Shopify POS vs Clover: Which Costs Less for a Retail Store?

What Does Clover Cost a Retail Store?

This page weighs two registers for a retail store. If Square is also on your shortlist, our comparison of Shopify POS with Square and Lightspeed covers that side; everything below stays on Clover and Shopify.

Clover prices retail as three bundles, each a device set plus software, and each can be paid two ways: a subscription of a fixed monthly amount for 36 months, or an upfront price — $349 for Basic, with no monthly fee printed beside it, and a hardware price plus a monthly software-plan fee for Standard and Advanced. The table is Clover's retail pricing page as read on September 28, 2026.

Two more lines matter on that page. The rates in the table are 2.6% + 10¢ on Clover Basic and 2.3% + 10¢ on Standard and Advanced for a card tapped, swiped or inserted, per Clover's retail table in September 2026. Rapid Deposit, which gets you funds within minutes of a credit card sale, costs a 1.75% fee on all three bundles.

Outside the bundles, Clover sells single devices. The mobile Clover Go reader is $199 on its Starter plan, at rates Clover gives as "as low as 2.6% + 10¢", or $199 plus $29.95 a month on Essentials, "as low as 2.5% + 10¢". Its closest Shopify counterpart is the $49 Tap & Chip Reader, or no reader at all with Tap to Pay on iPhone. Flex, Mini and Station Solo are also sold one by one on Clover's device pages.

What Does Shopify POS Cost for the Same Store?

Shopify prices the register differently from Clover. The plan is the entry fee: the in-person tier that Shopify's POS pricing page now calls Casual in-person selling, long known as POS Lite, is free with every paid plan from Basic upward. POS Pro is an optional per-location subscription on top, and hardware is bought once.

The card-present rate is where Clover can win. Shopify Payments charges 2.6% + 10¢ on Basic, 2.5% + 10¢ on Grow and 2.4% + 10¢ on Advanced in person in the US, as of September 2026. Basic matches Clover's Basic bundle, but it is 0.3 points above Clover's Standard and Advanced bundles at 2.3%. What that rate costs on a month of counter sales is worked through in our breakdown of in-person running costs.

The other honest cost is the plan itself: a store that never sells online still pays for a plan built around an online store, and it sits under every other fee. That is one layer of Shopify's cost stack, and it is the reason Clover's cheapest bundle undercuts Shopify for an in-person-only counter.

Do you need POS Pro at each store?

Shopify recommends POS Pro "if your retail business sees a lot of foot traffic, has multiple levels of staff, or carries an extensive product catalog". POS Pro costs $89 a month per location, or $67 a month on a 12-month term for retailers new to POS Pro, and the yearly page states that cancelling before the term ends means paying the monthly fees left in it — a commitment of its own, if a shorter one than Clover's 36 months. Whether its staff, inventory and reporting features pay for themselves at your volume is the question our guide answers in the math behind POS Pro.

Hardware you buy for Shopify POS

Shopify's hardware runs from nothing to a full counter. Tap to Pay on iPhone takes contactless cards on an iPhone XS or newer without a reader. The Tap & Chip Card Reader is $49 and sold in the US only, and the countertop Shopify POS Terminal is $349. Our Shopify POS app guide covers the rest of the lineup, from printers to scanners.

For selling on the floor, the Shopify answer to Clover Flex is the Verifone Victa Mobile, at $399 without a dock or $449 with a dock. Shopify POS Go is no longer available for sale; a POS Go you already own can be used in mobile selling mode until May 26, 2027, per Shopify's POS Go page.

Who Sells You Clover, and What Can You Cancel?

Clover's pricing page says the system is sold by financial institutions such as Citi, PNC and Wells Fargo as well as by Clover Direct. The same page gives two different counts of the other partners, read on September 28, 2026: one answer says "More than 1,000 other financial institution partners also sell Clover solutions in the US", and the answer beside it says "more than 3,000 other financial institution partners".

The count doesn't change your decision, and there is no reason to pick one. What changes it is which provider sold you Clover, because Clover states that "Contract terms and any termination fees can vary based on your service provider". The agreement from that provider, not the website, holds your terms.

If you pay for Clover hardware monthly over 36 months, Clover's own pricing page is explicit about leaving early:

How much an early exit costs in dollars is the figure a switcher wants most, and it is the one Clover doesn't print: none of the Clover pages we read on September 28, 2026 — its pricing FAQ, the retail pricing page and the POS systems page — names a dollar amount for a termination fee. Ask your provider for it in writing.

Which Costs Less Over One to Three Years?

The comparison below counts what each vendor publishes: subscriptions or upfront hardware, software fees, the Shopify plan and card-present fees.

It leaves out sales tax, apps, the optional add-on Clover lists for building a new online store, typed-in card sales and refunds, and it also leaves out the tablet or phone that Shopify POS runs on and a receipt printer or cash drawer; Clover's bundles include a printer (built into Basic), and Standard and Advanced add a cash drawer. Leaving those devices out makes the Shopify totals lower than a complete Shopify counter would cost.

One store, three years, two setups

Take one store selling $20,000 a month in 500 card-present sales for 36 months — illustrative figures, not a benchmark — with one Clover bundle per store, which is our assumption rather than a Clover rule.

Because a Clover subscription is a 36-month commitment, the Shopify side is priced on yearly terms: Basic billed yearly at $29 a month, and POS Pro at $67 on its 12-month term for retailers new to POS Pro. That offer also comes with incentives for retailers new to POS Pro, each with its own conditions on Shopify's POS Pro yearly page, which this example doesn't count.

