Key points:
Popularity and Features: Shopify and WooCommerce are the two most popular e-commerce platforms, offering various features.
Ease of use: Shopify is a hosted platform that takes care of all the technical aspects, allowing for a quick and easy setup of your online store. WooCommerce, as a WordPress plugin, requires more active management, including hosting and maintenance.
Customization and Flexibility: WooCommerce offers maximum flexibility with a wide range of customizable themes and plugins, ideal for those looking for complete control over their site. Shopify, while customizable, is more limited in terms of design freedom.
Costs and Budget: WooCommerce is free but requires the purchase of hosting and possibly paid themes or plugins. Shopify, although it is a paid service with a monthly subscription, includes all the services necessary to manage your online store.
Customer Support: Shopify offers high-quality 24/7 customer support, which is a major plus for users who need quick assistance. WooCommerce, on the other hand, mainly offers documentation and community forums for support.
SEO: WooCommerce benefits from WordPress’ powerful SEO tools, providing better optimization opportunities. Shopify offers basic SEO features and integration with some external tools, but may be limited in terms of access to core files.
E-commerce has grown in recent years and many businesses are considering selling their products online to reach new customers or offer more personalized services.
However, choosing the right e-commerce manager is not always easy .
In addition, webmasters often ask themselves the following question: Woocommerce vs Shopify: which one is best for my online store? If you want to create a store on the Internet, you must first choose the e-commerce platform to use to create it.
In this article, we compare two of the most common e-commerce platforms that currently exist on the market and are compatible with WordPress.
The eternal question: WooCommerce vs Shopify
Shopify and WooCommerce are the most popular platforms for building online stores. A quick glance at Google Trends will show that they are two of the most popular eCommerce products on the market.
Using them, you can upload your products to the Internet to sell them, manage payments, control orders and start a dropshipping e-commerce.
There is, however, a fundamental difference between these two products. While Shopify is an online store platform , WooCommerce is a WordPress plugin .
So you’ll need other tools to set up your business. Below, we look at their pros and cons.
Setting up a store with WooCommerce
First of all, and from a technical point of view, it is worth remembering that WooCommerce is one of the e-commerce plugins designed for WordPress.
This means that to build a virtual store with WooCommerce, you will need to install this plugin on a website previously created with WordPress. This one is free and open source , and you must host it on your own server.
Then you need to configure it and monitor for updates.
Setting up a store with Shopify
Shopify is an ecommerce platform hosted on its own hosting and accessible through a monthly subscription, although you can start with Shopify Basic to see if it’s right for you.
To create your Shopify store , you need to subscribe to the plan that suits you best, choose a template and upload your product catalog .
The platform itself takes care of:
- Accommodation,
- Security,
- Updates,
- Caching,
- Other technical questions.
All you have to do is upload your products and blog content (if you create one) and focus on marketing and selling.
WooCommerce vs Shopify: Pros and Cons of Each Platform
WooCommerce
This platform gives you complete control over your online store. Its themes and plugins are endless and you can customize them as you wish.
On the other hand, since it is free software , it has a large online community to answer questions about features.
As for the disadvantages of WooCommerce, the most important one is that, as a user, you will have to manage everything:
- Accommodation,
- Security,
- Maintenance,
- Backups,
- Etc.
Additionally, you will need to have your own website, web server and domain.
Shopify
The main benefits of launching a virtual store with Shopify are the dedicated e-commerce platform and access to thousands of apps and designs.
With Shopify, you know exactly how much you’ll pay each month. This fee includes the use of the platform as well as the maintenance and security of your online store.
Another advantage of Shopify vs WooCommerce is the store customization that takes just a few minutes.
As for the disadvantages, we should note in particular the lack of control of the website.
In addition, you will pay a fixed monthly expense. And this, regardless of the profits generated by your web store.
WooCommerce vs Shopify: The Main Differences
After analyzing their pros and cons, let’s tackle some practical questions to help you make your own comparison between WooCommerce and Shopify.
Design and usability
When building an online store, you need to consider the design, visual quality , and usability of your e-commerce platform.
Shopify stores have free and paid templates . They are organized by industry and item catalog size. But again, you don’t need any programming knowledge to customize them. You just need to choose their features.
When it comes to WooCommerce, it has its own area for purchasing themes. However, you have to buy the templates you like and install them yourself. This requires some programming skills .
However, the amount of themes available for WooCommerce is huge, which is very interesting.
Finally, there is another important difference between Shopify and WooCommerce. This is because Shopify templates do not require updates, while WooCommerce themes have regular updates that will need to be managed.
Price
One of the first questions that arise when comparing WooCommerce vs Shopify is price.
WooCommerce is priced at zero, as this WordPress plugin is free to download and use. However, if you don’t have a WordPress website, you are required to hire a hosting service and design a site.
On the other hand, you may have to pay for some themes or hire professionals or even programmers to do updates, etc.
Shopify is a paid service that will charge you upfront. But, it offers tailored plans, so you can choose the option that works best for you.
