How to start an online store in India: the seven steps in order
Starting an online store in India is a sequence, not a single purchase. Paperwork and accounts come first because the payment gateway and couriers will ask for them; the store build comes in the middle; test orders come last. Doing them out of order is how stores end up "ready" but unable to take a single rupee.
Here is the order this guide follows. Each step links to the detail below, so you can jump to where you are.
- 1. Decide product, buyer and margin
- 2. Set up the business: PAN, current account, Udyam if useful
- 3. Settle GST and any product licences
- 4. Choose a platform: hosted, WordPress or custom
- 5. Open a payment gateway and decide on COD
- 6. Choose shipping partners and packaging
- 7. Build, test with real orders, then launch
Step 1: work out your margin per order before anything else
Before you register or build, check that a single online order makes money after every cost. A store can look perfect and still lose money on every parcel.
Write down, for one typical order: your selling price, product cost, packaging, the gateway's percentage, the shipping charge you pay, and an allowance for returns and failed deliveries. Subtract. What is left must cover marketing, the store's running costs and your time. If the figure is thin, raise prices, bundle products to increase order value, set a minimum order for free shipping, or choose lighter packaging.
Weight and size matter more online than in a shop. Couriers charge on the higher of actual weight and volumetric weight (length × breadth × height divided by the courier's factor), so a bulky but light product like a pillow can cost more to ship than a heavier small item. Measure your packed products before you set prices.
What registration do you need to start an online store in India?
At minimum you need a PAN and a bank current account in your business name, because payment gateways and couriers use them for KYC and settlements. Most first-time sellers start as a sole proprietorship; partners often choose an LLP, and funded founders a private limited company.
A sole proprietorship needs no separate registration to exist, but banks and gateways want proof that the business is real, such as a GST certificate, Udyam certificate, shop and establishment licence or similar document. Udyam registration is free on the government's Udyam portal and gives you an MSME identity that some banks and schemes recognise.
Ask your chartered accountant which structure fits your plans before you open accounts. Changing structure later means redoing gateway KYC, courier contracts and GST, which takes weeks.
- PAN of the proprietor, firm or company
- Current account in the business name
- Proof of business: GST, Udyam or shop licence, as your bank or gateway accepts
- Address proof for the pickup or warehouse location
- Trademark application for your brand name, if you plan to build a brand
Is GST mandatory to start an online store in India?
It depends on your turnover and on how you sell. Selling only from your own website follows the normal threshold, while selling through a marketplace has stricter rules.
Under the CGST Act, a business supplying goods generally has to register once aggregate turnover crosses ₹40 lakh in most states, with lower thresholds in some special category states and for services. Sellers supplying through an e-commerce operator, such as a marketplace that collects tax at source, have historically needed GST registration regardless of turnover. From 1 October 2023, a relaxation lets small sellers who supply only within their own state through an e-commerce operator, and stay under the threshold, enrol with their PAN instead of full registration.
In practice many new store owners register voluntarily anyway: some gateways, B2B buyers and marketplaces ask for a GSTIN, and registration lets you claim input tax credit on your purchases. It also means filing returns on time every period. This is a decision for your CA; once you have a GSTIN, we configure the store to print it on invoices and apply the tax rates your CA confirms.
Product licences and labelling rules to check before listing
Some products need their own licence or labelling before you can sell them online, regardless of GST. Check your category early, because approvals can take longer than building the store.
Food products, including home-made pickles, sweets and spices, need FSSAI registration or a licence depending on the size of the business, and the number goes on your label and listing. Packaged goods generally must carry declarations such as MRP, net quantity, manufacturer or packer details and country of origin under the Legal Metrology (Packaged Commodities) Rules, and online listings are expected to show the same information. Cosmetics, electronics, medicines, supplements and toys have further category-specific rules.
We build product pages with fields for every declaration you need, so the information shows consistently on each listing. What those declarations must say is for you and your adviser to confirm; we make sure there is a proper place for them.
Choose a hosted builder like Shopify if you want to start within weeks and are comfortable with a monthly subscription; WooCommerce if you already use WordPress and want to edit everything yourself; and a custom-built store if your rules, speed needs or long-term costs outgrow templates.
Hosted builders are quick and reliable but charge a subscription, and features you need, such as COD controls, GST invoice formats or pincode checks, often come from paid add-on apps. WooCommerce is free software with a huge plugin library; the risk is plugin sprawl slowing the site and breaking on updates.
