Printful and Printify – US Holiday Surcharges for 2026
Printful and Printify Bring Back US Holiday Shipping Surcharges for 2026
Print-on-demand suppliers Printful and Printify have reintroduced a temporary $0.40 shipping surcharge on orders delivered to US addresses, affecting ecommerce sellers worldwide who serve American customers.
The additional charge took effect on 15 October 2026 and is scheduled to remain in place until 17 January 2027.
Both companies say the surcharge reflects higher shipping carrier costs during the busy Christmas and New Year period. Importantly, neither has increased the fee compared with the 2025 holiday season.
For UK dropshippers, the distinction is straightforward: orders delivered to UK customers are not subject to this particular surcharge, but orders sent to US customers are affected regardless of where the seller operates.
Why are Printful and Printify charging extra?
According to Printful’s official explanation, major US delivery companies, including DHL, FedEx and USPS, introduce temporary seasonal charges to manage increased parcel volumes and additional handling requirements.
Printify offers a similar justification, describing its charge as an adjustment linked to carrier-wide peak-season pricing rather than an increase in its own underlying shipping rates.
There is independent evidence of rising seasonal delivery costs. In an announcement dated 25 August 2026, USPS outlined temporary increases across several domestic parcel services, citing additional holiday handling costs.
However, carrier increases vary according to factors including service, parcel weight and destination. Neither Printful nor Printify has publicly provided a detailed calculation explaining how its flat $0.40 charge compares with its actual additional carrier costs.
Why does the surcharge apply only to US deliveries?
The companies have specifically introduced these temporary charges for orders with US delivery addresses, reflecting their stated focus on seasonal pricing changes among major US carriers.
The deciding factor is the delivery destination, not the seller’s country.
A British merchant selling a personalised T-shirt to a customer in California will face the surcharge. The same merchant selling to a customer in Manchester will not incur this particular fee.
This does not mean shipping prices outside America are unaffected by other changes. Both suppliers operate internationally, and their normal delivery rates and other charges may still vary.
Neither company’s surcharge guidance explains why a comparable temporary charge has not been introduced for other destinations.
How much will sellers pay?
Both platforms charge $0.40 per qualifying order, rather than per item or individual parcel.
This means an order containing several products, or requiring multiple shipments, still incurs one surcharge through the relevant platform.
The financial impact depends on sales volume:
| US orders | Additional cost |
|---|---|
| 100 | $40 |
| 500 | $200 |
| 1,000 | $400 |
| 5,000 | $2,000 |
These figures exclude any applicable taxes or other changes to fulfilment costs.
Printful confirms that US sales tax may apply to the surcharge in states where shipping is taxable. It also says ordinary shipping discounts and coupons do not reduce the fee, although qualifying sample orders with free shipping are exempt.
Printify states that fully cancelled orders receive a surcharge refund, while partially cancelled orders retain the charge.
How do Printful and Printify handle the surcharge differently?
Although both companies charge the same amount, the options for recovering that cost from customers are not identical.
Printful
Printful allows merchants using certain supported integrations to pass the surcharge into customer-facing shipping prices.
Eligible sellers can visit:
Dashboard → Settings → Store settings → Shipping → Temporary shipping surcharges
They can then enable the option to add surcharges to storefront shipping prices.
Supported arrangements include Shopify stores using Printful flat rates and certain live-rate integrations involving Shopify, WooCommerce, Ecwid and custom API stores. Shopify plan and carrier-calculated shipping requirements may apply.
Etsy sellers must instead configure an appropriate shipping profile. Printful warns that manually editing profiles generated by its system may not work permanently because future product updates can overwrite those changes.
Printify
According to Printify’s 2026 surcharge guidance, the additional charge appears in the shipping section of order details but is not automatically included in storefront selling prices.
Merchants wishing to recover the cost through product pricing are advised to update prices in Printify and republish the affected listings to synchronise changes with their sales channels.
There is one notable exception: Printify says orders using TikTok Shipping, which is managed separately by TikTok, are excluded from its surcharge.
Aren’t Printful and Printify owned by the same company?
Yes. Printful and Printify announced their merger on 5 November 2024, bringing the two major print-on-demand businesses together.
They now operate as separate brands within FYUL, which also includes Snow Commerce. The FYUL corporate website confirms the shared group structure.
While the platforms retain distinct products, integrations and customer experiences, they are no longer unrelated competitors operating under entirely separate corporate ownership.
Their matching holiday surcharges are therefore an interesting point of context. However, the identical amounts alone do not establish how the pricing decisions were made internally.
What should dropshippers do?
For most small retailers, an extra $0.40 on one order is unlikely to transform profitability. Across hundreds or thousands of Christmas orders, however, the cumulative impact becomes more relevant.
My advice: I suggest sellers using either service review their US order margins now, rather than assuming existing storefront shipping prices automatically reflect the additional charge.
Check a recent order to see how the fee appears, test your shipping settings and calculate the total cost against expected seasonal sales.
For stores offering free shipping, modest product-price adjustments may be worth considering, but I would avoid raising every product price automatically without examining margins and customer expectations first.
Sellers using both providers should check each platform independently, as their surcharge-handling arrangements differ.
The charges are scheduled to end on 17 January 2027. Merchants who temporarily increase their prices or shipping rates should review those adjustments afterwards to avoid unnecessarily retaining the additional amount.
The wider lesson is that print-on-demand fulfilment costs are not fixed throughout the year. Printify, for example, revised many catalogue prices and shipping rates on 27 August 2026, and the holiday surcharge now sits on top of those changes. Sellers should check their base costs as well as seasonal fees when reviewing margins.