Squarespace costs $19 to $99 a month when you pay annually, or $25 to $139 a month when you pay month to month, as of November 2026. There are four website plans: Basic, Core, Plus and Advanced. For most online stores, Core ($29/mo billed annually, $39/mo monthly) is the plan to buy, because it drops the Squarespace store transaction fee to 0% and unlocks the selling tools Basic leaves out. I run Ecommerce Paradise, where I build and advise on online stores for a living, and this page gives you the full price table, the fees that change your real cost, and how to pick a plan without overpaying.
Affiliate disclosure: some links in this article are affiliate links and I may earn a commission at no cost to you. It does not change which tools I recommend or what the research found.
Fast answer: Basic is $19/mo annual or $25/mo monthly. Core is $29 or $39. Plus is $49 or $65. Advanced is $99 or $139. The free trial lasts 14 days and there is no permanent free plan. The only plan that charges a 2% fee on store sales is Basic, and every plan charges card processing on top of the plan price. I pulled every number below from Squarespace’s own pricing page in November 2026, so you can check the live plans here before you buy.
Squarespace Pricing Table (November 2026)
| Plan | Monthly Billing | Annual Billing (per month) | Annual Total (per year) | Online Store Fee | Digital Content and Memberships Fee |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Basic | $25/mo | $19/mo | $228 | 2% | 7% |
| Core | $39/mo | $29/mo | $348 | 0% | 5% |
| Plus | $65/mo | $49/mo | $588 | 0% | 1% |
| Advanced | $139/mo | $99/mo | $1,188 | 0% | 0% |
| Plan | Contributors | Video Hosting | Standard Card Rate | Google Workspace Email | Best For |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Basic | 2 | 30 minutes | 2.9% + $0.30 | Not included | Portfolio sites and idea testing |
| Core | Unlimited | 5 hours | 2.9% + $0.30 | Free first year | Most growing online stores |
| Plus | Unlimited | 50 hours | 2.7% + $0.30 | Free first year | Drops, pre-orders and timed launches |
| Advanced | Unlimited | Unlimited | 2.5% + $0.30 | Free first year | High-volume and high-ticket stores |
The annual price is shown as a per-month number, but you pay for the full year up front. Squarespace’s page says annual plans save “up to 36%,” yet the listed prices work out to a saving of about 24% to 29% depending on the plan, so do your own math before you trust the headline. Prices are in US dollars, and taxes are added at checkout where they apply.
Want to see if Squarespace fits your store before you commit to a plan? Compare Squarespace plans and start your free trial →
How Squarespace Pricing Works
Squarespace sells website plans in four tiers, and each tier comes in a monthly and an annual billing flavor. Three things change as you move up: the store transaction fee, the card processing rate, and the selling tools you unlock. The visible features like video hosting and AI credits scale too, but they rarely decide which plan you should buy.
Every plan includes the basics. According to the Squarespace pricing page, all four plans have no caps on bandwidth or storage, 24/7 customer support, free SSL security and fully managed cloud hosting. You are not paying extra just to keep the site online, and you will not get a surprise bill for traffic.
AI credits are the newer line item. The pricing page lists 10 one-time credits on Basic, 20 a month on Core, 40 a month on Plus and 120 a month on Advanced, with AI Visibility prompt runs at the same counts. I would not pick a plan for those numbers alone, but it is good to know the allowance exists.
Squarespace Plans Explained
Basic: $19 to $25 a Month
Basic is the entry point, and it is a fair home for a portfolio, a simple service business or a store you are still testing. You pay $19/mo on annual billing or $25/mo monthly. You get two contributors, 30 minutes of video hosting and a free custom domain for the first year when you pay annually.
The catch is the money side. Basic charges a 2% fee on every online store sale and a 7% fee on digital content and memberships, on top of card processing. On a $2,000 order that 2% is $40 gone before you count the card fee. Squarespace’s page also shows Basic without advanced code blocks, code injection, shipping labels, carrier shipping, ecommerce analytics, payment plans and the Mailchimp and Zapier integrations.
