Smile loyalty and LoyaltyLion both promise to turn one-time Shopify shoppers into repeat customers, but they take very different approaches to pricing the features that actually drive repeat purchases.
Smile.io puts VIP tiers behind its $199/month Growth plan, which includes up to 2,500 monthly orders. LoyaltyLion starts at $199/month for just 500 orders on its Classic plan, with VIP tiers available as an optional add-on or included with its higher-tier Advanced plan.
In this article, I'll break down what Smile.io and LoyaltyLion actually cost at 500, 2,000, and 5,000+ orders per month, which features like VIP tiers are included at each level. I'll also compare both with a third option that delivers more features without the higher price tag.
Smile.io: A solid self-serve choice if you don't need paid memberships or multi-store support. However, VIP tiers are only available on the $199/month Growth plan, which covers up to 2,500 orders.
LoyaltyLion: A strong option if you're running loyalty across multiple international Shopify storefronts under one program. Otherwise, you're paying $199/month for just 500 orders to get started, with VIP tiers available only as a paid add-on on the Classic plan.
Love Loyalty is the best Shopify loyalty app for stores that want VIP tiers, referrals, and paid memberships together. Plans start at $79/month for up to 2,000 orders, and unlimited orders for just $399/month.
I've compared both Smile.io and LoyaltyLion across the areas that matter most when choosing a Shopify loyalty app for your store.
Now let's get into the details.
Most loyalty app pricing looks straightforward until you factor in order limits, overage fees as your order volume grows, and which features are actually included at each tier.
Here's the real cost breakdown.
Smile.io and Love Loyalty are close at the entry tier. LoyaltyLion charges over 13 times Love Loyalty's price for the same 500 orders, and VIP tiers still aren't included, just available as a paid add-on.
At 500 orders a month, you're paying:
This is where the value gap gets obvious.
Love Loyalty at $79/month gives you 2,000 orders, VIP tiers, paid memberships, B2B loyalty, and POS support, all at a fixed price.
Smile.io charges $199/month to unlock VIP tiers at all, and still has no paid membership option on any plan.
LoyaltyLion doesn't publish a price for the tier where VIP tiers stop being an add-on. You go through a sales conversation before you know what that costs.
If you're processing 2,000 orders a month, you're paying:
Love Loyalty's premium tier is the only one with fixed, published pricing at this level: $399/month, unlimited orders, no overage.
Smile.io's Plus plan requires annual billing and still doesn't include paid memberships.
LoyaltyLion moves fully to custom pricing here, so there's no published number to compare directly.
At this tier, you're paying:
Let's say you're running a growing Shopify store processing 2,000 orders a month, and you want VIP tiers, referrals, and POS support for a physical retail location.
With Love Loyalty: $79/month for 2,000 orders, with VIP tiers, referrals, POS support, and paid memberships all included.
With Smile.io: $199/month for 2,500 orders, with VIP tiers and referrals included, but no paid membership option.
With LoyaltyLion: an unpublished custom rate once you move past the $199/month Classic plan, since VIP tiers as a standard feature (not an add-on) require the Advanced tier.
Both platforms cover core points and referral functionality, but VIP tiers, the feature that turns a discount system into an actual loyalty program, sit behind a higher price or a paid add-on on both.
LoyaltyLion covers the basics well: points on purchases, a branded rewards page, and referral tracking with unique links for both sides of the referral.
VIP tiers are technically available on the $199/month Classic plan, but only as a paid add-on, not something included in the base price. To get VIP tiers as a standard, included feature, you need the Advanced tier, which is custom-quoted rather than published.
Scheduled bonus campaigns, loyalty challenges, and automated campaign suggestions are all gated behind Advanced as well.
Smile.io's entry plan at $15/month covers points, referrals, free product redemption, and a dedicated loyalty page.
VIP tiers aren't available until the $199/month Growth plan. Below that, a store can run points and referrals, but nothing tier-based.
Points expiration and syncing VIP tiers to Shopify metafields also arrive at Growth, not before.
Love Loyalty includes VIP tiers, referrals, and paid memberships together starting at $79/month, the same price range where Smile.io only unlocks VIP tiers and LoyaltyLion still requires a custom quote to get there.
At $79/month, you get:
Neither Smile.io nor LoyaltyLion bundles all of that together at a single, published price point.
LoyaltyLion and Smile.io take different approaches to Shopify integration: LoyaltyLion supports multiple e-commerce platforms and leads with multi-store loyalty, while Smile.io is built no-code and Shopify-first without being Shopify-exclusive.
LoyaltyLion supports Shopify, Adobe Commerce, and BigCommerce, among other platforms. Its standout feature is multi-store loyalty: one program running across multiple Shopify storefronts, useful for a brand running separate country-specific stores.
Because it's built for multiple platforms rather than Shopify specifically, deeper customization can require more setup effort, and some reviewers note that customization changes benefit from developer support.
Smile.io is built to be managed by a marketing team without developer help. Colors, text, and layout can be adjusted directly in the Smile admin. Smile also holds Shopify's Built for Shopify badge and Shopify Technology Partner certification.
It's still a platform that supports other use cases beyond Shopify specifically, so its deepest integration options sit alongside broader platform compatibility rather than being built exclusively around Shopify's data model.
