VAT Switcher setup guide

This guide takes you from install to a working VAT toggle in a few minutes. You don’t need to edit theme code, and the app never changes your products, prices or theme files. Watch the video on YouTube if you prefer to see it first.

1. Install and choose a plan

Install Merivirta VAT Switcher from the Shopify App Store. Shopify’s plan selection page opens right away: choose Starter or Pro to start your 7-day free trial. You are not charged during the trial, and Shopify then brings you back to the app.

Not sure which plan you need? Open Feature demo in the app to try every feature in a simulated store first.

2. Check what the app read from Shopify

The dashboard shows what the app detected, so there is nothing to type in:

• whether your prices include tax (Shopify Settings → Taxes and duties);
• your home country and its VAT rate, from your store address;
• your Markets, including markets that add tax at checkout or adjust prices to each country’s VAT rate.

When you change these in Shopify, the app picks up the change automatically. If something needs a different value, override it under VAT rates.

3. Activate the app

Select Activate on the dashboard and confirm. Until you do, the app publishes nothing to your store.

4. Turn on the app embed

Select Enable embed on the dashboard. The theme editor opens at App embeds → VAT Switcher: turn it on and select Save. The dashboard shows a check mark once the embed is on.

5. Choose the look and placement

In the same app embed in the theme editor, choose:

• Style: ten toggle styles, with your own colors and size.
• Where to show the toggle: in the header, floating on the page, or only where you add the VAT toggle block or the VAT bar section.
• On mobile: the same place as on desktop, or its own place.

The theme editor only controls the look. Everything about prices and VAT lives in the app.

6. Set how prices are shown

Open Settings in the app:

• Default view: show prices incl. or excl. VAT when a shopper first arrives, or lock the store to one view and hide the toggle.
• Dual price display: show both prices at once, stacked or side by side.
• Toggle texts: labels are built in for every EU language, and you can write your own.
• Match cart line totals to the unit price: turn on if you want line totals to match the unit price exactly.

7. Show net prices to business customers

Under Settings → Customers & B2B:

• Choose customer tags (for example wholesale). Logged-in customers with these tags see prices excl. VAT by default.
• On Pro, Shopify B2B company customers are detected automatically. You can also hide the toggle from them or turn the app off for them.

8. Products with a reduced VAT rate (Pro)

Books, food, medicines and other goods often have a lower rate. Under Multi-VAT rules, give a VAT category to a collection, tag, vendor, product type, product category or single products. The app then uses that category’s rate in each country. Select Scan my catalog to get rule suggestions from your products’ Shopify categories.

9. Visitors from other countries (Pro)

• Visitor-country VAT rates show prices with the VAT rate of the shopper’s country.
• For visitors from outside the EU, choose the normal toggle, Shopify prices as they are, or prices excl. VAT only.
• Visitor popup asks first-time visitors whether they shop as a business or a consumer, and remembers the choice.

10. Check your store

Open your store and switch the toggle on a product page, a collection, the cart drawer and the cart page. Every price on the page should follow, including the subtotal and total. Checkout stays unchanged by design: Shopify calculates the tax charged there.

If a price isn’t switched, or something is switched that shouldn’t be, see Troubleshooting. We also help with placement and theme-specific price fixes free of charge: contact support.