In my experience, Basic makes sense while you validate an idea. Once you are making steady sales, the 2% fee costs more than the extra $10 a month Core charges.
Core: $29 to $39 a Month
Core is where I point most real stores. It costs $29/mo on annual billing or $39/mo monthly, and the store fee drops to 0%. The digital content and memberships fee falls to 5%, which still matters if you sell courses or memberships.
Core also adds unlimited contributors, advanced discounts, automated taxes and shipping, shipping labels, carrier-calculated shipping, payment plans, Google Shopping, Meta advertising, ecommerce analytics and the Mailchimp and Zapier integrations. Video hosting rises to 5 hours, and you get Google Workspace email free for the first year.
Run the math on a store doing $15,000 a month. Basic’s 2% fee is $300 a month, while Core costs $10 more than Basic on annual billing. That is not a close call.
Plus: $49 to $65 a Month
Plus is $49/mo annual or $65/mo monthly. It keeps the 0% store fee, cuts the digital content and memberships fee to 1%, and lowers the standard card rate to 2.7% + $0.30. Its signature addition is the reserved cart and countdown timer, which matters if you run limited drops or timed launches.
Video hosting jumps to 50 hours. For a normal catalog store, Plus is paying for features you may never touch, so I only recommend it when release mechanics are part of how you sell.
Advanced: $99 to $139 a Month
Advanced is $99/mo annual or $139/mo monthly. Every store and digital content fee is 0%, video hosting is unlimited, and the standard card rate falls to 2.5% + $0.30. It also adds high-traffic checkout, which is built for busy launch days.
Advanced pays for itself on volume, and I show the exact break-even math in the next section. For a low-volume store it is an expensive way to save a few dollars of processing.
Squarespace Transaction Fees and Card Processing
People mix up two separate charges, so let me split them. The first is the Squarespace store fee: 2% on Basic and 0% on the other three plans for online store sales, with a separate fee on digital content and memberships. The second is card processing, which applies to every sale on every plan.
| Fee | Basic | Core | Plus | Advanced |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Standard card rate | 2.9% + $0.30 | 2.9% + $0.30 | 2.7% + $0.30 | 2.5% + $0.30 |
| Premium card rate | 3.2% + $0.30 | 3.2% + $0.30 | 3.2% + $0.30 | 3.2% + $0.30 |
| ACH payments | 1.5% | 1.0% (max $10) | 1.0% (max $10) | 1.0% (max $10) |
| International card surcharge | 1.5% | 1.5% | 1.5% | 1.5% |
| Currency conversion | 1.0% | 1.0% | 1.0% | 1.0% |
| Automated global tax fee | Not included | 0.15% (max $0.99) | 0.10% (max $0.99) | 0.05% (max $0.99) |
On a $2,000 sale paid with a standard card, processing is $58.30 on Basic or Core, $54.30 on Plus and $50.30 on Advanced. Basic adds its 2% store fee on top, which is another $40. That is the real reason cheap plans get expensive as your order values rise.
Here are the break-even points, using only the published rates. Moving from Basic to Core on annual billing costs $10 more a month, so Core wins once you sell more than about $500 a month. Moving from Core to Advanced costs $70 more a month and saves 0.4% on standard card sales, so Advanced wins on processing alone once card sales pass about $17,500 a month. For a high-ticket store with $2,000 orders, Advanced saves $8 per order versus Core, so roughly nine orders a month covers the gap.
These rates are the ones Squarespace lists for its own payments service. If you accept other payment methods, check what those providers charge separately, since they add their own fees.
What Squarespace Really Costs in a Year
The plan price is never the whole bill. Here is a realistic first-year picture on annual billing, using the plan prices from the table above.
- Basic: $228 for the plan, plus store fees and card processing on every sale.
- Core: $348 for the plan, plus card processing and the small automated tax fee if you turn it on.
- Plus: $588 for the plan, plus card processing at the lower 2.7% rate.
- Advanced: $1,188 for the plan, plus card processing at the lowest 2.5% rate.
