How to Accept Crypto Payments on Ecwid in 2026

If you run an Ecwid store and want to accept crypto, the fastest, lowest-cost route in 2026 is to install Aurpay from the Ecwid App Market. It is a non-custodial gateway: payments settle directly into your own wallet, Aurpay never holds your funds, the fee is a flat 0.8% per transaction with no monthly cost and no contract, and you can be live in under five minutes. You can accept BTC, Bitcoin Lightning, ETH, USDT and USDC (on both ERC-20 and TRC-20), DAI, and BNB.

One catch to know before you start: Ecwid only allows third-party payment gateways on the Venture plan or higher. If you are on the free Starter plan, crypto checkout will not appear until you upgrade. Most setup guides skip this, which is why merchants often install, get confused, and give up. Confirm your plan first and the rest is genuinely quick.

This matters more now than a year ago. Coinbase Commerce shut down for merchants outside the US and Singapore on March 31, 2026, leaving thousands of stores looking for a replacement, and US stablecoin regulation finally has a framework. If your Ecwid customers have been asking for crypto, this is the practical way to give it to them.

Key takeaways

• Where to get it: Aurpay is listed in the Ecwid App Market under Payment Gateways. Install from your dashboard, no code required.
• Plan needed: Ecwid Venture plan or higher. The free Starter plan does not support third-party payment gateways.
• Cost: 0.8% flat per transaction. No monthly fee, no setup fee, no contract.
• Coins: BTC, Bitcoin Lightning, ETH, USDT (ERC-20 + TRC-20), USDC (ERC-20 + TRC-20), DAI (ERC-20), BNB.
• Custody: Non-custodial. Funds go straight to your wallet on blockchain confirmation. Aurpay never touches them.
• Works everywhere Ecwid runs: standalone Ecwid stores, Ecwid embedded in a Wix site, and Ecwid-powered Instagram shops — because the integration lives at the Ecwid checkout layer.

What you need before you start

Three things. First, an Ecwid plan that supports third-party payment gateways — that means Venture or higher, not the free Starter plan. Check the current Venture rate inside your Ecwid billing page before you commit. Second, a free Aurpay account at aurpay.net, which gives you a dashboard with your Merchant ID and Public Key for the Ecwid app. Third, your own crypto wallet address — this is where your money lands, since Aurpay settles to a wallet you control, not a balance you withdraw later.

How to install Aurpay on your Ecwid store (step by step)

No developer needed. The whole thing takes a few minutes.

• Step 1 — Confirm your plan. In your Ecwid control panel, make sure you are on Venture or higher. If you are on Starter, upgrade first, otherwise the gateway will not show as an option at checkout.
• Step 2 — Open the App Market. Go to Apps > App Market and search for “Aurpay” under Payment Gateways.
• Step 3 — Install. Click Install and agree to the requested permissions. Ecwid connects the app to your store automatically — there is no manual scope request and no two-day support wait that some self-hosted options require.
• Step 4 — Connect your credentials. Create your free account at aurpay.net, then in your Aurpay dashboard open Integration > Ecwid and copy your Merchant ID and Public Key. Paste both into the matching fields in the Aurpay app inside Ecwid. This links your store to the wallet that will receive payments.
• Step 5 — Choose your coins and save. Select which tokens you want to accept (more on the smart defaults below) and save. Crypto checkout is live immediately — no review queue.

For your customer, the experience is straightforward. At checkout they pick “Pay with crypto,” scan a QR code, and send from any wallet app — no Aurpay account or sign-up wall. The order confirms once the blockchain validates the transaction.

Which cryptocurrencies can you accept?

The Aurpay Ecwid integration covers the coins your customers actually use, across the networks that make economic sense for a store. You can enable any combination of:

• Bitcoin (BTC) and Bitcoin Lightning
• Ethereum (ETH)
• USDT — ERC-20 and TRC-20
• USDC — ERC-20 and TRC-20
• DAI — ERC-20
• BNB

Here is the practical guidance most setup guides skip: the network you choose for stablecoins changes how much your customer pays in fees, and that directly affects whether small orders convert. A USDT transfer on Ethereum (ERC-20) typically runs about $2 to $10 in gas and can spike higher when the network is congested, while the same USDT on Tron (TRC-20) usually settles for around a dollar or less (stablecoin network data). On a small order, that gap is the difference between a sale and an abandoned cart. Enable TRC-20 USDT and USDC as your primary stablecoin rail for orders under roughly $200, and keep ERC-20 available for larger orders or customers who prefer Ethereum.

