Subscribe and Save on Shopify: How Selling Plans Work and What to Decide

How Shopify subscriptions are built: selling plans

Subscribe and save looks simple on a product page: a second option under the price, a small discount, a delivery frequency. Underneath, Shopify models it with selling plans, and knowing the model makes every later decision easier.

Shopify's selling plans overview describes two layers. A selling plan group is a selling method, such as "Subscribe and save" or "Prepaid". Inside it, each selling plan is one option the shopper can choose, such as deliver weekly or deliver monthly. Pay per delivery means the customer pays for each delivery; prepaid means one payment upfront for several deliveries.

Each selling plan carries a set of policies. The billing policy sets how often the customer is charged. The delivery policy sets how often the order ships, and it can differ from billing. The inventory policy decides whether stock is committed when the order is created or when it is fulfilled. The pricing policy sets the discount. Shopify's API reference says a selling plan can hold at most two pricing policies, and a recurring pricing policy has an afterCycle setting for the cycle after which it applies. That is how an offer like "a larger discount on the first order, a smaller one after that" is built. Shopify's own example is a 20% discount on the first billing cycle and 15% on the cycles after it. Adjustments can be a percentage off, a fixed amount off, or a set price.

Who actually charges the card

When a shopper checks out with a selling plan, Shopify creates a subscription contract. Shopify's subscription contracts documentation explains that an app charges the customer by starting a billing attempt on that contract, and each successful attempt creates an order. In other words, you need a subscription app. Shopify's theme and checkout show the options; the app runs the schedule.

Shopify makes its own app. The Shopify Subscriptions listing shows it as free and built by Shopify, with subscribe and save pricing and customer options to cancel, skip or pause. Third-party apps exist for more complex programmes, but for a first subscription offer Shopify's app is a sensible starting point: move only when a real need appears.

Timing is worth knowing before you write your emails. Shopify's subscription considerations say customers are billed the day after the subscription is due, at 10:00 am in the store's local time. The Shopify Subscriptions app emails customers 3 days before each recurring order is charged, which gives them time to skip, pause, cancel or update payment details.

Before you start: what Shopify requires

Check these before you design anything. Most of them come from Shopify's considerations for subscription products and the Shopify Subscriptions setup guide.

The four decisions: cadence, discount, flexibility, failed payments

Every subscription programme comes down to four choices. None has a universal right answer, so decide them from your own product and margins.

1. 01

   Cadence

   In the Shopify Subscriptions app, a plan can offer several delivery frequencies, each set as a number of weeks, months or years. Match the options to how long the product actually lasts. Offer the frequency most customers need as the default, plus one shorter and one longer option, rather than a long list.

2. 02

   Discount

   The app supports percentage off, amount off or a fixed price. The discount has to be worth committing for, and you pay it on every renewal, so work it out against your margin after shipping, not against the first order alone. If you want a stronger first order offer, a second pricing policy that changes after the first cycle is cleaner than a separate discount code. Shopify's subscription discounts page explains how discount codes apply to subscriptions and how to limit how many billing cycles they cover.

3. 03

   Flexibility

   Customers can pause, resume, skip upcoming orders and cancel from their customer account, and update payment and shipping details. Shopify says a pause takes effect immediately. Changing delivery frequency is a merchant action on the contract, so decide how customers ask for it and how quickly you respond. Making skip and pause easy to find tends to be better for the relationship than making cancel hard to find.

4. 04

   Failed payments

   The app's billing settings let you choose the number of retry attempts, the days between retries, and what happens when all retries fail: skip, pause or cancel. Shopify does not publish a recommended default, so choose deliberately. For most consumables, pausing is kinder than cancelling and easier to recover from.

What to measure after launch

Shopify gives you a starting point. The Shopify Subscriptions analytics overview shows subscriptions revenue, active subscriptions, new subscriptions and cancelled subscriptions, and notes that active subscriptions include paused contracts and skipped orders. The sales reports add subscription sales over time and a subscription versus one-time sales report once you sell through the app.

Those numbers tell you whether the programme is growing. To know whether it is healthy, track a few more each month, from your own data. The share of new customers who choose subscribe and save on their first order. How many renewals were skipped, and how many contracts are paused rather than active. How many failed payments were recovered by a retry. And the margin on a renewal after the discount and shipping, which is the number that tells you whether the discount is set right.

Look at cancellations by how long the customer stayed. Early cancellations often point to the product, the default cadence or an expectation set on the product page. Later ones are more often about the customer having enough stock, which skip and pause are there to handle.

A practical checklist

Work through this before the subscription option goes live on your product pages.

1. 01

   Confirm eligibility

   Gateway, theme and sales channels all support subscriptions.

2. 02

   Write your subscription policy

   Replace the generated template, and say plainly how to skip, pause and cancel.

3. 03

   Choose cadence options

   One default based on how long the product lasts, plus a shorter and a longer option.

4. 04

   Set the discount from renewal margin

   Check the margin on a renewal after discount and shipping, as well as on the first order.

5. 05

   Decide the failed payment rules

   Number of retries, days between them, and whether the final action is skip, pause or cancel.

6. 06

   Check recurring shipping

   Renewals default to your cheapest shipping method, so make sure it is one you are happy with.

7. 07

   Test the customer account

   Place a test subscription and try skip, pause, resume and cancel as a customer would.

8. 08

   Set a monthly report

   Active, new and cancelled subscriptions, skips, pauses, recovered payments and renewal margin.

Common questions

Sources

1. About selling plans. Shopify.dev. Accessed 2026-09-25.
2. SellingPlanInput (GraphQL Admin API). Shopify.dev. Accessed 2026-09-25.
3. SellingPlanRecurringPricingPolicyInput (GraphQL Admin API). Shopify.dev. Accessed 2026-09-25.
4. SellingPlanPricingPolicyAdjustmentType (GraphQL Admin API). Shopify.dev. Accessed 2026-09-25.
5. About subscription contracts. Shopify.dev. Accessed 2026-09-25.
6. Shopify Subscriptions. Shopify App Store. Accessed 2026-09-25.
7. Considerations and payment gateways for subscription products. Shopify Help Center. Accessed 2026-09-25.
8. Setting up Shopify Subscriptions. Shopify Help Center. Accessed 2026-09-25.
9. Shopify Subscriptions customer experience. Shopify Help Center. Accessed 2026-09-25.
10. Create and edit subscription plans. Shopify Help Center. Accessed 2026-09-25.
11. Subscription discounts. Shopify Help Center. Accessed 2026-09-25.
12. Managing subscription contracts. Shopify Help Center. Accessed 2026-09-25.
13. Managing Shopify Subscriptions app settings. Shopify Help Center. Accessed 2026-09-25.
14. Shopify Subscriptions analytics overview. Shopify Help Center. Accessed 2026-09-25.
15. Sales reports. Shopify Help Center. Accessed 2026-09-25.