A successful business focuses on retaining existing customers along with attracting new customers. Do you know why?

Because companies typically pay 2-4 months’ worth of revenue upfront to acquire a customer and they need that 5th, 6th, 7th month of renewals to actually make any profit on that customer.

One of the great ways to encourage repeat purchases is – Subscription. 

Subscriptions are nothing but the facility your business provides to the customer to purchase your products automatically, enabling recurring payments.

You can easily add a “subscription” feature to your Shopify store by using various Subscription Apps available on Shopify App Store.

But, with over a ton of Subscription apps on Shopify, it can be overwhelming for you to choose the right one for your business.

Well, in this post we will give you an insight into:

• Six things to look for in a good Shopify Subscription App?
• Top 10 Shopify subscription apps

6 things to look for in a good Shopify subscription app:

1. Enables Self-managed subscription for customers – An ideal subscription app will provide customers the freedom to add, delete, swap, skip or temporarily pause their subscriptions. Customers always feel at ease with your business if you provide such provisions.

2. Integration with Shopify Checkout – Even though a lot of 3rd party checkout platforms are available, Shopify Checkout is the best option you could use because when a customer uses a different checkout, the third-party sales policies apply rather than your Shopify policies. So, “integration with Shopify checkout” is a quality you can’t miss out on while choosing a Subscription app for your Shopify Store.

3. Provides Dunning management to reduce churn – As subscriptions work on online payment using various payment methods, there is a chance for certain transactions to be failed. Dunning is the process of handling failed payments and declined credit cards to recover lost revenue. A customer-friendly subscription app would have features of dunning management which include:

• • Sending  Alert SMS/Emails for retrying failed payments
  • Reminders about upcoming payments
  • Notifications regarding due payments from declined credit cards.

4. Easy Migration from other Subscription Apps – Customer data and existing subscriptions of your Shopify store may be lost while shifting from one subscription app to another. This problem won’t happen in a good Subscription App, and they will provide assistance for the migration of data.

5. Works well with all payment options – As you are dealing with customers coming from multiple sectors, their mode of payment may also differ. So, for sales growth. rather than sticking to one payment option, your Subscription app should provide diverse payment options.

6. Securely store customer data – Subscriptions run on automated and recurring payments. So, the customers would have to share with you their personal details, bank details, credit card details, shipping address, etc. You must make sure that the Subscription app your store use is having secure data privacy policies and they never shares your customer details with third-party app or platforms without the consent of your customer.

Top 10 Subscription Apps For Shopify:

1. Appstle℠ Subscriptions
2. Recharge Subscriptions
3. Seal Subscriptions℠ & Loyalty
4. Bold Subscriptions
5. PayWhirl Subscription Payments
6. Subscription & Recurring Order
7. Ongoing Subscriptions
8. Native Subscriptions
9. Loop Subscriptions
10. Skio Subscriptions

Let’s dive into further details of these Shopify Subscription apps in detail:

1. Appstle℠ Subscriptions

• Rating – 5/5 (1236 reviews)
• Pricing – Provides a 14-day free trial. After that, you can either go for the free plan or the premium plan starting from $10/month.
• Key Features:
  • Founded by an Apple-Siri engineer, this app is GDPR & data privacy compliant that comes with the amazing offer of no transaction fee on recurring orders. This app is so far ranked No.1 in the Shopify Subscriptions app:

• • Customers can self-manage the subscription by pausing or skipping deliveries, swapping/adding/deleting product subscriptions, including products one-time, and adjusting all delivery dates.
  • Provides recapturing of failed transactions due to expired/declined cards, with in-built mechanisms, and automatically notify customers to retry payments.
  • Even when a subscription is canceled, this app automatically initiates asking questions to know the reason behind the customer’s decision.
  • Comes with additional features of personalized email notifications, seamless Shopify checkout connects, and a real-time product performance tracker.
  • Integrates well with Loyalty Lion, Klaviyo, Zapier, PageFly, Growave, Yotpo.
• Appstle℠ Subscriptions app is good for: This app is best for its No transaction fee on recurring policies, easy migration from other apps, and 24/7/365 customer support.

