WooCommerce Store Settings: Currency, Checkout, Accounts, Emails, and Advanced Options

WooCommerce settings are the “control panel” for how your store behaves: where you sell, what currency you charge in, how checkout works, what customers can do with accounts, what emails get sent, and which technical endpoints (REST API/webhooks) integrate with other systems. A practical way to configure settings is to go in this order: General → Products → Tax → Shipping → Payments → Accounts & Privacy → Emails → Advanced. This sequence reduces rework because later panels depend on earlier choices (currency, tax basis, shipping zones, and checkout behavior).

1) General: store address, currency, and selling locations

The General panel defines your store’s “home base” and commercial scope. These choices affect taxes, shipping, payment availability, and how totals display.

Step-by-step: set store location and currency

• Go to WooCommerce → Settings → General.
• Store address: enter your legal/operational address (street, city, postcode, country/state). This is used for tax calculations (depending on your tax setup) and may appear on invoices/receipts depending on your theme/plugins.
• Selling location(s): choose where you sell to (e.g., “Sell to all countries” or “Sell to specific countries”).
• Shipping location(s): often matches selling locations, but you can restrict shipping more tightly (e.g., sell digital products globally but ship physical products only domestically).
• Default customer location: recommended beginner default is Geolocate (or Geolocate (with page caching support) if you use caching). Tradeoff: geolocation improves tax/shipping estimates early, but can be inaccurate for VPN users; if you sell in one region only, “Shop base address” is simpler and more predictable.
• Currency options: set your store currency, position (left/right), thousand separator, decimal separator, and number of decimals.

Recommended defaults for beginners

• Currency: set to your primary settlement currency (the one your payment processor deposits to). Avoid switching later—historical orders keep their currency, but reporting and customer expectations get messy.
• Selling locations: start with your primary market(s) only; expand later once shipping/tax/payment rules are proven.
• Default customer location: “Geolocate (with page caching support)” if you have caching; otherwise “Geolocate” or “Shop base address” for a single-country store.

2) Products: measurement units, reviews, and inventory defaults

The Products settings define how items are measured, how customers can review products, and the default behavior for stock management.

Step-by-step: configure product basics

• Go to WooCommerce → Settings → Products.
• Shop page: confirm the correct shop page is selected (usually created automatically). If it’s wrong, product archives and navigation can break.
• Measurements: set Weight unit (kg/lb) and Dimensions unit (cm/in). These matter for shipping calculations and label integrations.
• Reviews: enable reviews if social proof matters for your catalog; consider requiring verified owners if you want to reduce spam and increase trust.

Inventory defaults (and why they matter)

• Go to the Inventory sub-tab (within Products settings).
• Manage stock: recommended to enable for physical goods. Tradeoff: adds admin work (keeping stock accurate) but prevents overselling.
• Hold stock (minutes): beginner-friendly default is 60. This reserves stock for unpaid orders for a limited time. Tradeoff: too high can block real buyers; too low can frustrate customers during payment.
• Notifications: enable low stock and out-of-stock notifications; set thresholds that match your replenishment speed.
• Out of stock visibility: hiding out-of-stock items can reduce frustration, but can also hide demand signals; showing them can help SEO and allow backorder messaging (if you use backorders).

3) Tax: enable taxes and choose the calculation basis

Taxes in WooCommerce are rule-based: you enable tax calculations, define tax rates, and decide whether taxes are calculated based on your store address, the customer’s shipping address, or billing address.

Step-by-step: enable taxes

• Go to WooCommerce → Settings → General and check Enable tax rates and calculations.
• Then go to WooCommerce → Settings → Tax.

Key settings and recommended beginner choices

• Prices entered with tax: choose based on how you advertise prices. If your market expects tax-inclusive pricing (common in many regions), set this to “Yes.” If you advertise tax-exclusive pricing (common in some B2B contexts), set “No.”
• Calculate tax based on: common default is Customer shipping address for physical goods. Tradeoff: if customers ship to a different region than their billing address, shipping address is usually the correct tax jurisdiction; for services/digital goods, rules vary by region.
• Shipping tax class: “Based on cart items” is a safe default when your products have different tax classes.
• Rounding: “Round tax at subtotal level” can reduce line-item rounding oddities; however, some accounting practices prefer per-line rounding. Pick one and keep it consistent.
• Additional tax classes: add only if you truly need reduced/zero rates for certain categories.