The domain is the next item. On an annual plan, Squarespace’s help center says you can claim a free first-year domain in its lowest price tier, which includes .com, within one year of signing up. After the free year the domain renews at the standard rate for its extension, and the renewal price is shown at checkout rather than on the pricing page. If you would rather shop renewals separately, a registrar like Namecheap is worth comparing before you auto-renew.
Email is the other one people forget. Core, Plus and Advanced include Google Workspace free for the first year, and after that you pay Google. Basic does not include it at all. Extra extensions, upsell tools and review widgets stack on top of your plan the same way apps do on any platform.
If you also plan to sell digital downloads or memberships, remember those carry their own fee: 7% on Basic, 5% on Core, 1% on Plus and 0% on Advanced. A course creator on Basic is paying a lot more than the plan price suggests.
Monthly vs Annual Billing
On Squarespace’s listed prices, annual billing saves about 24% on Basic ($300 a year monthly versus $228 annually), about 26% on Core ($468 versus $348), about 25% on Plus ($780 versus $588) and about 29% on Advanced ($1,668 versus $1,188). That is real money, but there is a catch worth reading before you commit a full year.
Squarespace’s website refund policy says annual plans cancelled within 14 days of purchase qualify for a full refund, minus the cost of any free domain you claimed. Monthly plans, renewal payments and annual plans cancelled after 14 days are not refunded. To avoid a renewal charge you cancel before the renewal date shown on your invoices. I walk through the exact steps in my guide on how to cancel Squarespace.
My advice: use the 14-day free trial first. Squarespace says no credit card is required, and my full breakdown of the Squarespace free trial covers what you can and cannot do during it. If you then want to test with real customers, start monthly for 60 to 90 days, then switch to annual once you know you are staying. If you want to hunt for a discount first, my Squarespace coupon guide shows what is worth checking.
New to selling online and not sure which products to build a store around? Start with my free mini course →
Which Squarespace Plan Should You Choose?
If you are still validating a niche, Basic is a fine temporary home, and it pairs well with the research in my high-ticket niches list. The 2% fee barely registers at $500 a month in sales. Once you have consistent orders, switch to Core, which covers what most stores need.
Pick Plus if you run drops, pre-orders or timed releases and want the reserved cart and countdown timer. Pick Advanced if your monthly card sales are above roughly $17,500, or if you sell high-ticket items where the lower processing rate and high-traffic checkout actually earn their price.
If you are building a store around high-ticket dropshipping, order values of $500 to $5,000 make every basis point of processing matter. That is the one case where I look hard at Advanced, but I also want you to ask yourself whether a website builder is the right foundation at all, which I cover below.
Squarespace vs Shopify and Wix Pricing
| Platform and Plan | Monthly Billing | Annual Billing (per month) | Standard Card Rate |
|---|---|---|---|
| Squarespace Core | $39/mo | $29/mo | 2.9% + $0.30 |
| Shopify Basic | $39/mo | $29/mo | 2.9% + $0.30 |
| Wix Core | Not shown | $29/mo | 2.9% + $0.30 (Wix Payments, US) |
At the entry level for selling, the three land in almost the same place. Shopify’s pricing page lists Basic at $39/mo or $29/mo on annual billing, with a 2% fee if you use a third-party payment provider, and an intro trial of 3 days free then $1 a month for 3 months. Wix lists Core at $29/mo on yearly billing in its own pricing guide, along with Wix Payments at 2.9% + $0.30 for US cards. Wix did not show a monthly-billing price in the sources I checked.
Because the sticker prices match, the decision comes down to what the platform does for your business. My Squarespace vs Shopify comparison covers that for stores. My Squarespace vs Wix breakdown compares the two builders head to head.
For the full numbers on each side, I keep a Wix pricing guide up to date. The Shopify side lives in my Shopify pricing guide. Read those next if you are narrowing down to two platforms.
Is Squarespace Right for Your Store?
Squarespace is a good fit for a small catalog, a design-led brand, a creator or a service business that also sells a handful of products. The editor is polished, support is included on every plan, and the 0% store fee from Core up keeps the math simple. If that describes you, Core on annual billing is hard to beat.