Entry pair. Clover Basic and Shopify Basic both charge 2.6% + 10¢, so card fees match and the gap is fixed cost alone: Clover Basic comes out $517 cheaper at any sales volume.

Growth pair. Clover Standard's 2.3% rate saves on fees, but its $180 subscription costs more over the 36 months than Shopify's plan, POS Pro and a POS Terminal together, so at this volume Shopify comes out $515 cheaper.

Pay Shopify monthly instead, at $39 for the plan and $89 for POS Pro, and the Shopify total rises to $25,477, which makes Clover Standard $637 cheaper.

With two or three stores, one Shopify plan still covers them all while POS Pro is priced per location, and on our one-bundle-per-store assumption each Clover store carries its own bundle; the calculator below prices up to three stores.

The chart shows why the rate matters more than the hardware. Card fees are between about 74% and 97% of the three-year bill in all four setups: 74% for Clover Standard, 84% for the Shopify growth setup, and 95% to 97% for the two entry setups, where fixed costs are small.

Where Clover's lower rate catches up

The growth pair is a trade between two numbers. With Shopify billed yearly and POS Pro on its 12-month term, Shopify's fixed costs run about $74 a month below the $180 Clover Standard subscription, once the POS Terminal is spread over the 36 months, while Clover's card-present rate is 0.3 points lower. The two cancel at about $24,800 a month in card sales at one store; above it, Clover Standard costs less over three years, and below it Shopify does. The 10¢ per sale is the same on both sides, so the number of sales doesn't move the break-even.

How you pay Clover moves the total too. On Clover's published prices, buying the hardware upfront costs less over 36 months than the subscription on all three retail bundles — $4,957.20 against $6,480 on Standard, counting its $84.95 monthly software fee. The subscription spreads the cost; it also locks you in for 36 months.

Run your own numbers

Change the inputs to your store. The calculator opens on the growth pair from the worked example; switch the Clover bundle or the Shopify billing to see how quickly the answer turns.

What Changes If You Also Sell Online?

Selling online is what the Shopify plan fee buys: the register and the website share one product catalog, one set of customers and one admin. Against Clover Basic, which doesn't include online-store setup, that is the case for Shopify. Clover Standard and Advanced include online-store setup and a single dashboard for online and offline sales, so against them the cost comparison above decides. The flip side is that an in-person-only store pays the plan fee too.

Clover's retail pricing table marks "Set up online store" and "Single dashboard for online and offline sales" as included on Standard and Advanced but not on Basic, and in a separate row lists "Build a new online store" as an optional add-on on all three, without a price beside it. Clover also points merchants who already have a web store elsewhere to its partners:

So you can keep Clover at the counter and still sell on Shopify; how that works is covered under keeping Clover at the counter below.

When Staying on Clover Makes Sense

Restaurants and cafés. Clover's Station Duo and Station Solo come with a Restaurant Growth option, with flat fees as low as 2.3% + 10¢, that adds online and QR code ordering. Before a restaurant moves, read where Shopify stops for tables, tickets and modifiers.

One counter, in person only. The entry pair in the worked example is the clearest win for Clover: the same card rate, and a lower fixed cost than a Shopify plan that includes an online store you wouldn't use.

A busy store on Clover Standard. Above the break-even in the worked example, Clover's lower rate outweighs Shopify's lower fixed cost. Check your own card sales in the calculator before you move for price alone.

Which Route Fits Your Store?

The verdict at the top answers by store profile, and the calculator answers in dollars. This quiz answers by where your Clover contract stands and how you sell. Against Clover Basic, those two decide whether you switch now, at the end of the term, or not at all; against Clover Standard and Advanced, which include online-store setup, check the cost in the calculator too.

Moving From Clover to Shopify POS — or Connecting the Two

Moving to Shopify POS and connecting Clover to a Shopify store are two different projects, and our FAQ on whether Shopify integrates with Clover covers both in more depth. This section keeps to what decides the cost and timing of each.

What the Store Migration app brings across

Shopify's first-party route out of Clover is the Store Migration app, which moves your Clover products and customers into Shopify; retailers new to POS Pro who choose POS Pro's 12-month term also get data migration support from a Shopify POS expert. The app's guide opens with the condition that decides whether you can use it at all:

The same guide lists what the import leaves behind:

• Product options: Shopify allows three product options, and products with more than three won't have their options imported.
• Prices by location: Shopify doesn't support prices by location, so each product takes its highest price.
• Inventory by location: this import method doesn't import stock by location.
• Reviews: Shopify's guide says you can't export or migrate reviews from Clover to Shopify, though you can import them manually with a third-party app from the Shopify App Store.

Keeping Clover at the counter

If the subscription or the contract keeps you on Clover for now, you don't have to wait to sell on Shopify. SKU IQ and Thrive Inventory both list Clover under "Works with" on the Shopify App Store, so a Clover register and a Shopify online store can share stock until the term ends. You then pay for a Shopify plan and a sync app on top of Clover, which is worth pricing against the months you have left.

Switching checklist

Step one comes first for everyone, and it decides the date of every step after it. If you are on a Clover subscription, the other six steps can wait until its end date comes into view. Give Clover the notice described in the contract lines above at least 30 days before the term ends.

The Bottom Line

The two registers trade a lower fixed cost against a lower card rate and land close together. Against Clover Basic, what separates them is how you sell; against Clover Standard and Advanced, which include online-store setup, cost decides, so check the break-even and your own numbers in the calculator above. The contract you are in today sets when you can switch.

Frequently Asked Questions