Set prices from cost using margin or markup

Calculate selling prices from cost per item, distinguish margin from markup, and understand what happens when a variant has no cost.

Use a task on Product prices to calculate selling prices from Cost per item. Margin and markup use different formulas. These features require Advanced or Premium and are not available for market-price changes or sales.

Margin and markup are different

Goal

Calculation

With a cost of 20

50% margin

Cost divided by 1 minus the margin

Selling price 40

50% markup

Cost plus 50% of that cost

Selling price 30

Margin is the difference between price and cost as a share of the selling price. Markup is that difference as a share of cost. These calculations use Shopify's cost per item, not your total business expenses, shipping charges or payment fees.

Set a target margin

  1. Click Create task.

  2. Select Product prices.

  3. Under Price, choose Set margin.

  4. Enter the target margin in Percent.

  5. Select the products under Apply to.

  6. Click Create task when ready to apply.

The margin must be greater than 0 and less than 100. For a 60% margin on a cost of 20, the calculated price is 50. Currency precision can affect the final margin.

Set a markup on cost

  1. Click Create task and select Product prices.

  2. Under Price, choose Increase price.

  3. Set Relative to to Cost per item.

  4. Set Change type to By percent.

  5. Enter the markup in Percent.

  6. Select the products and click Create task when ready.

Increase price here means an increase from cost, not from the current selling price. A variant costing 20 and currently selling for 50 will become 30 with a 50% markup. The result can lower an existing selling price.

Check costs before running the task

The cost-based calculation needs a positive cost for each variant. Missing or zero costs cannot produce the requested margin or markup. Fill in those costs first and check the task's Details afterward. Other selected actions or rounding settings are separate, so do not assume a missing cost prevents every possible change to that variant.

Leave Cost per item unchanged if you only want to calculate selling prices. Changing a selling price from cost does not itself update the cost field.

This is a one-time calculation. It does not continuously recalculate selling prices whenever a supplier changes costs. Start with a small live test.

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