With around 286 million active users, PayPal is perhaps the best-known payment gateway in the world. This is enough to make it the 21st largest bank in the United States, if it were a traditional brick-and-mortar financial organisation.
But it’s not the only payment processing solution available to business owners. There are some other great options you can choose from and it may even be they’re a better fit for your company.
We’ve highlighted seven great payment gateways for ecommerce stores (we haven’t included Venmo because it’s owned by PayPal), explaining what type of business they’re ideally suited to, their customer reviews, cost and some other key details you need to know about them.
Read on to find out more below.
What are the best alternatives to PayPal that I can use?
Taking PayPal out of the pictures, these are the seven best gateways you can use for your ecommerce checkout process:
- Amazon Pay
- Apple Pay
- Google Pay
- Payoneer
- Quickbooks Payments
- Shopify Payments
- Skrill
They’re ordered alphabetically (just because Amazon Pay is number one it doesn’t necessarily mean it’s our favourite).
Below, we’ve given you the key information on each gateway, so you can make your own mind up about which one you want to add to your ecommerce platform.
**We’ve taken the customer reviews rating from Trustpilot**
Amazon Pay
Credit: Amazon Pay
If there’s one brand operating in the payment gateway domain that’s better known than PayPal, then it’s Amazon. Amazon Pay has packages for SMEs, big companies and nonprofits, making it ideal for a wide range of businesses.
- Best for: Business owners who want a trusted payment gateway
- Customer reviews: 1.9/5
- Cost: Variable —
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- Less than 50,000 orders: processing fee (2.7%); authorisation fee (£0.30)
- Over 50,000 orders: you can apply for a discount by contacting Amazon
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- Apps: iOS and Android
Adding Amazon payments to your business is quick and simple. Check out the site to find out more about how to add it to your ecommerce store.
Apple Pay
Credit: Apple Pay
Apple Pay claims to be “faster than accepting traditional credit and debit cards and other payment methods”. This is great for ecommerce businesses because their customers can make payments and check out with a single touch.
- Best for: Companies that want a fast and secure payment method
- Customer reviews: 3.6/5
- Cost: Apple charges no additional fees
- Apps: iOS
If your company accepts Visa, Mastercard, American Express, Discover and/or China UnionPay then adding Apple Pay should be pretty straightforward. Review Apple Pay’s merchant checklist to find out what you need to do.
Google Pay
Credit: Google Pay
Alt-text: Google Pay is one of the best PayPal alternatives
Formerly known as Google Wallet, Google Pay allows your online business to accept payments from customers who have added their credit or debit card to their Google Account. This makes for a quick checkout process for shoppers and companies alike.
- Best for: Store owners looking for a simple and trusted gateway
- Customer reviews: 2.1/5
- Cost: free for your business and its customers
- Apps: Android and iOS
One of the other great things about picking Google Pay is that it supports SCA, the two-factor authentication process that was introduced for most online payments from 31 December 2020. Find out how to add Google Pay to your store by visiting the website.
Payoneer
Credit: Payoneer
Payoneer is a payment solution that allows your business to receive credits from and pay freelancers who complete any work for your company via Upwork, Fiverr and similar platforms.
- Best for: Ecommerce businesses that outsource work to freelancers
- Customer reviews: 4.4/5
- Cost: Variable —
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- Card payments: 3% fee
- Via eCheck (USD): 1% fee
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- Apps: Android and iOS
As a cross-border payments platform, Payoneer can be a good option for global ecommerce businesses but it’s more of an all-round business payments platform than a pure ecommerce checkout. Read the resources on Payoneer’s site to learn more about this payment gateway.
Quickbooks Payments
Credit: Quickbooks Payments
Quickbooks Payments integrates with some of the biggest ecommerce platforms, including BigCommerce and Shopify. It allows you to accept card payments from your customers and does so securely through 128-bit SSL encryption.
