- Short answer
- No: on a development store, apps run on free or $0 test plans; a plan's price still applies on production stores.
- Whose app it is
- App Pricing apps. Your developer's own: any available plan at no charge. Others: free or free-to-test plans only.
- Where the real price applies
- On production stores. Shopify's pages differ on whether a dev store can go paid.
- If your developer builds it to hand over
- It's a client transfer store: only free and partner-friendly apps install; custom and draft apps can't.
- Is free a Shopify rule?
- No page we read on September 25, 2026 requires it; the app's developer decides what is free to test.
Do paid Shopify apps charge a development store?
On a development store, apps billed through App Pricing can be tested at no charge:
When you select a paid plan at no charge, Shopify creates an app subscription contract with effective prices of $0 for its recurring and usage-based items.
Which plans you can pick depends on who owns the app: "any available plan" if your developer's Partner organization made it; for any other app, "free plans or any plan the Partner has marked as free to test."
Your developer's own manually billed app uses a developer-set test flag, and on install "Shopify creates a test charge"; for another developer's manually billed app, Shopify's route to dev stores is free testing, which "doesn't create an app charge in Shopify."
No Shopify page we read on September 25, 2026 — App Pricing, the app review guide and the free-testing docs — makes a free development-store plan an App Store requirement; it's the app developer's choice.
When does the real app price apply?
Shopify's App Pricing docs say a plan's price "still applies on production stores." Shopify's pages differ on whether a dev store can go paid. Its dev-store docs say "Dev stores can't be converted to production stores", while its free-testing docs advise developers of manually billed apps:
We recommend subscribing to the SHOP_UPDATE webhook to get notified if the development store changes to a paid plan. If you receive this webhook, then block access to your app and create an app charge for the paid plan.
Before launch, check the paid plan of every app you're keeping.
Which apps can go on a client transfer store before handover?
A store your developer builds to hand over is a client transfer store, "a free Shopify account." The rules above are written for development stores; yours has its own app limit: "You can only install free apps and partner-friendly apps. Custom and draft apps can't be installed."
So a custom app built for your store waits until the transfer.
Shopify's pages differ: the developer docs say "You can't directly change the plan of a client transfer store"; the Help Center says a developer can switch it to a paid plan and stay the owner. See what changes when you accept the transfer.
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