Shopify Vs. WooCommerce For E-Commerce in 2023

You might have heard about 2 e-commerce giants: Shopify vs WooCommerce. Shopify claims it powers over 8 lakh online stores, while WooCommerce says that it’s considered a popular e-commerce platform. Who is right or wrong?   

So, let’s dive into the blog to help you distinguish between Shopify Vs WooCommerce. Stay tuned with us to know who wins the battle – Shopify or WooCommerce in 2023.   

Popular Products As Service (PAAS)   

In the past few years, products were sold in one-time transactions, but PAAS is a business model wherein products and services are sold to the customer in a subscription. It’s more like a subscription model where businesses pay for their needed services.  

Moreover, customers need not worry about making a large investment to avail of services, and the businesses can sell their products and continue to generate recurring revenue streams.   

For example – Shopify, Magneto, Presta Shop, and WooCommerce are popular examples of PAAS-based business models as they offer subscription-based pricing plans to businesses.  

In addition, An e-commerce platform would manage the subscription process, handle billing and payments and manage inventory and shipping.   

Some popular PAAS for e-commerce are –  

1. Shopify   

Shopify is an e-commerce platform that is highly suited for small and medium businesses. Shopify allows you to create a fully functional online store using drag-and-drop functionalities.   

It is a cloud-based platform having more than 60 themes that could be free and paid for. It allows customers to do seamless product launches and keep their store up front during high-traffic days.   

Additionally, this e-commerce platform has an extensive customization feature that allows you to customize the color, image, fonts, and layout using its inbuilt image editor.   

It allows businesses to set up and manage their online store and do the following things for them: website design templates, inventory management, payment processing, shipping, and delivery management. Businesses pay a monthly subscription fee to Shopify.   

Shopify allows you to sell directly on websites, social media, and third-party marketplaces.  

It allows business owners to make their online store fully functional in just 15 minutes. The basic plan of Shopify starts at $29/month, and the advanced plan goes up to $299/month.  

Hence, Shopify proves to be a profitable option for anyone looking to create an online store without coding expertise. Not only that, but it also provides a 3-day free trial to use their services to know if they can suit your business needs.   

2. WooCommerce   

WordPress provides an e-commerce plugin that is called WooCommerce. WooCommerce allows business owners to turn their WordPress websites into e-commerce stores.  

 Additionally, It provides business owners with various features and customization options, including selling physical and digital goods, managing inventory, processing payments, and tracking sales.   

Besides that, WooCommerce is highly suited for those who own a WordPress blog and want to turn it into an online store.   

Compared to Shopify, WooCommerce is an affordable option as it allows an individual to use the plugin for free and can pay transaction fees. If you want to add e-commerce capabilities to your WordPress content management system (CMS), you need to install the WooCommerce plugin.   

Let’s look at statistics – Around 5 million websites use WooCommerce. WordPress CMS provides you with various themes and plugins that you can use to create a website without having to code from scratch.   

If you want to set up an online store for free, WooCommerce is a profitable option for you as it is open-source software and even allows you to add extensions if needed.   

WooCommerce allows business owners to make their online store mobile-friendly and more suitable for social media stores. Additionally, WordPress features are included in WooCommerce, which makes it easy for you to rank the keywords related to your product.   

WooCommerce plugin is free to install on your website; you are required to pay for website hosting or domain name to set up your WooCommerce store. Therefore, small business owners prefer using WooCommerce to create online stores.   

3. Magento   

Magneto was acquired by Adobe in 2018. Magneto is an e-commerce platform that allows developers to customize their online store and make it fully functional. But, In the case of Magneto, developers need advanced coding skills to set up an online store.   

Additionally, Magneto provides access to thousands of templates created by the Magento community.   

So, If you compare Magneto with Shopify, it’s challenging for developers to use Magento if they are not proficient in coding or website design skills.  

Let’s look at the stats – more than 7 lakh websites around the globe are using Magneto.   

Regarding the pricing of Magento, it has 2 versions – Magento Free and Magento Commerce. Magento Free is an open source, which is free to download on the system. (Anyone can create a website for free) while Magento commerce which is a paid solution.   

Magento commerce offers more advantages over Magento open source. Furthermore, Magento Commerce provides an automated hosting known as Magento Cloud, especially for enterprise customers. 

Also Read: WooCommerce vs Magento 

4. Presta Shop  

It is an alternative to Shopify that allows you to create an online store. Presto is available for free. However, you have to pay for hosting services and domain names. Presta Shop has limited themes and templates as compared to Shopify platform. 

It does not charge you an additional transaction fee and can support 25 languages. Thus, this platform is suitable for businesses that are just starting and have expertise in coding skills.   

Presta shop provides access to various features, including inventory tracking, online shopping cart, analytics reporting, etc. In addition to having SEO features, Presta shop does have some support for over 250 payment modules.   

Difference Between Shopify And WooCommerce  

Basis of comparison	Shopify	WooCommerce
Type of E-commerce	Shopify is a software-as-service e-commerce platform allowing businesses to create and manage online stores.	While, WooCommerce is a WordPress plugin that allows you to turn websites into an online store
Open source	Shopify is a closed-source platform	On the contrary, WooCommerce is an open-source platform
Theme options	Shopify offers a variety of themes to use. Choosing a theme that suits your use case and fits your design requirements is good. Its paid themes are modern and professional as compared to WooCommerce.	On the other hand, WooCommerce does offer many themes to use.   It provides limited customizations; however, you can use the code to customize your online store
Ease of use	Shopify is easier to use as it is a fully hosted platform. Here, you don’t need to install or update any software. It has a drag-and-drop feature allowing you to manage product pages, sales, and inventory. Moreover, Shopify is easy to use for those users who don’t have technical skills.	Unlike Shopify, WooCommerce is not a hosted platform. It does not offer drag-and-drop functionalities. Here, you are required to install the WooCommerce plugin to start an online store
On-premise	Shopify is ideal for Users	WooCommerce is ideal for users and developers
On premise	The set up of WooCommerce can be on premise and deployed to the cloud.	The set up of WooCommerce can be on-premise and deployed to the cloud.
Restful API	Graph QL (throttling limit usage)	Rest API offers unlimited usage
SEO friendly	WooCommerce is not SEO-friendly.	WooCommerce is not SEO friendly.

Use Cases of Shopify.   

• Shopify is the best to use for those businesses which require an all-in-one e-commerce solution. It is good for users to create and manage an online store even if they don’t have technical skills.   
• Profitable option for businesses who are keen to launch their e-commerce store without worrying about requiring technical setup   
• Businesses that are looking for a platform with built-in features ranging from managing inventory, shipping, and payment processing   

Use Cases of WooCommerce.   

• It is highly suited for small and medium-scale businesses with a tight budget and looking for an affordable option.   
• Businesses are already familiar with WordPress and have been using WordPress for a while. They are interested in adding e-commerce functionalities.   
• Businesses that want to exercise a high level of control over the website design and other functionalities   

Wrapping Up   

Now, you better understand how Shopify is different from WooCommerce. But, if you are still trying to choose one to create an online store, don’t worry. We got your back.   

If you are new to e-commerce and a novice tech entrepreneur, then Shopify is meant for you. So, It is good for you if you want to avoid dealing with complex setups.   

It has a lot to offer – A complete e-commerce solution with way too many amazing features and functionalities to help you run your e-commerce store.   

However, if you already have an e-commerce website and want to exercise full control over the store and add some e-commerce capabilities, then you can go with WooCommerce. 

WooCommerce has a steeper learning curve, and you must understand the technical side of things to create and manage your online store.   

Hire a Shopify development company 

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 Read Also: Shopify Theme Development