How to choose a WooCommerce payment plugin that drives conversion

1. Does payment stay on your website?

There are two broad categories of payment gateway you can run on WooCommerce: redirect and direct.

A redirect gateway sends your customer away from your store to pay. They land on an external page, usually branded by your payment provider, complete the payment there, and are redirected back to your site when it’s done.

A direct gateway keeps payment selection and card entry inside your own checkout. Your customer doesn’t need to open a new tab or enter their card details on an unfamiliar page before they’ve even chosen how to pay. Depending on the payment method itself, there may still be a further step outside your site, a bank authentication screen for a bank transfer, for example, but that’s a requirement of the method, not something a direct gateway adds on top.

Here’s the part that businesses often miss: with most plugins, the redirect happens before the customer has even chosen how they want to pay. Your branding disappears along with your URL, and your customer is handed over to a third party right when they need to trust you the most.

With a plugin like Mollie, payment selection and card entry happen inside your WooCommerce checkout. For some cards and Apple Pay, the payment completes without any page transition.  

The real difference is when your customer leaves your store: with a redirect provider, it’s before they’ve paid. With Mollie, any redirect only happens at the step that the payment method itself requires, such as bank authentication for bank transfer payments, not before your customer has even chosen how to pay.

2. Does the plugin support WooCommerce block checkout?

WooCommerce made block-based checkout the default for new stores in November 2023. The classic, shortcode-based checkout still works, but it’s in maintenance mode.

That means every new checkout capability WooCommerce ships lands on blocks first, so a payment plugin that only works for the old checkout falls further behind with each release.

A good plugin, like Mollie’s, supports block checkout through a native integration with the block API, so you get the checkout experience WooCommerce is steering everyone towards, without relying on a workaround that could break at any moment.

3. Does it show the right payment methods to each customer?

The best payment setup shows customers the methods they actually prefer. Get that right, and shoppers are more likely to complete their purchase. Get it wrong, and unfamiliar or irrelevant payment options add friction at exactly the wrong moment.

Mollie lets you configure which payment methods to show based on a customer’s billing country. Once configured, the plugin applies those rules automatically, without requiring custom checkout logic.

4. Can customers use express checkout?

Express wallets like Apple Pay autofill a customer’s stored payment and shipping details, letting them skip the checkout form and complete a purchase in a few taps.

A good plugin should display Apple Pay on product and cart pages, so eligible customers can pay before your checkout form has even loaded.

5. Can it support your subscription model in the long term?

Stored card tokens and SEPA Direct Debit mandates are difficult to move between providers. If you do switch, every subscriber might have to re-authorise their payment details from scratch, which is a reliable way to lose a chunk of your customer base.

A good plugin supports WooCommerce Subscriptions natively: card customers renew on securely stored tokens, and customers who first pay through a supported method can be set up on a SEPA Direct Debit mandate for future charges. It’s worth settling this before launch rather than discovering it once you have subscribers to retain.

6. How are card details handled?

Not every plugin handles card details the same way.

Some route card data through the business's own server before it reaches the payment provider. Others use secure fields served directly from the provider’s domain, so raw card numbers never touch your systems.

For example, Mollie’s card fields run through secure iframes served from Mollie's domain. Card numbers, expiry dates and security codes never pass through your server, which helps limit your PCI DSS scope.

7. Will the provider be there when something goes wrong?

Payment methods and pricing get most of the attention, but two things matter just as much when you’re looking for a new plugin: what happens when something goes wrong, and how quickly you can start using it.

Look for support you can actually reach, tools that handle disputes and reconciliation without hours of manual admin, and a setup simple enough to manage yourself.

The best providers offer a real person to talk to in your own language, so that if there are ever any issues – or you just need some guidance – you have someone to contact. 

It’s easy to overlook this while comparing plugins on paper, but it’s usually the first thing businesses wish they’d checked once something goes wrong.