A custom store built by us, typically on Next.js or Astro with a Node.js or Laravel back end, has no platform subscription and is built lean for Indian mobile networks. It costs more up front and suits sellers who have a clear catalogue and plan to grow. Two deeper comparisons help here: Shopify vs a custom ecommerce website and the full cost of a Shopify store in India.
Should you start on a marketplace or with your own store?
Start on a marketplace if you need sales this month and your product competes on price and search within that marketplace; start with your own store if you are building a brand, selling to a community you already have, or selling something marketplaces handle poorly.
Marketplaces give you buyers from day one but set the rules: commission and fees per order, return policies, listing formats, and the constant pressure of competing sellers on the same page. Your own online store starts with zero traffic, but every customer and every review belongs to you, and there is no commission on repeat orders.
Many Indian sellers run both. The marketplace brings first-time buyers; a card in the parcel invites them to reorder on your website or WhatsApp. Our comparison of selling on Amazon versus your own website works through the numbers in detail.
How does a payment gateway work for a new online store?
A payment gateway collects money from customers by UPI, cards, net banking and wallets, then settles it to your current account after a short delay, keeping a small fee per transaction. You apply directly with the gateway in your business name; your developer only connects it to the store.
Expect the gateway to review your website before activating live payments. They typically check that the store shows your business name, contact details, product prices, and pages for terms, privacy, shipping, returns and refunds. That is why we publish those pages early on the staging site, so activation does not delay launch.
On the technical side, the store must confirm payments through server-side callbacks, not just the customer's return to a "success" page. We also handle UPI payments that stay pending for a few minutes, so orders are neither lost nor marked paid by mistake. Settlement reports from the gateway should match your order list every week; we add a simple export to make that check easy.
Should a new online store in India offer cash on delivery?
Offer COD if your buyers expect it and your margin can absorb some returned parcels; restrict or drop it if refused deliveries would wipe out your profit. For many first-time buyers in smaller towns, COD is still how they test a new store.
The cost of COD is return to origin, or RTO: a customer orders, then refuses the parcel, and you pay shipping both ways without making a sale. The fix is not to ban COD outright but to control it.
- Confirm every COD order on WhatsApp before dispatch; cancel if unconfirmed
- Add a small COD handling charge or give a discount for prepaid UPI
- Allow COD only up to an order value you are comfortable losing
- Block COD on pincodes with repeated refusals
- Ask for a small prepaid advance on high-value or custom-made items
We build these controls into checkout from the start, because adding them after the first wave of refused parcels is always more expensive.
How to ship orders from an online store across India
Most new stores start with a courier aggregator: one account and dashboard that books pickups with several courier companies, prints labels and handles COD remittance. As volumes grow, some sellers sign direct contracts with a courier for better rates.
Compare partners on the pincodes they serve, pickup reliability from your area, COD remittance speed, how they handle weight disputes and how returns come back. India Post is worth adding for remote pincodes that private couriers may not reach. For local same-day delivery in your own city, a hyperlocal delivery service or your own delivery person can work better than a courier.
Packaging is part of shipping. Use boxes sized to the product to avoid volumetric charges, protect fragile items properly, and photograph each packed parcel before handover; it helps in damage and weight disputes. Your store shows shipping charges by weight or order value, checks the customer's pincode at checkout, and shows an estimated delivery window.
Pages and policies Indian consumer rules expect on your store
Your online store needs clear pages for returns, refunds, exchanges, shipping, cancellation, privacy, terms, and a grievance contact before launch. Payment gateways check for them, and consumer rules expect them.
The Consumer Protection (E-Commerce) Rules, 2020 require e-commerce businesses to display details such as return, refund, exchange, warranty and delivery terms, and to have a grievance officer whose contact details are shown, who acknowledges complaints within 48 hours and resolves them within one month. Product pages are expected to show total price and, where relevant, the country of origin.
Personal data of customers also falls under India's Digital Personal Data Protection Act, 2023. We build a privacy notice page, consent checkboxes where needed, and admin access limited to people who need it. The policy wording should come from you or your legal adviser; we place it clearly, link it from checkout, and make the grievance contact easy to find.
What does it cost to start an online store in India? A launch budget around a ₹50,000 build
A custom online store from us starts at ₹50,000, but the store is only one line of your launch budget. Put every line on paper before you commit, so the money does not run out between launch day and the first steady orders.
The lines below are the ones new sellers forget most often. Some are one-time, some recur with every order, and marketing is the line most founders underestimate. Prices for domains, hosting, gateways, couriers and packaging vary by provider, so collect two quotes for each and add them to your sheet.