I want to be straight about where it stops. The Squarespace pricing page itself shows how much of the selling toolkit sits behind the Core plan, and the platform has far fewer apps and supplier integrations than Shopify. In my experience, stores that sell higher-ticket products, work with suppliers or plan to grow into hundreds of products outgrow a website builder faster than their owners expect. That is why I build on Shopify.
If you want a high-ticket dropshipping store built properly rather than learning a platform from scratch, my team handles the build. It also helps to understand how to structure your business so plan fees, processing costs and taxes fit into a real budget. Before you pick any platform, learn how to find suppliers.
Want a high-ticket dropshipping store built for you on Shopify? See how the done-for-you build works →
Hidden Costs and Gotchas
The 2-contributor limit on Basic catches people the moment they hire a VA or bring on a partner, because that forces an upgrade to Core regardless of sales. Video hosting is the other quiet cap: Basic includes 30 minutes in total, which a handful of product demos can use up.
Moving off Squarespace later is not free or instant, because product data, design work and URLs all need rebuilding. If you are weighing options now, my roundup of Squarespace alternatives shows where each one wins. My full Squarespace review covers what it feels like to run a store on it past the pricing.
Finally, remember that pricing pages change. Squarespace, Shopify and Wix all adjust plans and rates over time, so use the numbers here as a November 2026 snapshot and confirm the live price before you pay.
Frequently Asked Questions
How much is Squarespace per month?
Squarespace costs $25, $39, $65 or $139 a month on monthly billing for Basic, Core, Plus and Advanced. On annual billing the same plans work out to $19, $29, $49 and $99 a month, charged as one yearly payment. These are the prices Squarespace listed in November 2026.
Is Squarespace free to use?
No. There is a 14-day free trial that Squarespace says needs no credit card, but there is no permanent free plan. After the trial you choose a paid plan starting at $19/mo on annual billing.
How much does Squarespace charge per transaction?
Card processing is 2.9% + $0.30 on Basic and Core, 2.7% + $0.30 on Plus and 2.5% + $0.30 on Advanced. Basic also charges a 2% store fee on top, while Core, Plus and Advanced charge 0% on online store sales. Digital content and memberships carry separate fees of 7%, 5%, 1% and 0% by plan.
What is the cheapest Squarespace plan that is worth it for a store?
For a store with steady sales, it is Core at $29/mo billed annually. Basic is cheaper but its 2% fee beats the $10 a month saving once you sell more than about $500 a month. Core also adds shipping labels, ecommerce analytics and unlimited contributors.
Does Squarespace give refunds?
Annual plans cancelled within 14 days of purchase qualify for a full refund, minus the cost of any free domain you claimed. Monthly plans, renewals and annual plans cancelled later are not refunded, so cancel before your renewal date. Terms change, so check Squarespace’s current refund policy before you buy.
Ready to see the real numbers for your own store? Try Squarespace free for 14 days →
Related Articles
If you found this useful, these guides go deeper on the same decision:
- Squarespace Review 2026
- Squarespace vs Shopify
- Squarespace vs Wix in 2026
- Wix Pricing 2026
- Shopify Pricing 2026
Trevor Fenner is an ecommerce entrepreneur and world traveler from Seattle, Washington, and the founder of Ecommerce Paradise, a platform focused on helping entrepreneurs build and scale profitable high-ticket ecommerce and dropshipping businesses. With over a decade of hands-on experience, Trevor specializes in high-ticket dropshipping strategy, niche and product selection, supplier recruiting and onboarding, Google & Bing Shopping ads, ecommerce SEO, and systems-driven automation and scaling. Through Ecommerce Paradise, he provides free education via in-depth guides like How to Start High-Ticket Dropshipping, advanced training through the High-Ticket Dropshipping Masterclass, and fully done-for-you turnkey ecommerce services for entrepreneurs who want a faster, more hands-off path to growth. Trevor is known for emphasizing sustainable, real-world ecommerce models over hype-driven tactics, helping store owners build scalable, sellable, and location-independent brands.
He maintains homes in Seattle and Bali, spends most of the year overseas, and usually returns to Seattle for about a month each summer.
