What's the actual monthly savings a mid-market merchant sees after replacing a stack of paid apps with the native Shopify features that became free (Subscriptions, B2B) since 2025-2026?

Which paid apps does native Shopify replace for free?

Native Shopify replaces two paid apps for free: a subscription app, with the Shopify Subscriptions app, and a wholesale app, with native business-to-business (B2B) features. A page builder and a cart widget can go too, but only after theme work, so they are a build, not a free feature.

Only the B2B half is new. Shopify opened native B2B to Basic, Grow and Advanced on 2 April 2026 “at no additional cost” (Shopify Changelog, October 2026). Shopify Subscriptions is free and has been on the App Store since 31 January 2024 (Shopify App Store, October 2026).

How much does swapping paid apps for native Shopify save each month?

Swapping the Recharge subscription app and a wholesale app for native Shopify saves $2,611 to $3,131 a month on $2M a year of subscription sales at Recharge's published rates, before its 19¢ per order (Deploi arithmetic). Most of it is Recharge's percentage fee, which applies to “all transactions processed by Recharge per month” (Recharge pricing, October 2026), so it grows with every subscriber you add.

The plan fees are the small half: $99 or $499 a month for Recharge. Listed paid plans for business-to-business (B2B) apps run $29 to $399 a month, from BSS B2B Wholesale Pricing to PortalSphere (Shopify App Store, October 2026). Deploi's app-stack record scores consolidation CUSTOMIZE: replace widget-class apps with native features and theme sections (Deploi decision record, October 2026). Divide your scoped theme-work quote by $2,611 to $3,131 a month to see how many months the swap takes to repay it (Deploi arithmetic).

What shrinks the saving from replacing apps with native Shopify features?

Four things shrink the saving from replacing apps with native Shopify features: the business-to-business (B2B) catalog cap, lost retention features, theme work and data moves.

1. The catalog cap. On Basic, Grow and Advanced you can assign “up to 3 active catalogs across all your B2B markets” (Shopify Help Center, October 2026), and deposits and partial payments stay on Plus. So count your price lists against the 3-catalog cap before you cancel a wholesale app. If wholesale is what keeps you on Plus, whether dropping to Advanced pays is the next question.
2. Retention depth. Recharge's $99 Starter plan includes gift subscriptions, prepaid subscriptions and Smart Cancellation Prevention (Recharge pricing, October 2026). The native app lists renewals, discounts, skip, pause and cancel, so check what Shopify Subscriptions does not cover before you switch.
3. The theme work. In our judgment the native app's default purchase options need design work to match a paid app's widget, and dropping a cart or page-builder app leaves your team owning the drawer and sections. So book the saving once that work is scoped, because the product page is where a subscriber decides.
4. The data move. Wholesale accounts and price lists need a home before you uninstall, which our B2B record counts as real switching work (Deploi decision record, October 2026), and subscriber contracts and loyalty balances need one too.

How do you find what your apps cost today?

You find what your apps cost today by adding up three kinds of bill, because Settings > Billing alone undercounts it. The three are the regular Shopify bill, separate invoices for one-time app charges, and charges some apps bill outside Shopify (Shopify Help Center, October 2026). Recharge is one of those apps, so its fee may never reach your Shopify bill: its listing says charges “may be billed by Recharge separately from your Shopify invoice” (Recharge on the Shopify App Store, October 2026).

Count all three before you book a saving from native features. How to count what unused apps cost you sets out that reconciliation step by step, and it explains why no industry benchmark can stand in for it.

When is swapping a paid app for native Shopify the wrong move?

Swapping a paid app for a native Shopify feature is the wrong move when the app does work the native feature cannot, or when its contract makes the timing wrong.