> ## Documentation Index
> Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://help.the-meridian.ai/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.

# Introduction

Public apps need a way to monetize, and Shopify offers several approaches depending on your strategy. The Plan Builder is Meridian's: define your pricing once, and let the SDK handle everything a merchant sees and everything Shopify needs.

## Recurring charges

Define plans, include features in each, and let the merchant choose. Bill monthly or yearly, regardless of how much they use the app.

## Usage-based charges

Bill on events instead of, or alongside, a recurring charge. Define events, track them, and invoice the merchant continuously based on usage.

## How does Shopify handle it?

| Approach | What you get | What's missing |
| - | - | - |
| **Managed pricing** | Manage monetization through Shopify's interface, easy to drop in | No feature gating, no account page, no automations around it |
| **Billing SDK** | React Router is Shopify's base template; if you use it, an SDK is already there to talk to the billing API | Easier than the raw API, but the surrounding capabilities are still yours to build |
| **Billing API** | Everything is possible | Everything takes time |

## What the Plan Builder is

One place to define your monetization, and one integration to expose it:

* **[Plans](/create-a-plan)**: the tiers you sell, with a monthly price, an optional [annual price](/billing-interval), and an optional [free trial](/free-trial).
* **[Features](/introduction-13)**: what each plan includes, boolean or a numeric limit, gated at runtime by key.
* **[Events](/introduction-6)**: what you meter. The catalog is app-level (under **Usage**) and shared; a plan adds the terms: included quantity, overage rate, cap.
* **[Discounts](/discounts)**: percentage or fixed-amount, code-based or automatic.

Your app renders the [pricing page](/plans) and [account page](/account) from that definition through the [SDK](/authentification), and Meridian does the Shopify Billing handshake, so you write almost no billing code, and none of the recurring-charge or usage-charge API calls.

## The path through it

1. Define your [features](/introduction-13), and your [events](/introduction-6) under **Usage** if you want to bill on usage.
2. [Create a plan](/create-a-plan) that includes them, as a draft.
3. [Publish it to Shopify](/publishing-plans) by activating it. This is the step with prerequisites.
4. Gate your app on the feature keys, and report usage on the event keys, through the SDK.

<Note>
  A plan is a draft until you activate it, and only active plans reach merchants. See [Visibility](/merchant-subscription).
</Note>


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