How to Set Up PayPal on WooCommerce in Minutes?

In this post, we’ll discuss how you can integrate your PayPal business account with your online store built on WooCommerce by following some simple steps. 

PayPal is an internationally recognized payment gateway used by more than 210 million people across 200 regions. The best part is that it supports 25 different currencies and the currency transfer happens automatically within PayPal in the event of an international transaction. So, if you are an online store owner with intentions to conduct business both regionally and internationally, making and accepting payments through PayPal is a necessity.

If your online shop is built on the WooCommerce platform, you are in luck because WooCommerce has the functionality to integrate PayPal built into it which means you do not need to play with the backend processes to set up the PayPal payment gateway. In a few clicks, you can set up your PayPal account and start accepting payments from both your local and overseas customers.

Step 1: Getting your identity token

The identity token is important so that you can verify payments without PayPal’s Instant Payment Notification. The identity token allows your customers to track their payments. Here’s how you can obtain your identity token. 

Open your PayPal dashboard => Go to Account settings => Go to Website payments => Find the Website preferences option and tap on the Update button next to it.

This will open a window where you’ll need to enable Auto return for website payments.

Enabling auto return will ensure that the customer is directed to your webpage right after completing a payment. 

Next, find a box that says Return URL. You need to put the URL to your Thank You page in this box. This URL should direct your customer to a page that says that their transaction is completed. 

In the next step, turn on the Payment data transfer. You have to do this in order to get a notification when a payment is made successfully. And you will find the identity token at the bottom of this page.

Also Read – Reasons Why You Should Be Using Web Host Manager

Step 2: Getting API credentials

You need the API credentials to integrate your PayPal account with your online WooCommerce store. The API helps the applications communicate so that your customers can make PayPal transfers without leaving your store. Here’s how you obtain the API credentials. 

Open your PayPal dashboard => Go to Account settings => Go to Account access => Locate API access and tap on the Update button next to it => Locate NVP/SOAP API integration (Classic) => Click on Manage API credentials.

This will open the Request API credentials page. Locate the Request API signature option and click on Agree and submit. The API credentials will appear on a new page.

Step 3: Setting up PayPal for WooCommerce

So far you have prepared the ground for your PayPal account to be integrated with a website. In the following steps, you’ll learn how to set up your PayPal account with your online store on WooCommerce.

Visit your WordPress dashboard and find the WooCommerce option on the left sidebar => Click on Settings => Go to the Payments tab => Find the PayPal option => Enable it => Click on Set up.

Now, it’s time to configure your payment gateway. You’ll see a bunch of fields after clicking on the Set Up button, here’s what to do with each of them.

• Enable/Disable – Check the box and PayPal will be set as your payment gateway.
• Title – Enter the heading of your checkout page. For example, “Thanks for your payment”
• Description – Add a message for your customers to let them know that the transaction was a success. 
• PayPal email – Enter the PayPal email ID that you use to collect payments.

Final Step

At this point, you are ready for the final steps of configuring PayPal as a payment gateway for your WooCommerce store. You can use the Advanced options to tune the payment process for convenience. 

• Uncheck PayPal sandbox. This option allows you to test payments but you need a developer account for that.
• Enable Debug log. This keeps a log of all PayPal events.
• Enable IPN Email Notifications. This notifies you about refunds, chargebacks, and cancellations.
• Enter the email ID that will receive these notifications in the Receiver email.
• Insert the Identity token that you acquired from the PayPal dashboard.
• You can add an Invoice prefix to identify a specific store in case you have connected multiple stores to your PayPal account.
• Check the Shipping Details box to allow PayPal to create shipping labels.
• Keep Address override unchecked to disable customers from changing their address.
• In Payment action, you’ll find two options. Select Capture for immediate payment processing. If you want to approve each payment personally, select Authorize.
• Input the name of the Page style you want to show on your checkout page.
• Insert the Image URL for a 150×150 image that you can show on the upper left corner of your checkout page.  

After you have altered the advanced options as per your preference, configure the API credentials with the information you received from PayPal.

Finally, Click on Save Changes for the new settings to take effect.