- Store build: from ₹50,000, one-time, with 2 months of free maintenance
- Domain and hosting: yearly renewals, paid to the providers in your name
- Opening stock: enough for the first months without tying up all your cash
- Product photography: clean photos on white plus a few in-use shots
- Packaging: boxes, mailers, tape, labels, inserts
- Gateway fees: a percentage of every prepaid order
- Shipping and returns: forward charges plus an allowance for RTO
- Marketing: ads, influencer samples, launch offers
- Later: maintenance from ₹8,000/mo a month, SEO from ₹10,000/mo a month if you want it
For store-type price comparisons see ecommerce website cost in India.
Product photos, descriptions and SEO for a new store
Products sell online on photos and specific details, so prepare at least four clear images and a written description for every item before the build finishes. Content, not code, is what usually delays a store launch.
Write descriptions that answer the questions customers ask you in person: size, material, care instructions, what is in the box, delivery time and return rules. Use the words buyers type into Google, such as "cotton kurta for office wear" rather than a code name. Consistent product names help both search and your own stock records.
We give each product and category its own clean URL, add Product structured data with price and availability, compress images for fast loading on mobile data, and connect Google Search Console and Merchant Center where useful. Nobody can guarantee rankings for a new store, but these basics mean Google can read your catalogue properly from day one. Growing organic sales usually needs regular content and link work, covered by our ecommerce SEO help.
How long does it take to start an online store in India?
Allow about six to ten weeks from the first decision to your first real order: a week or two for registrations and accounts, four to eight weeks for the store build, overlapping with gateway activation and courier onboarding, then a short test period.
The build can run while paperwork progresses, as long as the gateway and courier applications are started in week one. What usually delays launch is product content arriving late and gateway activation waiting on missing policy pages or documents.
Weeks 1–2
Margin sheet, business setup, GST decision with your CA, gateway and courier applications submitted, store quote approved.
Weeks 3–5
Designs approved, catalogue structure built, policy pages live on staging for gateway review, photos being shot.
Weeks 6–8
Checkout, shipping rules and COD controls built; products uploaded; gateway live; test orders placed and delivered.
Week 9 onward
Soft launch to friends and existing customers, fix what they report, then a public launch with your marketing.
Your first order: tests to run before you announce the store
Place real orders yourself before telling anyone the store exists. Every path a customer can take must work end to end, with real money and a real parcel.
We run these tests with you on the live site. Anything that fails gets fixed before launch, which is far cheaper than fixing it after a customer complains on social media.
- A prepaid UPI order that lands in your account and in the order list
- A card payment, and one that fails, to check the retry message
- A COD order that triggers WhatsApp confirmation
- A refund issued from the admin that reaches the payer
- Shipping label creation, pickup and tracking link to the customer
- A delivery to a pincode far from you
- A GST invoice checked by your accountant
- A return request from the customer's side
Example: a silk-stole weaver in Bhagalpur starts an online store
This is a hypothetical scenario to show how the steps fit together, not a real client. Imagine a family of Bhagalpur weavers who sell silk stoles and sarees to traders and want to sell directly to buyers in Delhi, Bengaluru and abroad.
They open a current account as a proprietorship, register on the Udyam portal, and after speaking to their CA register for GST because they plan to sell across states and to list on a marketplace later. They apply to a payment gateway and a courier aggregator in week one. Their store is custom-built from ₹50,000 with a catalogue by fabric and occasion, fabric-care details on every page, UPI-first checkout, and COD only for orders below a value they are comfortable risking, with WhatsApp confirmation.
Before launch they photograph every piece in daylight, write weaving details in plain English and Hindi, and place five test orders to cousins in different states. International buyers pay by card, with shipping quoted per order. The marketplace listing comes three months later, with a card in every parcel inviting buyers to reorder from the family's own site.
Mistakes that stall new online stores in India
When a new store stalls, the cause usually traces back to one of these. None of them is technical, and all of them are avoidable.
- Building the store before checking margin per order after shipping and returns
- Registering the domain or gateway in a developer's or relative's name
- Unlimited COD with no confirmation, leading to heavy RTO
- Missing policy pages, so gateway activation stalls for weeks
- Blurry phone photos and one-line descriptions
- Spending the whole budget on the build and nothing on marketing
- Ignoring GST or product licences until a buyer or marketplace asks
- Launching publicly without a single real test order
If you are unsure whether you need a store at all yet, our guide on how to take a business online in India shows where a store fits in the wider order of steps.