Can I sell supplements on Stripe, Shopify Payments or PayPal?
Supplements are the one category here where the governing clause is explicit, and it does not turn on what you sell. Stripe prohibits nutraceuticals that are unsafe or that make harmful claims, so an ordinary vitamin brand passes and the same brand with disease language on the product page does not.
Also searched as: nutraceuticals, vitamins, sports nutrition, protein.
Stripe
RestrictedNamed, and allowed only on stated conditions or in certain countries.
“Pseudo-pharmaceuticals or nutraceuticals that are not safe or make harmful claims”
Named directly, and conditional on two things you control. Most supplement declines are not about the supplement. They are about copy promising to treat, cure or prevent something, which converts a permitted product into a prohibited one on the strength of a sentence.
Source: Stripe: Prohibited and restricted businesses. The policy states it was last updated 13 May 2026. We last read it on 27 August 2026. Check it yourself before you act on this: these lists change, and ours is a reading of theirs, not a substitute for it.
PayPal
Not namedAbsent from the policy entirely. This is not permission: it hands the decision to an underwriter, usually after you have money on the platform.
“narcotics, steroids, certain controlled substances or other products that present a risk to consumer safety”
Not named as a category. PayPal's exposure here is driven by chargebacks rather than compliance: subscription supplement businesses generate disputes, and disputes are what bring the account under review.
Source: PayPal: Acceptable Use Policy. The policy states it was last updated 29 October 2022. We last read it on 27 August 2026. Check it yourself before you act on this: these lists change, and ours is a reading of theirs, not a substitute for it.
Shopify Payments
RestrictedNamed, and allowed only on stated conditions or in certain countries.
No policy of its own
Inherits Stripe's conditional permission, on the same two conditions.
Source: Shopify: Payment processor list. The document publishes no last-updated date. We last read it on 27 August 2026. Check it yourself before you act on this: these lists change, and ours is a reading of theirs, not a substitute for it.
What actually happens
For a clean brand, nothing happens and the account runs for years. For a brand running free-trial-to-subscription offers, the chargeback ratio arrives at the card network monitoring thresholds and the processor acts before the network does. The compliance risk and the dispute risk are separate problems and they end the same way.
What works instead
Most supplement merchants do not need a specialist acquirer, they need their product pages rewritten and their subscription terms made explicit at checkout. That is a cheaper fix than a high-risk merchant account and it addresses the thing that actually terminates these accounts.
Want the version that accounts for your actual store?
This page is about supplements as a category. Approval turns on your specific catalogue, your claims and your paperwork, and we will tell you where you stand whether or not it leads to work for us.
Both are free and neither is a sales call. The check asks for your web address and nothing else; the call is thirty minutes and ends with an answer whether or not it leads to work for us. Ready to start instead? Tell us what you sell.