For small purchases, also turn on Bitcoin Lightning. Lightning payments confirm near-instantly and carry an effectively zero network fee, making them ideal for low-ticket items where a normal on-chain Bitcoin fee would eat the margin. For a deeper look at stablecoin network choice, see our guide on which stablecoin to accept and the case for low-fee TRC-20 processing.

What does Aurpay cost? Fee comparison

Aurpay charges a flat 0.8% per transaction with no monthly fee, no setup fee, and no contract. That sits below most hosted competitors without requiring you to run your own server. Here is how the common crypto gateways compare for an Ecwid merchant.

Gateway	Transaction fee	Custody model	Monthly / contract	Notes
Aurpay	0.8% flat	Non-custodial	None	Funds settle straight to your wallet; in the Ecwid App Market
BitPay	1% + $0.25/tx	Settles to you (managed)	None / tiered	Higher effective cost on small orders due to flat $0.25
Coinbase Commerce	1%	Self-custodial (winding down)	None	On-chain settlement to your own wallet on Base; shut down for non-US / non-Singapore merchants on Mar 31, 2026
NOWPayments	0.5–1% (plan-dependent)	Non-custodial (auto-forwards to your wallet)	Varies by plan	Funds route to your wallet, but settlement and conversion run through the provider
CoinGate	1%	Provider-settled	None	Provider intermediates settlement and any conversion
BTCPay Server	0% (self-hosted)	Non-custodial	None, but you run the server	Requires manual Ecwid scope enablement; developer setup

Fee sources: CoinGate gateway comparison and MoonPay’s Coinbase Commerce shutdown guide. BTCPay Server is also non-custodial and its headline 0% is real, but the cost shows up elsewhere: you host and maintain the server, and Ecwid requires its support team to manually enable the necessary scopes, which can take a couple of business days. Aurpay’s 0.8% buys you a hosted, App-Market install with no infrastructure to manage. For a fuller breakdown across platforms, see our 2026 crypto payment gateway comparison.

Does it work on Ecwid-on-Wix and Instagram shops?

Yes — and this is where Ecwid’s flexibility pays off. The Aurpay integration operates at the Ecwid checkout layer, not at the website-builder layer. That means any storefront powered by Ecwid routes through the same checkout, regardless of where the store is displayed.

If you have embedded an Ecwid store widget inside a Wix site, crypto checkout works identically to a standalone Ecwid store, because the customer still completes payment through Ecwid’s checkout. (Note: this is specifically about an embedded Ecwid store. For a plain Wix page with no Ecwid cart, you would instead drop in an Aurpay Payment Button, a separate snippet-based product.) The same logic applies to Instagram Shopping storefronts powered by Ecwid: when the buyer checks out through the Ecwid-hosted checkout URL, the Aurpay crypto option is available there too. Set it up once in the App Market and it follows your store everywhere Ecwid takes it.

Non-custodial vs custodial — why it matters for Ecwid merchants

This distinction matters more than any fee number, yet it often gets glossed over. With a non-custodial gateway like Aurpay, your customer’s payment goes directly to a wallet you control. Aurpay’s settlement mechanism routes the funds on-chain to your address — the company never holds your money, so there is no balance to “withdraw” and no provider that can freeze, delay, or lose your funds.

With a custodial provider — CoinPayments and similar processors that take the crypto into their own account first — the gateway receives the funds, holds them, and you request a withdrawal later. That adds a step, adds counterparty risk, and means your money sits on someone else’s balance sheet. The Coinbase Commerce shutdown shows a related dependency risk: even a self-custodial provider exiting a market forces merchants to scramble. Industry estimates put the affected stores in the several thousands when the product wound down for non-US and non-Singapore merchants on March 31, 2026 (migration details). A non-custodial model removes that dependency — your wallet is yours whether the gateway exists tomorrow or not. If you want the full argument, read our explainer on the non-custodial crypto payment gateway model.

One more practical benefit: Aurpay requires no contracts and no banking details to start. You do not submit a bank account or sign a service agreement to go live, which matters for merchants in regions with banking restrictions or who prefer to keep their finances private.

Zero chargebacks and instant settlement

Card payments carry two structural costs that crypto eliminates. The first is chargebacks. A card customer can dispute a charge weeks after delivery, costing you the goods, the money, and a dispute fee. Crypto transactions are irreversible once confirmed on-chain — there is no “dispute” button. For Ecwid merchants selling digital downloads, shipping to unverified regions, or running subscriptions, that closes a fraud vector cards cannot.

