* September 2007 Jupiter Research study of payment preferences online.
*Available to Free and Premium accounts
Using their standard method of integration the cart simply saves the order and then directs the customer to the PayPal website to pay for the entire cart contents as a single item. The order still remains listed in Admin even if the customer abandons the transaction when they get to PayPal.
There are some limitations when using the standard method of integration. In particular they only accept a very short description of the goods that are being purchased via their Web Accept system. Although the cart tries to push it's contents into that description it may be cut off. You also need to setup either the IPN or Auto-return if you want the cart to send you an email when the customer pays.
*Available to Free and Premium accounts
Express checkout is similar to the standard method of integrationonly but with much tighter integration with the cart. The customer is passed over to PayPal to sign-in but is then returned to the cart to complete their final checkout phase.
Express checkout is the best solution if you sell goods which are delivered by being downloaded from the internet. It is also an excellent choice if PayPal is your only payment method.
*Premium accounts only
PayPal Website Payments Pro is an all-in-one solution that allows you to accept credit cards and PayPal. Buyers can enter their credit card numbers directly in the cart with an unbranded card payment option. It is there for people who choose not to pay by PayPal!
It is part of your agreement with PayPal that if you use Payments Pro you also use Express checkout.
At the moment Payment Pro is available to US, Canadian and UK (British) based PayPal account holders only.