Knowledgebase
How to set up test business and personal accounts in PayPal
If you want to make test payments via PayPal to make sure that you store functions properly with PayPal, you can do this with the help of PayPal Sandbox. With PayPal Sandbox you can create test business and personal accounts (also referred to as seller and buyer accounts).
To do this first, you need to create a PayPal account, then log into the developer PayPal site and from there create the sandbox business and personal accounts. In this article we'll briefly go over all this. For screenshots and some more details check out the tutorial on how to create PayPal Sandbox accounts.
Create a PayPal Account
If you don't have a PayPal account, first you need to create one.
When you create a PayPal account you can log in with the same credentials in both the "live" site and the developer site. Since test accounts are created from the developer PayPal site and in order not to get confused you can create the account from developer.paypal.com. After you go to the site click on the Sign up button and fill out the registration form. PayPal will send you an email to the email address that you provided during the registration. Open the email message and click on the confirmation link there.
Add Test Business Accounts
After you create a developer account this automatically creates one test business account. If you want to, you can create more. To do this, after you go to developer.paypal.com and you log into your account, click on the Applications button, on the page that opens click on Sandbox accounts and then on Create Account. On the form that opens make sure that the radio button Business is marked. Configure the rest of the options and click on Create Account.
Add Test Personal Accounts
This is done in almost the same way as adding test business accounts. Go to the developer PayPal site, log into your account, then go to Applications>Sandbox accounts, click on the button Create Account, and on the form that opens make sure that the radio button Personal is marked. Configure the other options and save the changes. There's an option PayPal balance; make sure that you put some money so that you can use it to make test payments. It's not real money; it's used only for testing.
Edit and Delete Test Accounts
To view the details, edit and delete test business and personal accounts, go to developer.paypal.com, log into your account, click on the Applications button in the top navigation bar and on the page that opens click on Sandbox accounts. This will display a table with the existing accounts. To view the details of an account, to change its password and/or edit some of its options, click on the small arrow that's in front of the account's email address and then click on the Profile button that appears. A window will pop out. It has several tabs with which you can view the account's details. When you test PayPal payments with your store you'll need the API credentials of your test business account. One of the tabs of the pop-out window with the account details of a business account is labeled exactly API credentials. Click on it to view the credentials for the account.
To delete one or more test accounts, after you log into your developer account and you go to Applications>Sandbox accounts, mark the checkbox of each account that you want to delete and click on the Delete button.
For screenshots and some more details read the tutorial on how to create PayPal Sandbox accounts.