Love Loyalty is built exclusively for Shopify and stores everything inside Shopify.
What that means in practice:
LoyaltyLion's multi-store feature remains a genuine advantage for a specific kind of multi-country brand, one that neither Smile.io nor Love Loyalty currently matches.
Neither Smile loyalty nor LoyaltyLion offers paid membership functionality at any tier, the option for a customer to pay upfront for ongoing benefits like free shipping or a standing discount. A merchant who wants that model has to run it through a separate app on either platform.
LoyaltyLion doesn't offer paid membership functionality at any tier. A merchant who wants an annual membership program with always-on perks would need a separate subscription app and would have to manage the integration between the two manually.
Smile.io doesn't offer paid memberships either, at any tier, including Plus. Same limitation as LoyaltyLion: a different tool, run alongside Smile rather than through it.
Love Loyalty includes paid memberships starting at $79/month, with a 1.8% transaction fee that drops to 0.8% at $399/month.
A merchant sets the benefits, whether that's a percentage discount, free shipping, early access, or bonus points, and customers pay upfront to unlock them. That's a retention model built around predictable revenue rather than hoping a one-time buyer comes back.
Support access on both platforms broadens as you move up in plan tier rather than staying uniform across all of them, which matters most the moment a customer can't redeem a reward and every minute of downtime costs trust.
LoyaltyLion offers email, phone, chat, and knowledge base support across its plans, with dedicated CSMs and account managers available on its higher, custom-quoted tiers. Support access broadens as you move up in plan tier rather than being uniform across all of them.
Smile.io offers 24/7 live chat support, email/help desk, and a knowledge base, with a dedicated Loyalty Program Strategist available to Plus merchants specifically.
Love Loyalty includes live chat and email support on every plan, including Free. On the Growth and Plus tiers, that expands to founder-led onboarding, performance audits, and on-demand development, support that scales with the plan rather than gating basic responsiveness behind a higher tier.
Smile.io is built for no-code, self-serve management. LoyaltyLion's ongoing management takes more configuration time, particularly for VIP tiers and advanced campaign logic, since it's built to work across multiple e-commerce platforms rather than Shopify specifically.
LoyaltyLion's initial setup is guided, with an onboarding manager included even on the Free plan. Because the platform is built to work across multiple e-commerce systems rather than Shopify specifically, ongoing management, particularly for VIP tiers and advanced campaign logic, tends to require more configuration time.
Smile.io is designed for a marketing team to launch and adjust without a developer. Reward structures, on-site widgets, and campaign settings are all managed through the Smile dashboard.
Love Loyalty is designed to be configured once and managed easily from there. Because it's built exclusively for Shopify, its settings map directly to Shopify's native functionality rather than translating from a multi-platform system. Adjusting VIP tier thresholds, adding a reward, or changing where a widget appears takes a few clicks, with live chat support available starting on the $12/month Professional plan.
LoyaltyLion connects with 30+ tools built for broad, multi-platform compatibility, while Smile.io's integrations lean on its Shopify certification for deeper native depth, a distinction that matters for how cleanly each platform's data flows through the rest of your Shopify stack.
LoyaltyLion integrates with 30+ tools, including Klaviyo (as an Elite Master Partner), Attentive, Gorgias, and Recharge. Because LoyaltyLion supports platforms beyond Shopify, its integrations are built for broad compatibility rather than Shopify-specific depth.
Smile.io connects with Klaviyo, Recharge, and other standard ecommerce tools, with unlimited integrations available from its Growth plan onward. Smile's dual Shopify certification (Built for Shopify and Shopify Technology Partner) reflects a deeper native integration than most multi-platform tools offer.
Love Loyalty stores all loyalty data in Shopify metafields, which makes it accessible to other Shopify apps without a custom API integration. Because there's no external database being queried, integrations like Klaviyo, email marketing, and POS all read from the same native Shopify data rather than syncing between two separate systems.
Neither Smile loyalty nor LoyaltyLion is built exclusively for Shopify, and both gate VIP tiers, a foundational loyalty feature, behind a higher price point or a custom quote.
Love Loyalty includes VIP tiers, referrals, paid memberships, POS support, and B2B loyalty together starting at $79/month, and unlimited orders for only $399/mo.
If you want to see how that works on your own store before switching, you can book a demo and we'll walk through the setup and the migration with you.
Yes. Love Loyalty supports migrating existing customer data, including points balances, at scale, and has handled migrations from other platforms tested at over a million customers.
LoyaltyLion starts at $199/month with VIP tiers as a paid add-on. Smile.io starts at $15/month but needs its $199/month Growth plan for VIP tiers. Love Loyalty includes VIP tiers, referrals, and paid memberships together at $79/month.
Love Loyalty includes paid memberships starting at $79/month. Neither Smile loyalty nor LoyaltyLion offers paid membership functionality at any tier.
Love Loyalty stores all loyalty data in Shopify metafields and doesn't rely on external API calls to load that data, which is a structural difference from platforms built to support multiple ecommerce platforms.
Yes. Love Loyalty integrates with Shopify POS for both online and in-store transactions, starting on the $12/month Professional plan.
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