By Carson Cobb, Fractional Head of Ecommerce. Data checked November 1, 2026.
Everyone has an opinion on what a subscription offer should look like. This report shows what growing brands actually run. I read the live selling plans on up to 20 products per store (best sellers first) across 606 Shopify stores, including 434 brands that sell things people reorder: supplements, beauty and skincare, food and beverage, and pet.
Selling plans are the rules behind every subscribe and save option on Shopify: the discount, the delivery frequency and the app that manages it. Because they are published with the product, this data shows the real offer, not what a brand says in a case study.
The short version
- 72% of reorderable brands offer subscriptions, but only 13% offer them on every product checked.
- 10% off is the most common discount (32% of brands). 15% is next (26%). Supplements go deeper, with a typical 15% and almost one in three at 20% or more.
- Three delivery options is standard. Every 30, 60 and 90 days lead. 39% of brands offer every 4 weeks or more often.
- Best sellers get missed. 52% of brands with subscriptions left at least one best seller without a subscribe option.
- Recharge runs plans for 46% of brands with subscriptions; Skio runs 16%.
- One in three brands with subscriptions has no published subscription page that explains how it works.
Who offers subscriptions
| Category | Stores | Offer subscriptions | On every product checked | Typical share of products covered | Every best seller covered | No best seller covered |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Supplements | 120 | 87% | 25% | 85% | 65% | 8% |
| Pet | 41 | 68% | 12% | 80% | 40% | 30% |
| Food and beverage | 149 | 67% | 9% | 62% | 38% | 16% |
| Beauty and skincare | 124 | 66% | 7% | 65% | 18% | 29% |
| Home | 77 | 32% | 1% | 40% | 3% | 69% |
| Apparel | 95 | 3% | 1% | 25% | 1% | 96% |
“Typical share of products covered” is among stores that offer subscriptions. Best seller columns are among stores with a best sellers collection.
Beauty is the standout gap. Two thirds of beauty brands have subscriptions set up, but only 18% cover every best seller, and 29% cover none of them. That may mean subscriptions were set up on a few hero products and never extended to what sells now.
Subscribe and save discounts
Most common recurring discount per store, among reorderable brands with subscriptions (302 stores with a percentage discount).
| Discount | Share of brands |
|---|---|
| No discount | 12% |
| 1% to 9% | 8% |
| 10% | 32% |
| 11% to 14% | 3% |
| 15% | 26% |
| 16% to 19% | 1% |
| 20% | 11% |
| 21% to 24% | 1% |
| 25% or more | 6% |
Supplements are the deepest discounters: 22% offer 10%, 20% offer 15%, 18% offer 20% and 14% offer 25% or more. The typical supplement discount is 15%. Every other reorderable category centers on 10%.
12% of brands run subscriptions with no discount at all. Those brands are selling convenience, free shipping or a perk instead of a price cut, which can work well when the product has strong loyalty.
Other offer details:
- 11% of brands give a different discount on the first order than on later orders, most often a bigger first discount that steps down.
- 10% use a fixed dollar amount or a fixed price instead of a percentage.
- 8% sell at least one product as subscription only.
- 2% offer prepaid plans, where the customer pays for several deliveries up front.
Delivery frequencies
Share of brands with subscriptions offering each frequency (all 342 stores with subscriptions).
| Frequency | Share of brands |
|---|---|
| Every 30 days | 75% |
| Every 60 days | 61% |
| Every 90 days | 61% |
| Every 28 days or 4 weeks | 26% |
| Every 14 days or 2 weeks | 21% |
| Every 6 weeks | 21% |
| Every 8 weeks | 20% |
| Every 4 months | 18% |
| Every 6 months | 16% |
The typical brand offers 3 options. Only 9% offer a single frequency. Pet (61%) and food (55%) brands are most likely to offer every 4 weeks or more often, and 43% of pet and 51% of food brands offer something shorter than 4 weeks, which fits how fast those products get used.
The right frequency is the one that matches how long your product lasts. If a jar lasts five weeks and the default is every 30 days, subscribers pile up product and cancel. If you only check one thing from this report, check that your default frequency matches a real usage cycle.
Subscription apps
Share of reorderable brands with subscriptions whose checked products ran plans from each app. A store can use more than one.
| App | All reorderable | Supplements |
|---|---|---|
| Recharge | 46% | 44% |
| Skio | 16% | 28% |
| Appstle | 5% | 3% |
| Seal | 3% | 3% |
| Ordergroove | 3% | 3% |
| PayWhirl | 1% | 2% |
| Other or unidentified | 31% | 23% |
Recharge is still the default for growing brands. Skio is strongest in supplements, where it runs plans for more than a quarter of brands with subscriptions. “Other or unidentified” covers Shopify’s own subscription app and others that publish only a numeric ID; I only named apps I could confirm.
If you’re weighing a switch, I compare the three most common options in Recharge vs Skio vs Loop.
What this means for your store
- Cover every best seller. Half of brands with subscriptions miss at least one. Check every product launched this year too.
- Pick a discount you can hold. 10% or 15% is standard. Going deeper only makes sense if the extra orders are worth more than the margin you give up, and if your sale prices won’t undercut it (see the Black Friday report).
- Match frequency to how long the product lasts. Offer the real usage cycle as the default, plus one shorter and one longer.
- Add a subscription page. A third of brands with subscriptions have no published subscription page explaining how skipping, swapping and canceling work. That page answers the question that stops people from subscribing.
- Run your own numbers. The subscription calculator shows what a better offer is worth at your order volume.
How this was done
- Stores: 606 US Shopify stores priced in US dollars, including 434 reorderable brands: supplements (120), beauty and skincare (124), food and beverage (149) and pet (41). Home (77) and apparel (95) are shown for comparison.
- Products checked: up to 20 per store, best sellers collection first, then the catalog in order. 11,049 products in total.
- Subscriptions: a product counts when it publishes at least one selling plan group. Groups for pre orders and try before you buy programs were excluded.
- Discount: the most common recurring percentage discount across a store’s checked plans. Fixed amount plans are counted separately.
- Frequencies: read from plan names such as “Every 30 days” or “Delivery every 2 months”, converted to days.
- Apps: taken from the app ID each selling plan group publishes. Recharge was confirmed by matching its ID with Recharge scripts on store homepages. Apps that publish only a numeric ID I could not confirm are grouped as other or unidentified.
- Subscription page: a published page whose address contains subscribe, subscription or autoship.
No store is named in this report. Want to know how your offer compares? Book a 20 minute intro call.