Selling Abroad From an Indian Shopify Store: Payments, GST
Orders from the US, UK and Gulf? What Shopify Markets does without Shopify Payments, how foreign payments settle, and GST on exports under a LUT.
Indian D2C brands often get their first international orders by accident: a diaspora customer finds the Instagram page, or a gift buyer in Dubai wants to send something home. Then the questions start. Can I show dollar prices? Which gateway takes foreign cards? Do I charge GST? Here's how it works for a store based in India.
The limit you need to know first
Shopify Payments isn't available to businesses in India. Shopify's help centre lists the supported countries and India isn't one of them, so Indian stores use a third-party provider such as Razorpay, PayU, Cashfree or PayPal.
That one fact shapes the rest. According to Shopify, only stores using Shopify Payments (or Adyen) as their main gateway can charge customers in their local currency. With any other provider:
- you can still show prices in dollars, pounds or dirhams on the storefront
- the customer is charged in your store's currency, rupees, at checkout
- their card issuer may add its own currency conversion fee on top
Shopify's Managed Markets, which handles duties and local taxes for you, also needs Shopify Payments. It isn't an option for an India-based store.
Showing prices in local currency
Use Shopify Markets to create a market for each region you sell to, set the currency it displays, and decide whether prices are converted automatically or set by hand. Hand-set prices look better ($29 rather than $28.73), but someone has to update them when your costs or exchange rates move.
Be clear at checkout that the charge is in rupees. A shopper who sees $29 on the product page and ₹2,400-something at payment, without warning, often leaves.
Taking international payments
Most Indian gateways accept international cards, but it's usually a separate activation with its own documents and pricing. Ask your gateway to switch it on and confirm the fee before you advertise abroad.
PayPal is worth adding for the US and UK. It's familiar to buyers there, and Shopify lists PayPal Express among the methods it supports at checkout.
Watch for fraud. International orders from new customers have a higher chargeback risk than domestic UPI orders. Use your gateway's risk checks, and hold high-value first orders for a quick manual review.
Shipping and duties
You have two choices for duties:
- Delivered duty unpaid (DDU). The customer pays duty when the parcel arrives. It's simpler for you, but surprise charges at the door cause refused parcels and bad reviews.
- Delivered duty paid (DDP). You collect an estimate of duty at checkout and the courier pays it. It costs more to set up and the customer has a better experience.
International courier services and aggregators can quote both. Whichever you pick, say so on the product page and in the shipping policy. Set shipping rates per market in Shopify, and keep heavy or fragile products in their own shipping profile so a small order doesn't subsidise a big one.
GST on exports
Exports of goods are zero-rated under GST. Most small exporters file a Letter of Undertaking (LUT) once a year and then export without paying IGST, instead of paying it and claiming a refund later. Your invoices for export orders then carry no GST and the LUT reference.
In Shopify, that means:
- set tax to zero for your international markets
- make sure your GST invoicing app treats those orders as exports and prints the LUT reference
- keep the shipping bill or courier export documents for each order, because you'll need them to show the goods left India
Ask your CA to confirm the setup for your products and courier. Our GST on Shopify guide covers the domestic side.
When to build more than settings
Everything above is configuration. It's worth an engineering project when international is a real channel: separate international pricing, landing pages per country, duty estimates at checkout, or a separate store for one market. We've built for brands in India and abroad, including Mud Australia.
If you're not sure whether your setup is costing you international orders, our Website & Commerce Audit (₹60,000, credited in full to a project signed within 60 days) covers checkout, payments and markets.
