This is the full answer to how to start an online store in the UK: twelve steps, in the order you should actually do them, with real numbers. Every price and threshold below was checked on 7 August 2026 against HMRC guidance, Stripe’s UK pricing page and current registrar prices — because most guides on this subject were written years ago, for Americans, by people who have never posted a parcel from a UK post office.
The short version: you can be trading legally within a fortnight for under £50 plus stock. The long version is below. None of the steps are optional, but several are cheaper than you’ve been told.
Step 1: Pick a product you can actually win with
Everything downstream gets easier or harder based on this choice. The boring criteria beat the exciting ones: something small and light (postage is a margin-killer), hard to break in transit, bought more than once, and ideally something you know well enough to answer customer questions without googling. You don’t need a unique product — you need a specific customer. “Homeware” loses; “prints for rented flats you can hang without drilling” wins. If you’re still hunting, our roundup of trending products in the UK is a starting point, not a shortcut: a trending product you know nothing about is worse than a dull one you understand.
Step 2: Validate cheaply before you build anything
Do not spend a month on a website for a product nobody has paid for. Sell ten units first, anywhere: eBay, Etsy or Vinted, a market stall, Instagram DMs, pre-orders to friends who are allowed to say no. You’ll learn your real postage cost, what people ask before buying, and whether anyone reorders. If you can’t sell it on a marketplace where the traffic already exists, a website won’t fix that — and if you can, those ten sales fund the next three steps.
Step 3: Budget honestly
Here’s what a lean launch actually costs, checked 7 August 2026:
| Item | Cost | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| .co.uk domain | £6–£15 a year | First-year offers run under £1; check the renewal price before you buy |
| Store platform (Orbit Solo) | £25/month (£19/month billed yearly) | 14-day free trial, no card needed — you can launch before paying anything |
| Card processing | Per-sale only | No monthly fee; rates in step 7 |
| Registering with HMRC | £0 | Sole trader registration is free |
| Amazon, eBay and Etsy plugins | £0 | Free on every Orbit plan |
So the store itself is under £50 before stock and packaging. Where beginners actually overspend is everything around it — logo designers, stock they bought in bulk for a discount, ads before the store converts. We’ve broken down the full picture, including the sneaky costs, in what it really costs to start an online shop in the UK.
Step 4: Register with HMRC — when you actually need to
You do not need to register anything before your first sale, and you don’t need a limited company to start. HMRC’s trading allowance means you can earn up to £1,000 in gross trading income per tax year with nothing to report. Once you pass £1,000, you register for Self Assessment — the deadline is 5 October following the end of the tax year you passed it in. Registration is free and takes minutes. Sole trader is the right default for almost everyone starting out; a limited company adds admin you probably don’t need yet. The full walkthrough, including when a company does make sense, is in our guide to registering a business to sell online in the UK.
Step 5: Name it and buy the domain
Pick a name you can say out loud without explaining the spelling, check the .co.uk is free, and search the trade mark register on gov.uk before you print anything. A .co.uk runs £6–£15 a year at renewal (as of 7 August 2026) — registrars advertise first-year deals under £1, then renew at £12–£15, so judge on the renewal price. Buy the .com too if it’s cheap, and grab the matching social handles the same day even if you won’t use them for months.
Step 6: Build the store — and here we declare an interest
This step is what we do: we build Orbit Commerce, so read this section knowing that. The facts are checkable either way. On Orbit you get a drag-and-drop page builder, unlimited products on every plan, and a 14-day free trial with no card, which means you can build the whole store — products, pages, checkout — and only pay once you’re ready to open. It’s UK-built with UK support on every plan, which matters more than it sounds the first time something breaks at 8pm before a launch.
Whatever you build with, the requirements are the same: a homepage that says what you sell in one sentence, product pages that answer questions instead of listing adjectives, visible delivery costs before checkout, and a working mobile experience — most of your first visitors will be on a phone in a queue.
Step 7: Set up payments and understand card fees
Card fees are per-transaction, so they cost nothing until you sell — but know them before you price. Checked 7 August 2026: Stripe’s standard UK rate is 1.5% + 20p per transaction for UK cards, rising to 2.5% + 20p for EU cards and more for premium and international cards. Orbit’s built-in UK online card rates are 2% + 25p on Solo, 1.7% + 25p on Team and 1.5% + 25p on Pro, with no platform fee on top of your sales. On a £30 order, that’s pence of difference either way — what matters at the start is that nobody takes a monthly fee for the privilege.
