US PayPal Goods & Services and Checkout Fees Compared

These examples use standard product rates for domestic USD payments between US accounts, excluding cross-border and currency-conversion costs. For another market, select your actual account country in the calculator.

If you have tried a few PayPal fee calculators, you may have run into an annoying question: for the same USD 100.00 payment, one tool shows a USD 2.99 fee and another shows USD 3.98. Which one is wrong?

While maintaining the rate data for MerchantFeeCalc, we checked this specific question. The result: both numbers can be right, but they describe two different ways of receiving PayPal payments.

MerchantFeeCalc

According to the US merchant fee schedule updated on October 1, 2026, the following rates apply to the domestic US dollar transactions covered here:

• Send/Receive Money for Goods & Services: 2.99%, with no additional fixed fee under this fee category.
• PayPal Checkout on a website: 3.49% + USD 0.49 per transaction.
• Standard Credit and Debit Card Payments: 2.99% + USD 0.49 per transaction.

All three rates appear under different categories in the official PayPal US merchant fee schedule.

What is the difference between Goods & Services and Checkout?

The names can be misleading. Selling goods or services does not automatically mean that a payment is charged at the separate 2.99% Goods & Services rate.

Here are three common examples:

Case A: A customer pays you through the option for sending money for goods and services in PayPal. If the transaction falls under the official Send/Receive Money for Goods & Services category, the rate is 2.99% under the domestic US conditions used here.

Case B: A customer visits your online store and pays with PayPal Checkout on the checkout page. If the payment is billed under PayPal Checkout, the rate is 3.49% + USD 0.49.

Case C: You process a credit or debit card payment through an eligible standard card payment path. The relevant rate is 2.99% + USD 0.49. But a buyer having a card linked to PayPal does not prove that the merchant is charged under this category. Check the actual payment product and transaction record.

In short, the payment path actually used is what determines the applicable rate.

Why PayPal fee calculators can show different results

How much do the fees differ?

To keep extra charges out of the comparison, we used the same inputs for a reproducible simulation of the published rates:

• The seller has a US-registered PayPal merchant account, and both parties are treated as a domestic US transaction.
• The receiving currency is US dollars (USD).
• We calculate four payment amounts: USD 10.00, USD 100.00, USD 500.00 and USD 1,000.00.
• We exclude international surcharges, currency conversion, disputes, special pricing and other service fees.
• Fees are rounded to USD cents per transaction. Actual charges depend on PayPal settlement.

The calculation is straightforward:

Fee = payment amount × percentage rate + fixed fee
Net received = payment amount − fee

Comparison 1: two rates on the same payment

For a USD 100.00 payment, the calculation is:

Goods & Services: USD 100.00 × 2.99% = USD 2.99
Net received: USD 100.00 − USD 2.99 = USD 97.01

PayPal Checkout: USD 100.00 × 3.49% + USD 0.49 = USD 3.98
Net received: USD 100.00 − USD 3.98 = USD 96.02

The difference is USD 0.99: USD 0.50 comes from the extra 0.5 percentage points, and USD 0.49 comes from the fixed fee per payment.

As the payment grows, the 0.5-percentage-point difference grows too. The fixed USD 0.49 does not disappear just because the order is larger.

Recalculate the left-hand column with our Goods & Services calculator, or compare payment paths in the fee comparison tool:

Goods & Services fee calculator · Payment-method fee comparison (English)

Comparison 2: what if USD 1,000.00 is received in several payments?

We also checked an often overlooked detail: for the same USD 1,000.00 in revenue, do one payment and 100 payments cost the same?

Checkout adds USD 0.49 to every payment, so 100 orders incur USD 49.00 in fixed fees alone. With the 3.49% percentage fee and per-payment rounding, the total is USD 84.00. In contrast, one USD 1,000.00 Checkout payment has a simulated fee of USD 35.39.

Goods & Services has no fixed fee under this category, so splitting the amount has a much smaller effect. The difference between USD 29.90 and USD 30.00 comes from rounding 2.99% of each USD 10.00 payment separately to cents.

We are not recommending that you split orders or change transaction types just to pay less. This test shows why transaction count and average order value matter alongside total revenue. Renaming a transaction does not determine the payment product that actually applies.

Where does 2.99% + USD 0.49 come from?

Another common source of confusion is the 2.99% + USD 0.49 card rate. It also appears in the official merchant fee schedule, under Standard Credit and Debit Card Payments.

For a USD 100.00 payment:

Seeing “2.99%” is not enough. You must also check whether a fixed fee applies.

With PayPal invoices, fees also depend on the payment method the customer actually chooses. For domestic US invoices, PayPal / Venmo / Guest Checkout, standard cards, Pay Later and Pay by Bank (ACH) have separate fee categories. Our invoice calculator keeps these options separate from ordinary Goods & Services payments:

PayPal invoice fee calculator

How do you know which rate applies to your transaction?

We suggest checking in this order:

Step 1: Identify how you actually receive the payment. Is it the goods-and-services sending option within PayPal, website Checkout, or an invoice sent to a customer? Do not decide just because you sold goods or the customer paid by card.

Step 2: Check the merchant account region, both parties’ markets and the currency. These examples use a US merchant, a domestic US transaction and USD receipts. Do not transfer these rates directly to other countries or currencies. The US schedule adds 1.50% for applicable international commercial transactions. Currency conversion can change the cost further.

Step 3: Compare with a real statement. A negotiated rate, another payment category or extra charges may produce a different bill. Our calculators help with quotes and estimates; they do not replace PayPal’s final fee breakdown.

Common questions

So which rate should you use?

Remember one point: the 2.99% Goods & Services rate and the 3.49% + USD 0.49 Checkout rate do not contradict each other. They are standard rates for two different payment paths.

Identify the actual payment method first, then calculate the fee. Do not start with the lowest rate and try to fit your transaction into it.

Already know the payment method? Use MerchantFeeCalc to estimate the fee and net receipt. Still comparing options? Put the same amount into the payment-method comparison tool:

MerchantFeeCalc · Payment-method fee comparison (English)

Sources and verification notes

• PayPal: US merchant fee schedule (official page updated October 1, 2026; checked October 18, 2026)
• PayPal: Checkout product and pricing (checked October 18, 2026)
• MerchantFeeCalc: Goods & Services calculator (US rates marked as checked October 9, 2026)
• MerchantFeeCalc: fee sources, methodology and rounding rules (English)

All tables are simulations using published rates, not screenshots of real transactions. Rates can change and may vary by account, market, payment product and other conditions. Always refer to the official PayPal terms and your actual transaction details. MerchantFeeCalc is an independent tool and is not affiliated with PayPal.