- Best for: Companies who want integrated payments with key ecommerce platforms
- Customer reviews: 1.5/5
- Cost: Variable —
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- Simple Start: £12 per month
- Essentials: £20 per month
- Plus: £30 per month
- There are also transaction fees
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- Apps: Android and iOS
Unlike some of the leading PayPal alternatives, you have to pay both a monthly cost for using Quickbooks Payments and individual transaction fees when your customers make payments. You can discover more about these charges at the Quickbooks Payments site.
Shopify Payments
Credit: Shopify
Shopify is one of the biggest ecommerce platforms, with more than 500,000 businesses across the globe using it. Shopify Payments is its payment gateway and the big benefit of using it is that your company doesn’t need to sign up to another third-party provider.
- Best for: ecommerce stores built on Shopify
- Customer reviews: 1.4/5 (rating for Shopify as a brand)
- Cost: there’s no transaction fee for most payments — businesses based in Austria, Belgium or Sweden are charged a fee for orders processed through a third-party payment provider
- Apps: Android and iOS
Shopify Payments is free to use for Shopify customers. However, while you don’t pay transaction fees, this does mean you need to pay a monthly subscription charge to use the Shopify platform. You can find out how much that is by hedging to the Shopify website.
Skrill
Credit: Skrill
Skrill is a digital wallet that ecommerce businesses have been using since the beginning of the 21st century. It offers a quick checkout, digital wallet, rapid transfer and shopping carts.
- Best for: ecommerce owners who want a reliable digital wallet
- Customer reviews: 4.2/5
- Cost:
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- Local payment methods: 1%
- Global payment methods: 1%
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- Apps: Android and IOS
Skrill gets one of the best customer satisfaction ratings of any payment gateway. You can see what your fellow ecommerce business owners think of it by reading the reviews at Trustpilot now.
Is it a good idea for my business to use a PayPal alternative?
PayPal is used by people and businesses across the world, with millions of personal and merchant accounts benefiting from its service.
There are many payment gateways like PayPal, so your company can choose to use an alternative. The question, though, is why you’d choose to use these providers when these are the benefits you get from PayPal:
- Secure payment gateway
- No recurring bills (no pre-set monthly or annual fee)
- Broad ecommerce integration
One of the reasons you might choose to use an alternative to PayPal is that it charges processing fees, levying a charge per transaction to business owners. These fees include:
- Commercial transactions: 2.9% + a fixed fee
- QR Code Transactions:
- £10.00 and below: 2% + a fixed fee
- £10.01 and above: 1.5% + a fixed fee
So, while there’s no recurring billing, you can expect to pay a regular fee to PayPal if you choose to use it as your payment gateway.
Why can’t customers just pay directly from their bank account?
PayPal — and PayPal alternatives — aren’t the only way your customers can buy products from your ecommerce business.
Instead of setting up an account with PayPal or PayPal competitors, shoppers can simply pay directly from their bank account in the following ways:
- Debit cards
- Credit card payments
- Bank transfers
- Mobile payments
The problem is that if you limit your customers to just these payment methods then it can turn some of them off. This is particularly true of people global customers making international payments, as their bank might charge them a fee for doing so. They may also not feel comfortable or protected using these methods, which is something to keep in mind.
So, while you should allow your customers to buy your goods with pay as you go via their mobile, credit cards, debit cards and bank transfer from their bank accounts, we recommend that you give them some other payment options too.
We’ve given you a list of seven great alternatives to PayPal. We’ve told you how much they cost, what type of businesses they’re good for and why they’re a top card processing provider.
What we’ve not said, though, is that you could use some of these alongside PayPal — Amazon Pay, Apple Pay and Google Pay are prime examples of this.
You may choose to use PayPal and you may choose not to. What’s most important is that you make your decision based on the payment methods your customers use. Why?
Because if your customers can’t buy your products in the way they want to then they’ll simply purchase them from your competitors.