Two giants of the eCommerce game, both Shopify and WooCommerce are a class apart from the competitors. Their eCommerce platforms are extremely useful, scalable, and can help you get started with your eCommerce processes in no time.
But wait, you might be wondering which one is better for you?
In this post, we’ll be explaining the differences between WooCommerce and Shopify based on a variety of different metrics. Hopefully, once you’re done, you’ll have a better grasp of both of these tools.
So, let’s start with the basic pros and cons.
WooCommerce vs Shopify: Pros and Cons
Shopify Pros and Cons
🚀 Shopify Pros 🚀
- Hosted: Sets up and manages everything on your behalf.
- You can sell on multiple external channels with its multi-integration features.
- Provides constant customer support to resolve your issues on time.
🤦♂️Shopify Cons🤦♂️
- Transaction fees are high unless you’re using Shopify Payments.
- The costs of applications can be hefty.
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WooCommerce Pros and Cons
🚀 WooCommerce Pros 🚀
- You can customize just about any aspect of your eCommerce website.
- The platform is scalable according to your business needs and requirements.
- Being free to install, the extension helps you add additional functionality to your store at a reasonable cost.
🤦♂️ WooCommerce Cons 🤦♂️
- You are going to need some level of coding knowledge to get started with this tool.
WooCommerce vs Shopify: Ease of Use 😍
Compared to Shopify, WooCommerce is not as easy to use. There are a lot of prerequisites you need to learn before you can get started with WooCommerce.
The main reason why Shopify is better than WooCommerce lies in its closed source nature. Shopify takes care of all the technical pre-requisites and gets your store up and running in no time.
On WooCommerce you have to select hosting companies, SSL’s and learn the setup all by yourself.
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WooCommerce vs Shopify: Build Time 👌
Build times are an essential metric. The time from ideation to going live is essential and of concern to prospective business owners.
If you want quick deployment then there is no better alternative to Shopify. It helps you go live very quickly. Compare that with WooCommerce, and you will see slower deployment times with more focus.
You see, on Shopify, everything is built-in and ready to be deployed. On the contrary, WooCommerce doesn’t do that. You have to set up everything yourself. Now, you can choose a chatbot depending on the type of build time you require.
WooCommerce vs Shopify: Plugins and Integrations
Plugins and integration give your store additional functionality. With it, you can customize your website to become better at a particular aspect. Does the question then become that which platform has a better collection of integrations and plugins?
Now, WooCommerce is the hub of plugins. A major part of the WordPress ecosystem, there are tens of thousands of plugins on the platform. From adding a simple CTA to creating a form, to a full-blown website development project – there’s a plugin for just about any purpose.
Besides the free apps, there are also premium or paid plugins present that give your store premium functionality.
Compared to WooCommerce Shopify’s plugins range isn’t as extensive. It only has a few thousand plugins but even then, they are still handy enough for a variety of different purposes.
WooCommerce vs Shopify: Marketing Tools
Nowadays, every business opts to go for digital selling and having an internet presence online. If you’re one such business and you have either WooCommerce or Shopify installed, you can use the variety of Sales and Marketing tools on these platforms.
On both Shopify and WooCommerce, you have a variety of marketing plugins ranging from SEO to social media, and email marketing. The most particular in this regard is Mailchimp, whose benefits are far more than the downsides.
WooCommerce vs Shopify: SEO
In the modern landscape, if you want to take your website to the next level, SEO is a must. You want users to find you the moment they search for a niche keyword, say “grunge clothing”. To that end, you need to look at SEO.
Both the platforms are pretty unique when it comes to providing significant support for SEO. On one side, you have woo-commerce and WordPress, whose Yoast SEO plugin is the prime name for anyone looking to optimize their content based on keywords.
On the other hand, you have platforms like Shopify which also has its fair share of SEO plugins like SEO booster. It audits your website and provides insights on where you can improve your SEO.
Besides that, both platforms provide you with the ability to add rich information that, when integrated with keywords, can prove valuable in helping your content rank.
All in all, WooCommerce is the clearer winner here because it’s Yoast SEO and other SEO features make it one of the most SEO-friendly platforms out there.
