What is Shopify Plus and When Should You Upgrade?

Managing a large-scale online store, you need a reliable eCommerce platform. It is important to choose a platform that can scale automatically, lets you manage growing business needs, and seamlessly handle multiple stores. Various eCommerce brands use a basic Shopify store to deliver exceptional customer experiences. However, with the growing client base, businesses soon outgrow their store capabilities.

Shopify Plus is an enterprise-grade eCommerce solution designed specifically for high-growth greater traffic volume retailers. It empowers businesses to deliver a seamless and sophisticated shopping experience to customers worldwide. The platform successfully eliminates the burden of managing complex IT infrastructure or ongoing platform maintenance. 

This article explores the key features and advantages of Shopify Plus. So, you can determine whether it’s the right fit for your enterprise needs. A Shopify agency UK can help you build or upgrade your online store to manage growing sales and traffic seamlessly.

What is Shopify Plus?

The Shopify Plus plan offers a greater set of features compared to other plans offered by the eCommerce platform. It comes with a suite of features and benefits specifically designed for growing businesses like enhanced scalability, customization, and support. Overall, it’s ideal for businesses with high sales volume, complex needs, or those looking to expand internationally.

For starters, store merchants have access to enhanced permission controls that provide greater oversight of staff activity within the Shopify admin. They can assign distinct privileges, such as restricting access to specific apps or granting export rights for reports only to designated team members.

Shopify offers four core pricing tiers to suit businesses at different stages:

• Basic
• Shopify
• Advanced
• Plus

This structured approach allows your eCommerce operation to scale seamlessly as your business evolves. Each tier unlocks additional features, reduces transaction fees, and equips you with more advanced tools to support growth.

Shopify Plus encompasses all the features of the lower-tier plans but significantly enhances them with powerful automation tools and greater administrative control. You also get advanced customisation options, superior omnichannel capabilities, and robust support for expanding into international markets. 

What are the features of Shopify Plus?

Meant for global reach

Shopify Plus is built for international growth. It facilitates merchants to launch separate storefronts for different regions. So,  shopify plus design agency can help you launch  stores with tailored experiences providing multi-language support and consistent pricing across 133 currencies. The eCommerce platform also provides built-in analytics that offers valuable insights to help identify the best regions for future growth.

Centralised store management

Say goodbye to complex admin processes with Shopify Plus pricing plan. It provides you with a unified dashboard to manage all your stores at an organisational level. This means you can handle all user permissions and store access to performance analytics and bulk actions. The platform lets you easily  manage stores and everything can be controlled from a common point. This further reduces the need for large admin teams or third-party tools.

Greater flexibility

Shopify Plus unlocks enhanced access to APIs and developer tools, enabling deeper customisation without disrupting existing systems. With expanded API call limits and support from your dedicated Plus manager, you can build robust features and streamline workflows. Shopify let you customise checkout experiences with bespoke offers, shipping rules, and live price adjustments which is deal for handling promotions like volume discounts or bundled incentives.

Powerful automation tools

Merchants gets exclusive access to advanced apps like Shopify Flow, which can automate routine tasks in minutes. Since launch, Flow has saved merchants millions of hours by streamlining operations, freeing up time and resources to focus on growth and innovation.

Omnichannel selling platform

Shopify Plus supports sales across 100+ social platforms, 80+ marketplaces, and mobile interfaces, all managed from a central hub. From Amazon and eBay to Instagram, Messenger, and Pinterest, you can reach customers wherever they shop. The built-in B2B wholesale portal and Shopify POS system also allow for in-person and business-to-business selling. This seamless multi channel checkout options match the demands of modern day customer preferences.

Dedicated merchant support

Every Plus merchant is enrolled in Shopify’s Merchant Success Programme, offering 24/7 support and access to a dedicated Launch Engineer for onboarding and migration guidance. For bespoke development, a Shopify agency can build well-optimised stores with advanced levels of customisation. 

What are the benefits of Shopify Plus?

Shopify Plus offers a plethora of advantages compared to traditional legacy platforms and the standard Shopify plans. The platform’s superior flexibility, scalability, and performance has attracted global brands like Gymshark, Kylie cosmetics, Heinz, and many more.

Prioritises Business growth

Shopify Plus can help you simplify complex tasks and focus on strategic areas:

• Marketing activities 
• Research and Business Development
• Ways to drive customer engagement

Your store is fully hosted on Shopify’s secure servers. This eliminates the need for costly IT infrastructure, and businesses can run seamlessly. Even when compared with other leading platforms like the Adobe Commerce vs Shopify Plus debate, the latter emerges victorious in many ways. 

Reliable and secure at scale

The Shopify platform is proven to offer the following:

• 99.98% uptime
• Level 1 PCI DSS certification
• SOC 2 certification
• Offers limitless bandwidth
• Can handle nearly 11,000 orders per minute

Overall, Shopify Plus ensures stability during peak trading periods. This makes it a trusted choice for high-traffic events like Black Friday. 

Seamless migration

Moving your online store to Shopify Plus is a simple process. Even for large enterprises with extensive product catalogues, the process can be simplified by a Shopify Plus agency. At chilliapple, we assign dedicated developers and account managers to ensure a smooth migration. Our team covers everything from third-party integrations to SSL setup and payment gateways.

Transparent Shopify Plus pricing

Shopify Plus Pricing in the UK is not a fixed monthly fee, but rather a customised fee based on a business’s revenue, and can vary widely. It starts at $2,000/month for businesses generating under $800K in monthly revenue. 

Beyond that, the pricing plan follows a sliding scale of 0.25% of monthly revenue (e.g., $2,500/month for $1M in sales). Contracts starts as a one-year agreement, then switch to rolling monthly terms.

Using a third-party payment gateway incurs a 0.15% fee, but Shopify Plus merchants enjoy lower transaction rates with Shopify Payments:

Domestic: 2.15% + $0.30

Amex & International: 3.15% + $0.30

Add unlimited staff accounts & permissions

Shopify Plus lets you build unlimited staff accounts with granular permission controls. Merchants can track user activity, manage access, and streamline team workflows. Moreover, all of this is possible while maintaining full oversight of your operations. This allows to manage complex operations with ease.

When should You upgrade to Shopify Plus?

Shopify Plus is a good fit for businesses experiencing rapid growth, needing advanced customisation, or pursuing B2B sales. You should consider upgrading when your store’s annual revenue surpasses $800K. Furthermore, it is also advisable to migrate when you need specialised integrations, or your growing team requires more access and permissions.

Conclusion 

For high-growth or enterprise-level retailers, Shopify Plus delivers unmatched value. From operational efficiency and automation to global scalability and customisations, the platform offers one-in-all.  In short, it’s a smart, scalable, and future-proof platform built for serious ecommerce success.

At chilliapple, an eCommerce consulting agency based in the UK, we implement a smooth Shopify Plus upgrade process. Our experts guide you through every step of the migration process, ensuring minimal disruption to your business. From bespoke theme development to third-party integrations, we tailor your Shopify Plus setup to align perfectly with your brand and growth goals.