Coinbase is the largest cryptocurrency exchange in the United States and the second-largest globally. As cryptocurrency becomes more widely accepted, small business merchants may wish to experiment with accepting cryptocurrency as payment for products and services. This is often done in a bid to support technology, minimize costs, or receive international payments quickly.
If your company wishes to include cryptocurrency payments into its operations, Coinbase Commerce can be a good starting point. However, before making an informed decision about adopting the service, it is vital to learn more about it.
To help you through the process, here is a quick review of Coinbase Commerce as well as its operations, costs, and features.
What Does Coinbase Commerce Do?
Coinbase Commerce aims to make digital currency transactions for businesses more accessible. This software enables businesses to accept cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin (BTC), Ethereum (ETH), and Litecoin (LTC), among others.
Customers of Coinbase Commerce can open merchant accounts, streamline their cryptocurrency checkout experience, and integrate their account information on their platform. In addition, it enables the merchant to receive these payments directly in their account and gives them the ability to withdraw easily.
This makes it easier for service providers, online merchants, and organizations to accept cryptocurrency payments without having to create personal cryptocurrency accounts and manually list their account information on websites or applications.
Features of Coinbase Commerce
Coinbase Commerce is a lean service that prefers to leave a lot of fundamental commerce and even crypto-related functions to other apps. Let’s dig deeper into Coinbase Commerce’s features:
Crypto Payments
Coinbase Commerce’s primary function is to enable businesses to accept cryptocurrency payments. It does this by providing private wallets to facilitate your transactions. Plus, the account is available in two varieties: self-managed or Coinbase managed.
You will have complete control over your private keys and be accountable for any conversions you wish to perform with a self-managed account. Furthermore, Coinbase allows self-managed accounts to manually process payments in fiat (dollars, pounds, euros, and so on) with a free conversion.
Coinbase will handle your settlements automatically for a managed account but will retain ownership of your private keys until you transfer the cryptocurrency to your own personal wallet. If you deal in fiat, the cryptocurrency will not pass through your hands at all. It should be noted that Coinbase-managed accounts do not support as many cryptocurrencies as self-managed accounts.
Checkouts
Coinbase Commerce enables you to design and price checkout products. You have the option of requesting information from the buyer as well. When you’re done creating the item, Coinbase Commerce will provide a link and some HTML that you can integrate into your website. Customers who click on the item will be directed to the checkout page.
API Integrations
Using a payments API, Coinbase Commerce allows you to build custom checkouts for your website. Coinbase Commerce has Ruby, Python, Node.js, and PHP libraries available.
However, you don’t have to be a programmer to set up Coinbase Commerce. In addition, the service provides embedded buttons as well as hosted checkout support that may be easily copied and pasted into your website.
Point of Sale (POS)
Coinbase Commerce provides limited POS support via what is essentially a virtual terminal. Coinbase Commerce gives a link and a code that may be used to launch the virtual terminal on any device that can run an internet browser.
You can then choose a product or service you’ve created and complete the transaction.
After that, select the currency in which the customer intends to pay. Coinbase Commerce will then generate a QR code, which your customer can scan with their crypto wallet to send you payment.
Invoicing
You can quickly create timely invoices for your customers when you use the Invoicing feature on Coinbase Commerce. The process is easily handled via the Coinbase Commerce user interface.
Your customers can then use your Coinbase Commerce payment process to pay the specified amount. This provides a more professional and reputable method of receiving one-time and regular payments.
eCommerce Integrations
Coinbase Commerce supports quick integrations with over 12 popular eCommerce platforms, allowing you to set up your payment services swiftly.
Coinbase Commerce makes it easy to communicate payment details to your customers using payment buttons and checkout process flow. These integrations have modern design and functionality to provide the best possible user experience.
This significantly reduces your setup costs as well as time, giving you the flexibility and ease to accept cryptocurrency payments through a trusted platform.
Payment Thresholds
Since the crypto market is volatile, price fluctuations are all too usual. Unless you use a stable coin whose value is linked to fiat currency, you may expect these changes to be visible across all cryptocurrencies.
However, Coinbase commerce can play an important role in managing this volatility. You can specify cost restrictions above and below your list price by setting flexible payment thresholds.
This feature allows your customers to modify their anticipated payment based on current market conditions while staying within your minimal costs. This will enable you to accept more sales without incurring a loss.
Costs of Using Coinbase Commerce
Coinbase Commerce does not charge any fees for its services. This means anyone can open an account for free. However, you must still pay network fees when withdrawing to another cryptocurrency wallet. These fees vary by situation, with the money going straight to the relevant cryptocurrency network.
If you have a different Coinbase account in the exchange, such as Coinbase Pro, and want to deposit funds from your merchant account there in fiat currency, the system charges a 1% conversion fee.
As a result, Coinbase Commerce provides a cost-effective way to incorporate cryptocurrency payments into your operation. However, if you wish to continue using the service for continuous payments, you must consider the price of network fees as well as possible conversion fees.
Final Thoughts
If you’ve been putting off adopting cryptocurrencies because you’re worried about how complicated the process will be, Coinbase Commerce will put your fears to bed.
Adopting the solution gets more manageable if you already have a Coinbase exchange account. However, before adopting Coinbase Commerce, you should carefully consider all of your requirements as well as any relevant factors.
