PayPal Payments
by WooCommerce
The official PayPal extension with standard checkout, Pay Later and card processing.
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What PayPal Payments does
The official PayPal extension with standard checkout, Pay Later and card processing.
It sits in the payments part of a WordPress stack and is sold by WooCommerce on a free basis. We recommend it in our payments guides because it does that one job well without asking you to rebuild the rest of the site around it.
Every plugin adds work to a page request, so treat this as a decision with a cost. Record a speed test before you install it and run the same test afterwards, on the same page, so you know exactly what it charged you.
Real user ratings
PayPal Payments is sold outside the WordPress.org directory, so there is no public user rating to quote. Our own editorial score is 4.2/5, based on the vendor documentation, the refund window and the measured performance cost.
Where PayPal Payments ranks elsewhere
PayPal Payments does not appear in the published "best of" lists we track from WPBeginner, TechRadar, Kinsta, Themeisle and similar sites. That is not a mark against it - those roundups are short and skew towards the biggest names.
What changed in the latest version
PayPal Payments does not publish a changelog we can read automatically, so check the vendor's own release notes before you update a live site.
Pros and cons
- Buyer trust and wallet checkout
- Free with no licence to renew
- Actively maintained and used on production sites we test
- Dispute handling sits with PayPal
- Support is community-led rather than guaranteed
How to use it
- 1Install on a staging copy first if the site takes money.
- 2Work through the setup wizard and connect any external accounts it needs.
- 3Configure the one feature you installed it for, and leave the rest off.
- 4Test the result as a logged-out visitor on both mobile and desktop.
- 5Re-run our speed test to confirm the plugin has not cost you load time.
How it compares
Other payments plugins we recommend, with their rating and pricing model.
| Plugin | Our rating | WordPress.org | Pricing | Best for |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| PayPal Payments | 4.2 | n/a | Free | Buyer trust and wallet checkout |
| WooCommerce Stripe Gateway | 4.4 | 4.5 (4,823) | Free | Apple Pay and Google Pay included |
| WooPayments | 4.2 | 3.4 (169) | Free | Payments managed inside WordPress |
| WP Simple Pay | 4.7 | n/a | Freemium | Payments without WooCommerce |
Guides that cover PayPal Payments
Alternatives
Other payments plugins
WooCommerce Stripe Gateway
WooCommerce
The official Stripe gateway with cards, wallets and local payment methods for WooCommerce.
4,823 reviews · 461.6M downloads · v11.1.0
WooPayments
Woo
Woo's own payment gateway with the dashboard inside WordPress and no separate gateway signup.
169 reviews · 45.5M downloads · v11.1.0
WP Simple Pay
Awesome Motive
Takes Stripe payments through standalone forms without installing a full ecommerce platform.