Every week someone in Lahore, Karachi or Islamabad asks us the same question in a slightly different form: “Website banwani hai, online sale karni hai, kitna kharcha aayega?” The honest answer is that the build is the smaller part of the decision. The platform you pick, the payment methods you wire in and how you handle cash on delivery decide whether the store makes money or becomes an expensive Instagram link.
This guide is written for business owners in Pakistan who are about to commission an online store in 2026. It covers the three realistic platform options, the payment gateways that actually work here, the courier and COD setup, and what fair pricing looks like in PKR. Where we quote numbers, they are the ranges we see in real quotes, ours and our competitors’.
Who this is for, and who should wait
An ecommerce website makes sense once you have three things: a product that already sells somewhere (Instagram, WhatsApp, Daraz, a physical shop), a way to ship it, and someone who will answer orders every day. If any of those is missing, a store will not fix it. Sell on WhatsApp and Instagram for another three months, then come back.
If you do have those three things, the store pays for itself quickly, because you stop paying marketplace commission, you own the customer data, and you can run ads to a page you control. Most of our ecommerce clients in Pakistan recover the build cost within four to eight months of steady orders.
The three platform choices in Pakistan
There are only three sensible ways to build an online store here. Anything else is either a toy (Wix-style builders that cannot take Pakistani payments properly) or an over-engineered custom project sold to a business that needed a theme.
Shopify. Hosted, fast, and the platform most Pakistani DTC brands run on. You pay a monthly plan in USD (from about USD 39 for Basic in 2026, billed to a card) plus apps. Shopify Payments is not available in Pakistan, so card and wallet payments go through a local gateway app. Best for fashion, cosmetics, food, gadgets and any catalogue under a few thousand products. Our Shopify development work is mostly this.
WooCommerce on WordPress. Self-hosted, no monthly platform fee, complete control. Better for stores that also need a content-heavy website, B2B price lists, or unusual product logic. The trade-off is that you own the hosting, updates and security, which is why we pair it with a maintenance plan. Built by our WordPress team.
Custom store (Laravel or similar). Only when the business logic does not fit a platform: wholesale portals with per-customer pricing, multi-branch inventory, ERP integration, or a marketplace where other sellers list products. Real budgets start at PKR 1.5 million and go up. See custom development.
A quick rule: if your catalogue is simple and you want to be selling in six weeks, Shopify. If you already run WordPress or need content plus commerce, WooCommerce. If a platform would need ten plugins to approximate your workflow, custom.
Payment gateways that actually work in Pakistan
This is where most stores stumble. International guides assume Stripe and PayPal. Neither works for a Pakistani merchant. What does work in 2026:
- JazzCash and Easypaisa wallets, either through their own merchant integrations or through an aggregator. Together they cover the majority of digital payments outside cards.
- Card payments (Visa, Mastercard, local debit) through a bank or aggregator gateway. PayFast, Safepay and bank-provided gateways are the ones we integrate most often. Onboarding needs a registered business, an active bank account and NTN, and usually takes two to four weeks, so start the paperwork the day the project starts, not the week before launch.
- Bank transfer with manual confirmation, still common for high-ticket items. Cheap to offer, slow to reconcile.
- Cash on delivery, which is a payment method, a logistics problem and a fraud problem at the same time. It gets its own section below.
Two practical points. First, aggregator fees in Pakistan run roughly 2 to 3 percent per card transaction plus wallet charges; build that into your margin from day one. Second, test every method with a real PKR 100 order before launch, including a refund. We have seen stores go live where the JazzCash button worked in the gateway’s sandbox and failed on the first real customer.
Cash on delivery: the decision that shapes the whole store
COD is still the largest share of ecommerce orders in Pakistan, but it is shrinking, and every serious store owner we work with is trying to reduce it. The reasons are simple: return-to-origin rates on COD orders run 15 to 30 percent for many categories, the courier holds your cash for a week or more, and fake orders waste packaging and rider time.
