PayPal Standard in WooCommerce is being retired. Here is how to switch.

The short answer

PayPal Standard has been hidden for new WooCommerce stores since WooCommerce 5.5, and on June 24, 2026 WooCommerce announced that it is sunsetting. Nothing breaks immediately, and the announcement gives no shutdown date, but Standard gets no new features and WooCommerce describes its support for PayPal Standard as very limited.

The replacement is WooCommerce PayPal Payments. Since PayPal Payments 4.1.0, connecting your PayPal account to it automatically disables and hides PayPal Standard at checkout, unless active subscriptions still run on Standard. Switch on a staging copy first, test with a real order, and keep an eye on subscriptions.

Is your store on PayPal Standard?

Signs you are running the old gateway:

• In WooCommerce, then Settings, then Payments, a method called PayPal Standard is enabled.
• At checkout, customers click a PayPal option and leave your site to pay on PayPal’s own pages, then come back.
• Orders sometimes sit at pending payment until PayPal’s Instant Payment Notification (IPN) message reaches your store to confirm the payment.

If you are not sure, WooCommerce publishes a free, read-only Upgrade Readiness Tool. You install it like a plugin and it reports which PayPal integration you use (Standard, the older PayPal Checkout, PayPal Pro or PayPal Payments), whether your WordPress, WooCommerce and PHP versions meet the new plugin’s requirements, known plugin or theme conflicts, and whether you have recurring payments that need special handling. It changes nothing on your store.

PayPal Standard in WooCommerce: what has happened, in order

These steps are easy to mix up, so here they are from WooCommerce’s own posts:

1. 2021, WooCommerce 5.5. PayPal Standard stopped loading by default for new stores, per WooCommerce’s 2021 advisory. Existing stores using it were not affected.
2. May 2024, WooCommerce 8.9. A database update disabled PayPal Standard on stores that were not using it. The WooCommerce 8.9 release post describes it as only loading Standard on stores that have connected an account or have existing PayPal orders, and the filter developers used to force it back on stopped working.
3. June 2026, PayPal Payments 4.1.0. The plugin gained the ability to switch Standard off for you once you connect a PayPal account.
4. June 24, 2026. WooCommerce published its advisory that PayPal Standard is sunsetting.

What the advisory does not contain is a date when Standard stops processing payments. If you read a hard deadline somewhere, check it against WooCommerce’s own announcement before acting on it.

What PayPal Payments gives you instead

WooCommerce PayPal Payments is the full integration WooCommerce now recommends. According to its documentation and the advisory, it can offer:

• PayPal’s smart payment buttons, which show the payment methods relevant to each shopper’s market
• Pay Later, with optional messaging set up on the plugin’s Styling tab
• Venmo
• card fields on your own checkout, with fraud protection and 3D Secure, through advanced card processing
• Apple Pay and Google Pay as digital wallets

The PayPal Payments startup guide lists its requirements as WordPress 6.5 or newer, WooCommerce 9.6 or newer and PHP 7.4 or newer, plus a PayPal account. It accepts a personal or business account, and recommends business, which adds card processing, fraud prevention and invoicing.

PayPal’s fees are set by PayPal and depend on the payment method and your account, so check PayPal’s current merchant fee page for your situation before you switch.

How to switch, step by step

1. Take a backup and make a staging copy of the store. Payment changes belong on a copy first.
2. Run the Upgrade Readiness Tool on the live store and read its report, especially the subscriptions section.
3. Update WordPress, WooCommerce and PHP if the report says they are below the requirements.
4. Install WooCommerce PayPal Payments from Plugins, then Add New, and activate it.
5. Test in sandbox first. On the PayPal Payments setup screen, the link to see advanced options lets you turn on sandbox mode and connect a PayPal sandbox account, created at developer.paypal.com, so you can place test orders without real money.
6. Connect the live account. Choose Activate PayPal Payments, pick business or personal, choose what you sell (physical, virtual or both) and the checkout options you want, then log in to PayPal and choose Connect to PayPal.
7. Place a real order and refund it. A small real purchase proves the whole chain: payment, order status, stock, the customer’s email and yours.
8. Check that Standard is gone. Once the account is connected, PayPal Standard should no longer appear at checkout. If it does, the store has subscriptions still tied to it (next section).

Do the live connection in one sitting, at a quiet hour, and do not keep reloading the settings screen while you are in the middle of PayPal’s sign-in.

Subscriptions are the exception

If your store sells subscriptions and some active or pending-cancel subscriptions still renew through PayPal Standard, PayPal Payments deliberately leaves Standard enabled when you connect, so those renewals are not cut off. You get a notice saying how many subscriptions are affected and where to find them.

WooCommerce’s upgrade page says subscriptions processed through PayPal Standard stay on Standard until they wind down, while those on the older PayPal Checkout plugin can move to the new one. For a subscription store, WooCommerce recommends contacting its upgrade support team before switching, and I agree: map every active subscription first.

Problems I have seen when connecting

Most switches are uneventful. When they are not, it is usually one of these:

• The connection does not stick. PayPal’s side finishes, you return to the store, and it still says it is not connected. Open WooCommerce, then Status, then Logs, and read the PayPal Payments log. I have seen this on a store with no WooCommerce.com account connected, which the plugin’s sign-up relies on. The advanced options on the setup screen also let you connect with credentials from your own PayPal REST app instead.
• A caching or security plugin can interfere with the checkout scripts. Test checkout logged out, in a private window, after clearing every cache.
• Two PayPal integrations at once. If an older PayPal plugin is still active alongside the new one, check the checkout carefully for duplicate PayPal choices, and deactivate the old plugin once the new one is proven.
• Emails nobody receives. A payment is only finished when the order email arrives. If order or form notifications go missing, the cause is usually email authentication, which my guide to fixing website form emails covers.

Should you switch now?

Nothing forces the move today. I would still plan it soon, for three reasons: Standard gets no new features, support for it is limited if something goes wrong, and choosing your own quiet week beats being pushed into it during a busy season.

Third-party plugins exist that restore or keep PayPal Standard. They keep you on an integration WooCommerce and PayPal are retiring, so I treat them as a short bridge at most.

If you would rather not do it yourself, this is routine work for me as a WooCommerce developer in Louisville: staging copy, sandbox tests, the live connection, a real test order, and a check of every email the store sends. It also fits inside a WooCommerce care plan, along with the rest of the payment setup.

Frequently asked questions

Will my checkout stop working?

Not because of the June 2026 announcement. WooCommerce’s advisory says nothing breaks, and it gives no shutdown date. Retirement also does not prove that any particular store’s checkout has stopped, or that it still works: place a small real order to check yours. The risk is that Standard gets no new features and only limited support, so a problem with it later is harder to fix.

Do I need a PayPal business account?

PayPal Payments accepts personal or business accounts, but its documentation recommends a business account, which adds card processing, fraud prevention and invoicing. If you sell regularly, use business.

Will updating PayPal Payments switch off PayPal Standard by itself?

No. Updating to version 4.1.0 changes nothing on its own. Standard is disabled and hidden when you connect a PayPal account to PayPal Payments, and even then it stays if active subscriptions depend on it.

Can customers still pay with a card without a PayPal account?

Yes, with PayPal Payments’ card fields and digital wallets, depending on your account and settings. Test each method you turn on with a real order.

Can you switch my store for me?

Yes. I set it up on a staging copy, test it in sandbox, connect your live account, place and refund a real order and check every email. Your PayPal account stays in your name.