The second is settlement time. Card payments typically take two to five business days to reach your bank. With Aurpay, funds arrive in your wallet the moment the blockchain confirms — often within minutes, and seconds for Lightning — with no holding period or payout schedule. For a side-by-side on the economics, see stablecoin vs credit card fees for merchants.

Stablecoins and the 2026 regulatory picture

Accepting USDT and USDC in 2026 is mainstream, not experimental. The US GENIUS Act, signed on July 18, 2025 and finalizing through 2026, gave stablecoins a federal framework for the first time, and issuers like Circle have positioned USDC for early compliance under it. The scale of stablecoin settlement is now hard to ignore: on an adjusted basis that filters out bot activity, stablecoins moved roughly $9 trillion over the trailing 12 months — more than half of Visa’s payment volume — according to Andreessen Horowitz’s State of Crypto 2025 report (a16z State of Crypto 2025).

The two coins dominate. As of late April 2026, USDT’s market cap stood at about $189.6 billion and USDC’s at $77.6 billion — together over 80% of a roughly $321 billion stablecoin market (CoinDesk stablecoin report, April 2026), and industry data consistently shows stablecoins making up the large majority of crypto payment volume. For an Ecwid store, the takeaway is simple: enabling USDT and USDC checkout puts you where the volume already is. Our guide on stablecoin payments and GENIUS Act compliance goes deeper on what the rules mean for merchants.

Is crypto checkout actually worth adding?

The demand signal is hard to ignore. In a 2026 survey of US payment decision-makers run by The Harris Poll for the National Cryptocurrency Association, 39% of merchants already accept cryptocurrency at checkout, 88% report customers asking about crypto, and 69% say customers want to pay in crypto at least once a month (PayPal / NCA merchant survey). More than four in five merchants (84%) expect crypto payments to be common within five years.

The friction that used to hold merchants back was setup. In that same survey, 90% of merchants said they would accept crypto if the setup were as simple as accepting credit cards (PayPal / NCA merchant survey). An App Market install that goes live in minutes removes exactly that barrier. If you are migrating off Coinbase Commerce, our Aurpay vs Coinbase Commerce comparison maps the replacement path.

Frequently asked questions

Do my customers need a crypto wallet to pay?

They need a wallet app that holds the coin they want to pay with, but they do not need an account with Aurpay or any sign-up. At checkout they choose crypto, scan the QR code or copy the address, and send payment from their wallet. The order confirms automatically once the blockchain validates it.

What happens if a customer underpays or overpays?

Aurpay’s Ecwid app handles underpayments, so a customer who sends slightly less than the total — often due to wallet rounding or fee deduction — does not automatically fail the order. Overpayments are credited as well. This reduces the failed-order rate that catches out stricter gateways.

Can I accept crypto alongside credit cards on Ecwid?

Yes. Aurpay adds crypto as an additional payment method; it does not replace your existing card or wallet options. Both appear at checkout and the customer picks whichever they prefer, so you lose no sales from buyers who want to pay by card.

Do I need to complete KYC or submit bank details to start?

Aurpay’s official position is “no contracts or banking details required” to begin accepting payments. You create a free account, connect a wallet, and go live without signing a service agreement or handing over a bank account. Since the model is non-custodial, your funds settle directly to your own wallet.

Which stablecoin network should I enable first?

For most Ecwid stores, enable TRC-20 USDT and USDC as the primary stablecoin rail, because Tron network fees usually stay around a dollar or less versus roughly $2–$10 for Ethereum’s ERC-20. Keep ERC-20 available for customers who prefer Ethereum or for larger orders where the gas fee is a small share of the total.

Does Aurpay work if my Ecwid store is embedded in another website?

Yes. Because the integration sits at the Ecwid checkout layer, it works the same whether your store is standalone, embedded in a Wix site, or driving an Instagram shop — as long as the buyer checks out through Ecwid. For a plain webpage without an Ecwid cart, use the separate Aurpay Payment Button instead.

Get started

If your customers are asking for crypto, you can give it to them today. Confirm you are on the Ecwid Venture plan or higher, create your free account, and install Aurpay from the Ecwid App Market — non-custodial settlement to your own wallet, a flat 0.8% fee, zero chargebacks, and BTC, Bitcoin Lightning, ETH, USDT (ERC-20 + TRC-20), USDC (ERC-20 + TRC-20), DAI (ERC-20), and BNB at checkout, live in under five minutes. See the full Aurpay e-commerce integrations to set up your Ecwid store.