2. Recharge Subscriptions

• Rating – 4.7/5 (1068 reviews)
• Pricing – There is no monthly fee for the Standard plan. For the Pro plan, pricing starts at $300/month.
• Key Features:
  • You can manage your subscription business with Recharge’s powerful merchant portal.
  • You can provide your subscription packages on Shopify Payments within minutes. Their APIs also help in scaling and optimizing your subscription business by providing Analytics.
  • Customers can self-manage their subscriptions and the app will provide automatic notifications whenever necessary.
  • Comes with the feature of real-time product performance tracking.
  • Integrates well with Klaviyo, Gorgias, Yotpo, Shipstation, Loyalty Lion, Attentive.
• Recharge Subscriptions app is good for: The comprehensive API and management system of this Subscription app is the best. This app also updates you with insights about the performance matrix and optimizes your business.

3. Seal Subscriptions℠ & Loyalty

• Rating – 4.8/5 (422 reviews)
• Pricing – Provides a 15-day free trial. After that, you can either go with the free plan or with the paid plan starting from $7.95/month.
• Key Features:
  • Packed with multiple features including automated product swaps, interval changes, payment calendar, Quick Checkout Wizard, and much more.
  • This app can be operated in two modes – Auto-charging mode and in the Recurring invoices mode. In the Auto-charging mode, your customers will automatically get charged for recurring orders and you can access this on your Shopify admin page. If the customer is opting for Recurring invoices mode, they will get an email notification as a reminder for the upcoming payment with the checkout link, and they can pay from that link.
  • Customers get the facility for mixed subscriptions in the same cart, and the app will also help you in generating Subscription discounts as a reward for your customer.
  • Integration with Bundler – Upsell Bundles app allows your business to offer a subscription box functionality in your Shopify store.
  • You can migrate your existing subscriptions from another platform to Seal either manually or in bulk importing method.
  • Integrates well with Klaviyo, Google Analytics, Bundler, Multilanguage, Stripe apps.
• Seal Subscriptions℠ & Loyalty app is good for: This app is good for small businesses looking for an app with zero percent transaction fees.

4. Bold Subscriptions

• Rating – 4.4/5 (257 reviews)
• Pricing – Provides 60 days free trial. After that, pricing is $49.99/month+1% of orders containing subscription products.
• Key Features:
  • This Subscription app allows creating subscriptions in multiple ways. You can easily add Subscribe & Save options to one product, a specific collection, or to your entire Shopify store.
  • Provide migration services with zero downtime.
  • Shopify discount codes can be applied. 
  • Along with helping you in adding subscriptions, this app also provides services in the marketing, reporting, and customer management process.
  • Focused on enhancing customer satisfaction by letting them manage their subscriptions, payments, and personal information in their own language with a customizable customer portal.
  • Strengthen your support team by giving access to powerful customer management tools to edit and manage your subscriber accounts along with matching your billing and fulfillment cycles with buffer days giving proper intervals between two deliveries.
  • Integrates well with Paypal Express, Shop Payments, Authorize.net, Google Analytics, Zapier, Klaviyo apps.
• Bold Subscriptions app is good for: This app provides free migration of subscriptions from other subscription apps. Their powerful APIs is good for scaling your business.

5. PayWhirl Subscription Payments

• Rating – 4.9/5 (163 reviews)
• Pricing – Provides a 14-day free trial. After that, you can either opt for a free plan or a premium plan with pricing starting from $9/month.
• Key features:
  • Unlimited subscriptions and features on all plans.
  • Migration support from Shopify Payments, Stripe, Authorize, and PayPal
  • Comes with the features of both free & self-installation options, pre-paid & traditional subscription support, automatic dunning & failed payment management.
  • Works smoothly on payment gateways such as Shopify Payments, Authorize.net, and PayPal Checkout(formerly known as PayPal Express support). This app works well on Shop Pay & Apple Pay.
  • Gives your customers the facility of billing weekly, monthly, or annually, managing their subscriptions, credit cards & profile info.
  • Integrates with Themes, Product Pages, Carts, Checkout, Reports, Analytics, and Shopify’s built-in reports.

• PayWhirl Subscription Payments app is good for: This aspect of unlimited subscriptions and features regardless of the plan you choose is what makes this app business-friendly.

6. Subscription & Recurring Order

• Rating – 4.6/5 (128 reviews)
• Pricing – This is a free app.
• Key Features:
  • Provides both auto-charging and recurring invoice subscriptions. You can choose the preferred mode while creating the subscription rule and can switch later if needed.
  • Comes with smart subscription management with the ability to edit customer subscriptions. In addition, customers can fine-tune product price, shipping price, payment schedule, shipping address, etc.
  • Gives customers the freedom to choose any payment method and offers a discount when they subscribe.
  • Integrates with Shopify checkout and Shopify’s built-in reports and themes.