What actually works, in order of impact:
- Order confirmation by WhatsApp or automated call before dispatch. This alone cuts fake COD orders sharply.
- A small discount, free shipping or a gift for prepaid orders. Even PKR 150 off shifts a meaningful share of customers to JazzCash or card.
- A COD limit per order (for example, no COD above PKR 15,000) and no COD for repeat offenders, tracked by phone number.
- Clear delivery-time and return policy on the product page, because uncertainty is what makes people refuse the parcel.
These are store features, not afterthoughts, so ask for them in the scope. A quote that never mentions COD handling was written by someone who has not run a Pakistani store.
Couriers, shipping rules and inventory
TCS, Leopards, M&P, Trax and PostEx are the couriers most Pakistani stores use, and each has an API or a bulk-booking portal. On Shopify and WooCommerce, courier apps handle booking, tracking numbers and COD remittance reports. Decide early whether you ship from one location or several, and whether the store shows city-based delivery charges (Lahore same-day, rest of Punjab two days, Karachi and Islamabad three days) or a flat rate. Flat rates are simpler and convert better for most categories under PKR 5,000.
Inventory is the other quiet failure. If you also sell in a physical shop or on Daraz, the store must know when stock runs out. On Shopify that is an app or a simple sync; on custom builds it is a real integration with your POS or ERP and should be priced as one.
What an ecommerce website costs in Pakistan in 2026
These are complete-store ranges, including design, setup, payment integration, courier setup, basic SEO and training, from agencies that stay after launch. Freelancer prices are lower and usually exclude the last three items. For a wider view of pricing, see our website cost breakdown.
- Shopify store, premium theme customised: PKR 250,000 to 700,000. Three to six weeks. Plus Shopify’s monthly plan and apps, typically USD 50 to 150 a month.
- Shopify store, custom design: PKR 700,000 to 1,800,000. Six to ten weeks.
- WooCommerce store: PKR 300,000 to 1,500,000 depending on design and product logic. Hosting from about PKR 5,000 a month for a store that needs to stay fast under traffic.
- Custom store or B2B portal: PKR 1,500,000 to 6,000,000 and above. Ten to twenty weeks, delivered in phases.
- Monthly maintenance: PKR 10,000 to 40,000 depending on how much content and product work you want done for you.
Anything quoted below PKR 150,000 for a working store with payments and courier integration is almost always a free theme with your logo on it. It may be fine to test an idea; it is not a business asset.
What should be in the scope before you sign
A store quote in Pakistan should list, in writing: the platform and theme; the number of page designs; product upload (how many, who does it); every payment method to be integrated and tested; the courier integration; COD confirmation flow; shipping rules; tax and invoice format; email and WhatsApp notifications; Google Analytics, Search Console and Meta pixel setup; basic on-page SEO; speed targets on mobile; training for your staff; and what happens after launch. Domain, hosting and store accounts should be registered in your name, not the agency’s. We wrote about that mistake in our guide on choosing a web development company in Pakistan.
Red flags in ecommerce proposals
- “Payment gateway integration” listed with no named gateway and no mention of onboarding paperwork.
- No test orders in the plan, or a launch date that assumes the gateway approval arrives on time.
- Twenty apps in the app stack. Every app slows the store on a 4G phone in Pakistan, which is where most of your buyers are.
- No talk of returns, RTO or COD confirmation.
- Portfolio stores that you cannot actually place an order on.
How Fox Logic builds online stores in Pakistan
We have built and maintained stores for retailers, food brands and B2B suppliers in Lahore, Karachi and Islamabad since 2018. Every store project starts with a short call about products, payment methods, couriers and goals, followed by a PKR quote within a working day. Design is approved before build. The store is built on a preview link and we place real test orders through every payment method before launch. After launch, domain, hosting, gateway and analytics are all in your name, and most clients keep us on a monthly plan for updates and product work.
If you are planning a store, request a quote or message us on WhatsApp with your product range and the cities you ship to. We will tell you honestly whether Shopify, WooCommerce or custom is the right call, and what it should cost.