WooCommerce vs Shopify: Security
If you’re looking to get into the eCommerce game for the long haul, then you need to invest in security as soon as possible. You see, you need a secure platform to keep your and your customers’ data safe from hacks and breaches.
On Shopify, the issue of security is managed by Shopify. Being a SaaS platform Shopify’s security is top-notch and managed in the cloud. This means that you don’t have to add layers upon layers of security to your website. Speaking of layers, WooCommerce doesn’t lag in security. It’s got tons of unique plugins that help you add security to your website. But here’s the problem: you have to add them yourself and if you don’t have a solid system for security in place, you’re at a higher risk of getting hacked.
Another difference where Shopify goes above WooCommerce is its support for secured sockets layer (SSL). With WooCommerce Though, you either get an SSL through the hosting provider or by yourself and then use an external service to integrate it. While this is not necessarily bad, the prolonged process of doing everything yourself is not too helpful.
To conclude this, Shopify is the clear winner in this regard since it makes you lie back and relax while Shopify keeps your site secure around the clock.
WooCommerce vs Shopify: Customer Support
When comparing the two platforms, we cannot help but talk about the level of customer service both the platforms provide. There are certain inherent differences between the ways both platforms are used, but still, both are focused on providing excellent customer service in their special way.
Being a closed source platform, WooCommerce doesn’t have a dedicated customer service base. Instead, the help you can get is from documentations, forums, community boards, and other places across the internet. While this might make for poor exclusivity, there are benefits to it since you can Google around a problem that you’re facing and can see thousands of results from forums asking the same question. Unless it’s something super unique, you’re going to find the solution in one way or another. With regards to the customer service you need to provide to your buyers, it’s a good idea to seek help from a third party business that offers Woocommerce fulfillment services. They’ll handle all the shipping, inventory, and customer relations for you so you can focus on other aspects of your business.
Shopify, being a close source, Software as Service (SaaS) platform provides you customer service and all the facilities provided by woo commerce though on a smaller scale. You can contact Shopify through email, chat, phone, and other mediums. This the major selling point of Shopify, their customer service which is very good and can help solve your queries in no time.
While there is customer service through chat and email support and other mediums on WooCommerce, it’s only limited to the customer service promised by a hosting provider. For example, you’re running WooCommerce on Siteground or BlueHost. Since you purchase the hosting plan, you also get support for your projects.
Which one is the winner in this case? Well, it seems that no one is the clear winner and both the platforms are equal and unique in terms of the customer service they provide.
WooCommerce vs Shopify: Pricing
Similar to customer support, both Shopify and WooCommerce have their costs and pricing tiers that you will incur. But if we were to compare Shopify with WooCommerce, we would see that WooCommerce is a lot more flexible in terms of pricing.
You see, Shopify is a closed source platform which makes its pricing tier rigid. It ranges from $29 to $299. Now, if you’re someone who can afford the $29 fee, and above that, then it’s okay. But what if you’re just looking to try things out yourself?
This is where WooCommerce is quite effective since being an open-source platform, you can select a domain, hosting, SSL, and WordPress extensions based on your budget. Here’s the ideal chart for the pricing of a complete WooCommerce store.
• Hosting ($35 – $50/month)
• Security ($0 – $200/year)
• Domain ($10 – £20/year)
• Extension fees ($0 – $100/month)
Shopify Price Plan
Now, in Shopify’s defense, all of what you’re paying for in WooCommerce come packed in Shopify’s Plan.
- Shopify Basic ($29/month)
- Shopify ($79/month)
- Advanced Shopify ($299/month)
Shopify provides a 14-day trial to its users so you can get in touch with it the product and purchase it when the period is over.
All in all, we’ll call the competition a tie since both platforms are equal in terms of the value of money they provide.
Final Words:
In this post, we talked a lot and compared Shopify and WooCommerce with another. Hopefully, this guide gave you some insight into the differences between the two platforms.
To conclude things, you should use WooCommerce if you’re looking to get into the technical side of eCommerce operations, start a project from head to toe by yourself, and you want control over the design of your website.
Similarly, if you have the budget and resources, and don’t want to waste too much time on the technical side of things, then Shopify is the ultimate solution for you.
