Per-Character Pricing
Charges a fee for each character the customer types into a Text Input or Text Area. Used for engraving, monogramming, custom printing, or any text-based customization billed by length.
When to use
- Jewelry engraving charged per letter
- Custom embroidery charged per character
- Personalized printing where cost scales with text length
- Any text input where the price depends on how much the customer writes
Setup
- Open a Text Input or Text Area element → Pricing tab
- Enable Per-character pricing
- Enter the price per character (e.g.,
0.50for $0.50 per character) - Optionally set Free characters — the first N characters are not charged (e.g.,
5means characters 6 and beyond are billed) - Save
How it works on the storefront
As the customer types, the widget shows a running price breakdown beneath the input:
"Hello World" — 11 characters × $0.50 = $5.50The cart total updates in real time as the customer types. The total charge is calculated the moment the customer clicks Add to Cart, based on how many characters they’ve typed. BigCommerce records this final amount on the order.
Interaction with min/max length
Per-character pricing works alongside the min/max length settings on the text element:
- Max length — the maximum billable characters equals the max length setting
- Free characters — if set to 5 and max length is 20, the customer pays for 0–15 characters (up to 15 billed characters × rate)
Example pricing table
| Configuration | Customer types | Price added |
|---|---|---|
| $1.00/char, 0 free | ”ABC” (3 chars) | $3.00 |
| $1.00/char, 5 free | ”Hello!” (6 chars) | $1.00 (only char 6) |
| $0.50/char, 0 free | ”Happy Birthday” (14 chars) | $7.00 |
| $2.00/char, 3 free | ”Tom” (3 chars) | $0.00 (all free) |
Notes
- Spaces count as characters
- Per-character pricing cannot be combined with a flat price on the same element