Choosing WooCommerce or Shopify based on price depends on each project: the first is free, but requires the purchase of a hosting plan . As for the second, although it seems more expensive, it has everything you need to create a functional online store from scratch.
You can hire one of our WooCommerce or Shopify development agencies to help you.
Payment method
WooCommerce uses PayPal by default. That said, you can add extensions from other gateways, both free (Stripe, Amazon, and Square) and paid (FirstData). The problem with these platforms is that they act like extensions and can slow down websites.
Shopify, on the other hand, has its own payment gateway (Shopify Payments), third-party extensions (Amazon Pay, PayPal, and Apple Pay), and even for cryptocurrencies (Bitpay, GoCoin, CoinPayments, and Coinbase Commerce). It’s worth noting that third-party platforms will charge you a small fee per transaction.
In this sense, Shopify offers some advantages over WooCommerce by integrating its own payment platform . In any case, card payment on your site can be done with both options.
Features
This is the most important aspect of WooCommerce vs Shopify comparison.
Shopify includes:
- A centralized admin panel : You can create order forms, accept payments, and monitor the performance of your online store from a single, intuitive screen.
- Direct access to sales channels such as Instagram, Facebook Shop, Amazon and eBay.
WooCommerce stands out for its greater flexibility, with extensions that offer comprehensive features , including automatic tax calculation and enhanced security options.
In short, both platforms come with great features to grow your online business. Choosing one over the other is a matter of preference.
Concretely, if you want more customizations , WooCommerce seems more interesting.
On the other hand, if you are looking for a platform with standard , intuitive and more accessible features, Shopify is the solution.
Customer service
At this level, the WooCommerce vs Shopify comparison has a clear winner. Indeed, Shopify’s customer service is one of the highest rated , with free 24/7 support via chat, email, phone, or Twitter.
WooCommerce, while providing users with documentation, tutorials, and self-study guides, offers only limited support through tickets and an open forum. So, if issues arise, it sometimes takes longer to resolve them.
SEO Options
SEO is important in any online project, and WooCommerce brings more interesting options than Shopify. The most relevant? Its integrated WordPress optimization tools (SEMrush, Google Keyword Planner and Yoast ) .
On the other hand, Shopify provides basic SEO features, although the software is compatible with external tools such as Keywords Everywhere, Ubersuggest, and Screaming Frog. However, SEO optimization with Shopify is limited for another reason: the platform restricts access to your core files. If you want to push your SEO on Shopify, you can also hire a Shopify SEO agency . They will likely have more advanced skills to increase organic traffic to your Shopify site.
In any case, installing additional SEO plugins that help you fix your company’s web positioning is not always the solution.
If you really want to improve your ranking, it seems more sensible to use specialized SEO services. Only in this way can you take full advantage of the benefits of SEO.
Security
The security differences between WooCommerce and Shopify are defined by the features of each system.
Shopify holds an international PCI DSS Level 1 certificate that prevents credit card fraud and ensures secure digital transactions . WooCommerce cannot have this certificate because it is not a real platform, but a plugin.
It is also true that you can integrate all WordPress security plugins into WooCommerce. Despite this, the WooCommerce vs Shopify comparison, in this case, favors the latter.
Ease of use and speed of setting up your website
Today, setting up a web store seems very simple with Shopify. You simply have to choose a price and a configuration so that the platform itself takes care of the technical work necessary to launch your virtual store.
This includes:
- Adding your domain name ,
- Web hosting,
- The SSL (Secure Sockets Layer) certificate,
- The payment platform.
In fact, if you use Shopify’s payment gateway, you can start accepting credit card payments from day one.
WooCommerce takes a bit longer to set up , especially since the customization options are virtually endless. Also, it takes time to add and configure the plugin. If you don’t have a website and domain, you have to purchase it. Which increases the time it takes to open your website.
If you opt for WooCommerce, it is also certain that you would have a setup wizard that helps you add a payment gateway, choose the currency, and select the shipping method, among other things. This will make it easier to launch your online store.
Other alternatives for e-commerce
Although Shopify and WooCommerce are the most popular options, you have other alternatives to design your virtual store.
Here is a list that will help you choose the solution that interests you the most:
- Magento ,
- BigCommerce,
- Zen Cart,
- Square Online,
- PrestaShop ,
- CoreCommerce,
- Sellfy,
- Paper form,
- Simvoly,
- OpenCart.
WooCommerce vs Shopify: The Verdict
With all of the above, who comes out on top in the WooCommerce vs Shopify comparison? Generally speaking, Shopify has some advantages over WooCommerce. These include its ease of use , security , and payment methods .
At WooCommerce we highlight its flexibility , its customization options that it offers to users and the possibility of integrating WordPress SEO plugins to improve the positioning of your business on the Internet.
On the other hand, Shopify is a solution that offers 24/7 support. What’s more, security aspects (including SSL certificate management) are more carefully taken care of.
Our recommendation as experts? An e-commerce agency that can help you analyze the real needs of your online store and choose the option that suits you.
