Shopify checkout not working: the 8 most common causes

Shopify checkout is not working when a buyer can see the product but cannot pay. The button spins, the shipping step is empty, or the payment is declined for every card. The shop is still online. The sale is not.

The eight causes that show up most

1. The payment provider is in test mode, or it was never finished for the country you sell to.
2. Shipping is not offered to the buyer’s address, so the button never becomes real.
3. The variant is out of stock even though the page still looks buyable.
4. An app added a field, a discount, or an upsell on the last step and that app is erroring.
5. A recent theme change hid the checkout button on a phone.
6. The discount code the buyer entered is expired, and Shopify stops the step instead of explaining it.
7. The market or currency does not match the country the buyer is shopping from.
8. The shop is password-protected, so a real customer never reaches a live checkout.

Try one product you know is in stock, on a phone that is not logged into the store, with a normal address in the country you ship to. Write down the exact sentence Shopify shows. That sentence is the brief.

What not to do

Do not install another checkout app on top of the broken one. Do not switch themes in the same hour. Do not assume the design is the problem because the homepage looks old. Checkout fails in the settings and the apps far more often than in the pictures.

Hire a Shopify developer when the sentence on the screen is not one you can undo. Uplaps treats a dead checkout as a repair milestone. A redesign, if you still want one after checkout works, is the next milestone. No advance on either.