Why aren’t my customers charged extra shipping fees for additional items in Shopify?

Shopify’s current system doesn’t allow you to automatically charge extra shipping fees for additional items when products share the same shipping profile. This means your customers are only charged the first item’s shipping rate, even if they order multiples of the same product type.

How Shopify flat rates work

If products from different shipping profiles are in the same cart, Shopify will calculate shipping separately for each group. For example:

A t-shirt and a hoodie belong to different shipping profiles.
Shipping is charged as: first item rate for the t-shirt + first item rate for the hoodie.

However, if a customer orders multiple t-shirts (same profile), Shopify only applies the first item shipping rate.

How to charge more accurately for additional items

If you want shipping fees to better reflect the quantity of items ordered, you have a few options:

Enable Printful’s live shipping rates

Live rates calculate shipping in real-time based on the size, weight, and destination of the entire order. This ensures customers are charged accurately for larger orders, even when ordering multiples of the same product. To enable, follow these steps:

Go to Printful Dashboard → Settings → Store settings → Shipping and enable Printful’s live shipping rates.

Note

For Shopify live rates are only available if you’re on the Shopify Advanced or Plus plans, or on the Shopify Grow plan if paying an additional $20/mo for the feature to be enabled.

Use a third-party app for flat rates

If you prefer to continue using flat rates, you can use apps like Advanced Shipping Rules to set up more detailed shipping logic, including:

Additional charges for multiple items
Different shipping rules per product category

Learn more about shipping settings for your connected Shopify store

Still need help? Our Support Team is here for you—reach out anytime through our contact form or start a chat with us.