Practical workflow: create tax rates

1. In Tax → Standard rates, add rows for your jurisdictions (country/state/postcode/city as needed).
2. Use a clear naming convention in the Tax name column (e.g., “VAT”, “State Tax”, “GST”).
3. Test with a sample address in your target region to confirm totals match expectations.

Tip: If you sell to multiple regions with complex rules, consider using a dedicated tax automation service/plugin rather than manually maintaining rates.

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4) Shipping: zones and methods

Shipping is configured by zones (where you ship) and methods (how you charge). The same customer can see different shipping options depending on their address.

Step-by-step: set up shipping zones

• Go to WooCommerce → Settings → Shipping.
• Click Add shipping zone.
• Name the zone (e.g., “Domestic”, “EU”, “Local Pickup Area”).
• Select Zone regions (countries, states, or postcodes).
• Add Shipping methods for that zone (e.g., Flat rate, Free shipping, Local pickup).

Recommended beginner setup

• Zone 1: Primary market with Flat rate (simple, predictable) and optionally Free shipping above a threshold.
• Zone 2: Everywhere else you ship with a higher flat rate or disable shipping if you’re not ready.
• Local pickup only if you can operationally support it (clear pickup instructions, hours, and fulfillment workflow).

Tradeoffs: flat rate vs free shipping vs real-time rates

• Flat rate: easiest to maintain; risk is undercharging (you absorb cost) or overcharging (cart abandonment).
• Free shipping threshold: can increase average order value; risk is margin erosion if threshold is too low.
• Real-time carrier rates: accurate; requires more setup and can introduce checkout delays or rate surprises.

5) Payments: enable gateways and align with checkout behavior

Payment settings determine which methods customers can use and how orders move through statuses (pending payment, processing, completed). Payment availability can depend on currency and customer location.

Step-by-step: configure payments

• Go to WooCommerce → Settings → Payments.
• Enable the gateways you want (e.g., card payments, bank transfer, cash on delivery) and drag to reorder.
• Open each gateway’s Manage screen and set required fields (merchant IDs, API keys, webhook endpoints if required by the provider).

Recommended beginner defaults

• Enable one primary card wallet/processor plus one fallback (e.g., bank transfer) if it fits your business.
• Disable methods you can’t operationally support (e.g., cash on delivery without a delivery process).
• Make sure your gateway supports your currency and selling locations chosen in General settings.

6) Accounts & Privacy: checkout behavior, guest checkout, and customer account flow

This panel controls whether customers can buy as guests, when accounts are created, password rules, and privacy-related pages and retention. These choices directly affect conversion rate and support workload.

Structured approach: decide your account strategy first

Step-by-step: configure account and checkout options

• Go to WooCommerce → Settings → Accounts & Privacy.
• Guest checkout: for beginners, a common default is Allow customers to place orders without an account enabled.
• Account creation: enable Allow customers to create an account during checkout and optionally on “My account” page.
• Account username: “Automatically generate username from customer email” reduces friction and avoids confusing username rules.
• Password creation: letting customers set their own password during checkout can reduce “lost password” tickets, but adds a step. Auto-generating passwords reduces checkout fields but relies on email deliverability.

Password strength and friction tradeoffs

• Stronger password requirements improve security but can reduce conversion if customers struggle with rules.
• A practical compromise: keep password rules reasonable, enable rate-limiting/security plugins, and encourage password managers rather than making checkout harder.

Checkout field friction: what to optimize (without breaking compliance)

• Remove only fields you truly don’t need. For physical shipping, you typically need name, address, email, and sometimes phone for carrier delivery issues.
• For digital-only products, you can often simplify to name + email + billing address (depending on tax rules).
• Test changes by placing orders yourself to ensure payment gateways and tax calculations still work.

Privacy pages and retention (practical basics)

• Set your Privacy policy page and Terms and conditions page if required in your region.
• Review personal data retention settings with your legal requirements in mind (e.g., accounting retention vs privacy deletion requests).

7) Emails: sender identity, templates, and deliverability basics

WooCommerce transactional emails (order confirmations, processing/completed orders, refunds, new order notifications) are critical for customer trust and internal operations. Most “email problems” are deliverability problems, not WooCommerce problems.

Step-by-step: set sender name/address and core templates

• Go to WooCommerce → Settings → Emails.
• Click Email sender options (or similar section depending on version).
• Set “From” name to your store/brand name (consistent with your site header).
• Set “From” address to an address on your domain (e.g., orders@yourdomain.com). Avoid free mailbox domains for transactional sending if possible.
• Open Email template settings and set header image (optional), footer text, and color scheme to match your brand.