• Subscription & Recurring Order app is good for: The customer service this app provides is one of the best in class and that too without any additional charge.

 7. Ongoing Subscriptions

• Rating – 5/5 (106 reviews)
• Pricing – Provides a free plan charging 2% per transaction. The premium plan comes with $299/month+1% per transaction.
• Key Features:
  • This subscription app is PCI & GDPR Compliant providing a One-click installation facility.
  • Provides you with multiple discount models on subscription orders. You can provide a Percentage-based discount, Amount off discount, or Set price discount.
  • Customers can either choose Pay per delivery option or can opt for Prepaid payments. In the case of pay per delivery, the customer pays for goods or services per delivery. If they choose a prepaid option, they can make single payment upfront.
  • Provides automatic recurring billing and payments, and a beautiful subscription widget.
  • Integrates well with Locksmith, Authorize.net, Shop Pay, Paypal Checkout, Stripe, Multi-Language.

• Ongoing Subscriptions app is good for: This app provides a 15 minutes onboarding call for hassle-free installation and launch of the app, and it also has a great customer portal.

8. Native Subscriptions

• Rating – 4.9/5 (69 reviews)
• Pricing – Provides a 60-day free trial. After that, pricing starts at $9/month.
• Key features:
  • No transaction fees.
  • Comes with the facility of subscription, based on customer tags and custom shipping profiles.
  • This app offers excellent workflows to create amazing outcomes while building your subscription business model.
  • Comes with a user-friendly admin not only for your sales team but also for your customers for managing subscription data.
  • Customers can manage their subscription frequency, skip, pause or cancel subscriptions anytime they wish.
  • Ensure safe payments and provide email notifications for your customers.
  • Integrates well with Klaviyo, Authorize.net, Paypal Express, Shop Pay, Multilanguage.

• Native Subscriptions app is good for: This app is best for providing a seamless experience, and easy migration procedure.

9. Loop Subscriptions

• Rating – 4.9/5 (55 reviews)
• Pricing – This app is free to install. You can either opt for a free plan or a        premium plan starting from a $5/month+0.75 transaction fee.
• Key Features:
  • Helps in reducing customer subscription cancellation with more than  20+ notifications like upcoming payment reminders, failed payments, skipped orders, etc.
  • Provide your store with the facility of Setting up maximum & minimum limits on subscription orders and support for building complex subscription flows like auto-changing products basis rules, adding trial products for future upselling etc. on enterprise plan.
  • Easily integrates with 3rd party platforms.
  • Integrates well with Klaviyo, Google Analytics, Gorgias, Glew, Custom Integrations.

• Loop Subscriptions app is good for: This app easily integrates with 3rd party apps. They provide chat support according to the plan for quick onboarding (Starter/Growth Plan); Dedicated account managers for subscriptions set-up (Premium); integration engineers for Ultimate Plan.

10. Skio Subscriptions (YC S20)

• Rating – 4.8 / 51 reviews
• Pricing – Provides a 14-day free trial. After that premium plan with pricing $399/month+1% + 20¢ transaction fee, 3% of group revenue is available.
• Key Features:
  • This app really aces in matters of technology as it uses React/Next.js/GraphQL software.
  • The Subscription portal is hosted in such a way the new features get updated automatically without the need for theme development separately.
  • Customers get the amazing feature of passwordless login. They will get a 4 digit SMS or email while logging in.
  • Customers get the facility of Skio’s instant loading, where subscription edits take only a few seconds.
  • Increases retention rate by providing Spike referrals-friends subscribing together get a group discount on every order.
  • Integrates well with Klaviyo, Alloy, Attentive, Shogun, Postscript, Gorgias.

• Skio Subscription app is good for: This app provides easy migration from ReCharge. Passwordless login for customers is an innovative idea that attracts customers.

Conclusion:

Subscription apps are a significant feature you can add to your Shopify store for attracting a fixed revenue on a monthly basis. All the apps mentioned above are favorites among a lot of sellers. However, the app you choose is completely your choice as you are the one who knows the best about your store. Therefore, sit down and take a moment to analyze your business requirement and opt for the best Subscription app suitable for your Shopify store.

Check out our content hub on Best Shopify Apps for Customer Service, Inventory Management, Live Chat, and other key business processes.

And if you need help with customer interaction, you can delegate it to Helplama’s experienced professionals starting from just $399/month.

Also, try the Saufter – the customer service software that can help you automate and scale your customer support.