One threshold to know now, not later: you must register for VAT once your taxable turnover passes £90,000 in any rolling 12 months. Most new shops are years from that, but price with it in mind — our plain-English guide to UK VAT for online sellers covers when registering early actually helps.
Step 8: Photograph and describe your products properly
Photos sell the product; descriptions stop the returns. You don’t need a studio — a phone, a big window and a £5 roll of white paper produce photos that outsell most stock imagery, and our guide to taking product photos at home shows the exact setup. For descriptions: dimensions, materials, what’s in the box, what it works with, and one honest sentence about who it’s not for. That last one reads as confidence and quietly kills your returns rate.
Step 9: Get the legal pages right
UK distance-selling rules are specific and mostly ignored by new shops, which is an easy way to stand out. Customers can cancel an online order up to 14 days after delivery — and if you never told them about that right, the window stretches to 12 months, which is the most expensive paragraph you’ll skip today. You also need your business name and contact details displayed, total prices including any taxes shown before purchase, and a privacy policy that reflects what you actually collect (and check whether you owe the ICO’s data protection fee — most trading businesses do). The details, with template wording, are in UK returns law for online shops.
Step 10: Sort delivery before the first order, not after
Decide three things now: which service you’ll use, what you’ll charge, and what the parcel weighs with packaging — that last one decides the first two. Weigh a packed order on kitchen scales before setting prices; a box that tips into the next weight band can quietly erase your margin. Whether Royal Mail or a courier wins depends on parcel size and volume, and we’ve compared them properly in Royal Mail or courier for UK shipping. Charge a simple flat rate with free delivery over a threshold, and put it on every product page.
Step 11: Get your first ten sales
Your first sales will not come from Google — SEO takes months. They come from putting the product where buyers already are:
- Marketplaces. List on Amazon, eBay and Etsy alongside your store. On Orbit the marketplace plugins are free — listings and stock sync across, and marketplace orders arrive in your dashboard as native orders, so there’s no double bookkeeping.
- Google’s free product listings. Submitting your product feed gets you into the free listings in Google’s Shopping tab — not paid ads, just free presence.
- Social, done narrowly. One platform, short video of the product being made, packed or used. Making-of content outperforms polished adverts for small shops.
- People you know. Tell them. Ask for shares, not pity purchases. Local Facebook groups still quietly move product in most UK towns.
Ten sales is the goal because ten strangers paying you proves the offer — and gives you your first reviews.
Step 12: Month two — turn sales into a system
Once orders trickle in, stop launching and start compounding. Set up abandoned-cart emails first — carts get abandoned from day one and recovering even a fraction is the cheapest revenue you’ll ever earn; it’s included on every Orbit plan. Start collecting emails on the site, because owned audience beats rented reach. Begin the SEO groundwork now that it has months to pay off. Then read your own numbers: whatever sold best in month one gets more variants, better photos and more of your time. Whatever didn’t, cut without sentiment.
Questions people ask about how to start an online store in the UK
Do I need to register a business before I start selling online in the UK?
No. You can start selling immediately — HMRC’s trading allowance covers your first £1,000 of gross trading income per tax year. Once you pass £1,000, register for Self Assessment by 5 October following the end of that tax year. Registering as a sole trader is free, and you don’t need a limited company to begin.
How much does it cost to start an online store in the UK?
Under £50 before stock, at prices checked 7 August 2026: a .co.uk domain at £6–£15 a year and a store platform from £25 a month (£19 billed yearly on Orbit, after a 14-day free trial with no card). Card fees are per-sale only, and HMRC registration is free. Stock and packaging are the real variables.
Do I need to charge VAT when I start selling online?
Not until your taxable turnover passes £90,000 in any rolling 12-month period, at which point registration is mandatory. Below that it’s optional — occasionally worth it if you sell mainly to VAT-registered businesses, but most new shops are better off waiting.
How long does it take to set up an online shop?
The build itself takes a weekend: products, pages and checkout on a modern platform with a page builder. The slower parts are the ones people forget to start early — stock arriving, payment verification, photography and writing the legal pages. Start those in parallel and two weeks from idea to first sale is realistic.
Ready to open the doors?
Every step above works whether or not you ever use our platform — that’s the point of the guide. But if you’re at step 6, the fastest way through it is to start a free 14-day Orbit trial: no card, unlimited products, the page builder and the marketplace plugins included from the first minute. Build the store this weekend; sell something next week.