Enable/disable and customize specific emails

• From WooCommerce → Settings → Emails, click each email type (e.g., “New order”, “Cancelled order”, “Customer processing order”).
• Confirm which are enabled and who receives them (admin vs customer).
• Adjust subject lines carefully; keep them clear and recognizable (avoid spammy wording).

Deliverability basics (what to do before blaming WooCommerce)

• Use SMTP or a transactional email service: many hosts block or throttle PHP mail. Configure an SMTP plugin or provider integration so emails reliably send.
• Authenticate your domain: set up SPF and DKIM (and ideally DMARC) in DNS for your sending domain. This reduces spam folder placement.
• Match “From” address to the authenticated domain: sending as orders@yourdomain.com while authenticating yourdomain.com is consistent.
• Test inbox placement: check Gmail/Outlook and a few mobile clients; verify links and formatting.

8) Advanced: page assignments, REST API, and webhooks basics

The Advanced panel ties WooCommerce to WordPress pages (cart/checkout/account), and exposes integration tools like the REST API and webhooks. Beginners should confirm page assignments and understand the basics of integrations—even if you don’t use them yet.

Step-by-step: confirm WooCommerce pages

• Go to WooCommerce → Settings → Advanced.
• Under Page setup, confirm assignments for Cart, Checkout, My account, and Terms and conditions.
• If you changed themes or imported demo content, re-check these—broken page assignments commonly cause checkout loops or missing cart pages.

REST API (what it is and when it matters)

The WooCommerce REST API allows external systems (ERP, fulfillment, mobile apps) to read and write store data (orders, products, customers). If you don’t need integrations yet, you can leave it alone—but you should know where keys are managed.

• Go to WooCommerce → Settings → Advanced → REST API.
• API keys are tied to WordPress users and have permissions (read, write, read/write).
• Beginner safety rule: create a dedicated user for integrations with the minimum required permissions, and never reuse admin credentials.

Webhooks basics (event notifications)

Webhooks send an HTTP request to a URL when an event happens (e.g., order created, order updated). They’re useful for notifying external systems in real time.

• Go to WooCommerce → Settings → Advanced → Webhooks.
• Create a webhook by choosing: Topic (event), Delivery URL (endpoint), and Secret (signing).
• Beginner safety rule: only send webhooks to HTTPS endpoints you control, and keep secrets private.

9) Testing: run end-to-end orders safely (staging or test environment)

Before taking real orders, you should validate the full journey: product → cart → checkout → payment → confirmation email → admin notification → order status → fulfillment flow. Doing this in a staging or test environment prevents accidental customer emails and real charges.

Recommended testing setup

• Use a staging site (preferred): a copy of your store on a separate URL protected from search engines and customers.
• Use test payment modes: most gateways provide sandbox/test credentials and test card numbers.
• Use a test email inbox: use real inboxes you control to verify deliverability and formatting.
• Disable indexing on staging: in WordPress settings, discourage search engines; also consider basic auth.

Step-by-step: end-to-end test checklist

1. Create a low-priced test product (physical and/or digital depending on your store).
2. Place an order as a guest (if enabled) and as a logged-in customer to compare flows.
3. Test shipping calculations by using addresses in each shipping zone.
4. Test tax calculations by using addresses that should produce different tax outcomes (if applicable).
5. Complete payment using the gateway’s test mode (or a manual method like bank transfer for workflow testing).
6. Verify emails: customer order confirmation/processing, admin new order notification, and any account creation email.
7. In wp-admin, verify order status changes and that stock reduces (if stock management is enabled).
8. Test refunds (if your gateway supports test refunds) and confirm refund emails and order notes.

Common issues found during testing (and where to fix them)

• Wrong currency/format: General → Currency options.
• Taxes missing or incorrect: Tax → enable taxes, calculation basis, rates.
• No shipping methods shown: Shipping → zones don’t match the test address, or no methods added.
• Payment method not appearing: Payments → gateway disabled, currency/location mismatch, or gateway configuration incomplete.
• Emails not received: Emails → sender settings; deliverability → SMTP/authentication; check spam folder and host mail restrictions.
• Checkout too slow or confusing: Accounts & Privacy → guest checkout/account creation; review checkout fields and required steps.