery-method rules.
- Review Performance: Periodically check your conversion rates. If one payment method has a significantly higher abandonment rate, consider hiding it or moving it to the bottom of the list.
Strategic Decision Making: When to Say "No" to a Payment Method
The goal of checkout optimization is not to offer every possible way to pay. It is to offer the shortest path to a completed sale. Sometimes, the shortest path involves removing PayPal entirely for certain segments.
For example, if you are a dropshipper shipping from overseas, you might face longer shipping times. PayPal is known for being very customer-centric in disputes, often siding with the buyer if a package takes more than a week or two. If your business model involves longer lead times, you might find that PayPal’s dispute policies are too aggressive for your current setup. In this scenario, limiting your store to credit card processors that offer better merchant protection might be a smart move for your bottom line.
Conclusion
The answer to "Can I only use PayPal on Shopify?" is a definitive no. You have the freedom to use Shopify Payments, various third-party gateways, and local digital wallets. However, the real power lies not just in adding these methods, but in controlling when and how they appear to your customers.
By strategically hiding, sorting, and renaming your payment options, you can reduce friction, lower your transaction costs, and protect your store from high-risk orders.
- Start by enabling Shopify Payments to give customers more than just a PayPal button.
- Identify which payment methods are most popular in your key target markets.
- Use conditional logic to remove irrelevant or high-cost options for specific orders.
- Monitor your checkout data to ensure your payment mix is actually helping you convert.
To get started with advanced checkout control, you can get HidePay for your store. We offer a free-to-install plan so you can begin building rules that align your checkout with your business goals today.
FAQ
Does Shopify force me to use PayPal for my store?
No, Shopify does not force you to use PayPal. While it is enabled by default to help you start taking orders quickly, you can disable it at any time in your Shopify admin under the Payments section. You can replace it with Shopify Payments or any other supported third-party gateway.
Can I accept credit cards without a PayPal account?
Yes. By enabling Shopify Payments or a third-party gateway like Stripe or Authorize.net, you can accept all major credit cards directly on your checkout page. Customers will be able to enter their card details without being redirected to PayPal or needing a PayPal account.
Why does PayPal show up even after I added Shopify Payments?
PayPal often remains active alongside Shopify Payments because it is a separate "Express Checkout" provider. If you want PayPal to disappear entirely, you must manually deactivate the PayPal Express Checkout app in your payment settings. Alternatively, you can use HidePay to hide it only in specific scenarios where it might not be the best option.
Will removing PayPal hurt my conversion rate?
It depends on your audience. In some markets, PayPal is the most trusted way to pay, and removing it could increase cart abandonment. However, if you replace it with other trusted options like Apple Pay or credit card processing, many customers will simply use those instead. We recommend testing the impact by hiding it for a small segment of your traffic before making a permanent change.