So what is eCommerce payment gateway? Unless your offering specific goods that aren’t allowed for purchasing with credit or debit cards you need one. In other words, you should definitely establish the service that conforms to modern standards in your store to complete the road between item discovery and its ownership.
Nowadays you have quite a vast selection of APIs for the feature implementation that is provided by the corresponding transaction processing systems. They enable proper online transaction processing holding the status of easy-to-use for customers and easy-to-handle for store owners.
Based on our experience, we gathered together the best eCommerce payment gateway selection for your online business so you can choose the one that will meet your and your potential or existing customer needs.
Paypal
The world #1 reliable solution for online payment for eCommerce with the proven reputation, It was tested for years by diverse scopes and companies from startups to conglomerates. It can be used for enabling no-fee quick purchasing including using bank transfers for customers in web and mobile stores.
Using PayPal Pro plan ($30/month, startups - $0) you get a required hosted eCommerce checkout payment with established support for the store and users. Depending on the revenue transaction fees can vary from 2.2 to 2.9% +$0.30 (for international 4.4% + additional depending on the country). Digital Goods plans allow enabling recurring payments.
Credit and debit cards are accepted only from three top providers: Visa, Mastercard, and American Express. Given that the first two options have worldwide distribution you aren’t limited in the service providing in diverse regions.
Pros: status, simplicity, security, online/in-store
Cons: cost, responsiveness (over 286 mln users), direct path
Stripe
Smaller but ambitious decade-old Paypal rival it offers more alternatives concerning credit cards by adding to the top 3 Discover, Japanese and Chinese providers respectively JCB and UnionPay. You can also add other branded eCommerce payment options like Masterpass, and Visa Checkout, Google and Apple Pay, etc.
Free of monthly charge Stripe also enables both online and in-store checkouts and show stable performance for 24% lower costs in comparison to other services. The merchant fee is 2.9% + $0.30 for every local transaction and +1% for every international
The POS shows a truly personal approach to users. Stripe allows customizing the gateway UI using boxed-in toolkit and integrating it in a from-scratch marketplace and offer customized pricing for online with uniques business models, best sellers and international runners in some markets.
Pros: customization, versatility, cost, online/in-store
Cons: low support responsiveness, occasional long payouts
Google/Apple Pay
Mobile devices extremely eased checkout and online transactions everywhere. Considering that the number of mobile purchases grows every year OS holders created eCommerce payment platforms to simplify these actions for their users.
Google empowers payments for land-based and online stores big players like Airbnb. Basically, it’s a digital wallet that can be easily integrated and accessed from Android devices. Supporting 13 world-known and local networks it’s available in 30 countries including India and UAE.
Having a major share of the mobile commerce market in the US Apple provides similar services for local and overseas iOS users. Enabling one-click payments it gives a boost to sales and customer retention providing the basis for it - easy and quick access on-the-go. Available in more than 50 countries.
Pros: mobile-oriented, fast-operating
Cons: geographical and adoption limits
Card checkouts
Visa, Mastercard, and American Express offer branded checkout solutions Visa Checkout, Masterpass and Amex gateways respectively. This way they provide card users and online retailers with eCommerce payment methods to ensure reliable native transaction processing with proper security.
While Visa and Master so far offer their services free, Amex already came with rates of $0.12 for each per every transaction over 100. Paying from 25$ per month you can extend the number of available free-of-charge operations and lower rates for over range ones.
They can offer card-specific fraud protection of the professional-grade for free or additional payment. However, the most significant disadvantage is its uniqueness making impossible to use it as only one checkout system.
Pros: single-account simplicity
Cons: lack of option versatility
Square
This service provider earned fame by implementing and distributing a modern approach to in-person payments. It also didn’t avoid retail digital transformation trends and created a secure gateway for online stores.
Offering POS systems it gives both business types the room for growth for the average market price 2.9% + $0.30 per transaction. For simple integration Square made partnerships with leading and popular eCommerce platforms.
It proved its online retail focus by launching its own platform for the full-feature launch and easy running and managing all business operations. However, it still earns its place on the market and needs time to prove its reliability.
Pros: versatility, price, online/in-store
Cons: costly add-ons
Amazon Pay
The most successful marketplace supports not only its merchants. It also provides a quality gateway that meets the requirements of online store owners and their customers. It’s a multi-platform solution with top-level fraud protection.
Till January 2024 it was only available in the US but know customers from 15 Western European countries as well as Japan and India can add this reliable checkout option with a standard charge per transaction.
You can use whether fast Express or eCommerce payment API integration to open access to customers to secure goods purchasing. The second option takes more time but allows creating custom seamless experience.
Pros: status, security, technology
Cons: geographical and adoption limits
Payfort
Initially, a successful UAE startup that has chosen AWS to run its payment gateway Fort entirely on it. It allowed meeting the service provider requirements not just for performance but also for the security level. It supports common and local checkout options. Currently available only in the Middle East region.
Enablement of eCommerce comes on a monthly subscription basis (from $114 for UAE) with 2.94% bank commission + $0.50 for each eCommerce payment processing. It comes with 50+ shopping carts or custom SDK for easy integration.
Pros: versatility, scope-oriented
Cons: regional, cost level
2Checkout
For more than 10 years on the market, it’s the global payment gateway that shows a custom approach to your needs offering different plans for various eCommerce business types: for selling regular or digital products or providing services on a subscription basis.
The option for a classical model for online retail covers 200 regions and allows over 120 cards for integration making it actually a global solution. With access to recurring billing, it comes for a bit higher than the average price of 3.5% + $0.3 per successful sale.
Pros: globality, specific plans
Cons: per-sale fee level, only cardless pays
There is a number of smaller and novelty solutions that only search for their place on the market and may offer more acceptable rates. However, since the first requirement for the payment gateway is security it’s better to rely on the established scope leaders.
The question remains how easy it's to set up an eCommerce payment gateway. Although the majority of options offer simple checkout integration it’s better to outsource the set up to professionals to ensure a seamless connection.
