Shopify al­ter­na­tives

Online stores are now part of our day-to-day shopping behaviors. Never has it been so easy to order goods online. Just open your laptop or smart­phone, add a product to the virtual basket and hit the order button. A few days later, the delivery service comes knocking on your door.

A growing number of retailers are catching up with the trend and creating their own online stores. Once the decision has been made, the question of which is the right platform arises. Shopify has emerged as a beginner-friendly option. But there are some good free al­ter­na­tives to Shopify, and some fee-based options. Find out what the best Shopify al­ter­na­tives are in this guide.

Shopify scores because of ease-of-use: The software makes it simple to launch a web shop online in just a few steps. Shopify takes care of all the trimmings, such as web hosting and design templates, for a monthly fixed price and trans­ac­tion fees based on per­cent­ages. The page itself can be set up using drag-and-drop without any pro­gram­ming knowledge. The e-commerce platform is a great place to start when you’re launching your own shop but don’t know how to program. However, there are numerous al­ter­na­tives to Shopify that each have their ad­van­tages and may be even more suitable for you.

The most important Shopify al­ter­na­tives include:

• Big­Com­merce
• Shopware
• WooCom­merce

Each has different strengths and weak­ness­es. Read on to find out more.

Big­Com­merce relies on fixed and unscaled pricing, which makes this al­ter­na­tive to Shopify par­tic­u­lar­ly suitable for small and medium-sized busi­ness­es. As your business expands and orders increase, you won’t have to deal with higher costs. So, when your shop grows, Big­Com­merce's pricing model leaves you with more of your hard-earned cash by the end of the month.

What’s more, Big­Com­merce provides greater flex­i­bil­i­ty when it comes to pricing your own items. Products can be priced according to country and currency, which is important for busi­ness­es with an in­ter­na­tion­al focus. You can also connect various payment service providers, which gives you greater control of your online store. In addition, Big­Com­merce's pricing can be fanned out according to customer groups, which makes it easier to set up a B2B (business to business) shop. Different discounts can be awarded depending on the customer, which is great for bulk buyers.

APIs (Ap­pli­ca­tion Pro­gram­ming In­ter­faces) are in­ter­faces between different programs. With the help of these in­ter­faces, data is exchanged and compared. When launching an online store, this is often over­looked but becomes a major problem later down the line. Big­Com­merce begins at around 400 accesses to the API per second, which is suf­fi­cient even for medium-sized online stores. This is par­tic­u­lar­ly important when syn­chro­niz­ing between inventory and the dashboard. Syn­chro­niza­tion speeds are up to 200 times faster with Big­Com­merce than Shopify.

Another big advantage of Big­Com­merce as a Shopify al­ter­na­tive are the product options. Up to 250 product options can be stored with up to 600 article numbers (SKUs). It’s a great feature for a wide range of product cat­e­gories such as clothing.

Search engine op­ti­miza­tion (SEO) is a must for any online store. With the right SEO basics you can position your shop suc­cess­ful­ly in the long run. As a Shopify al­ter­na­tive, Big­Com­merce in­te­grates all the necessary SEO options. For example, the URL structure, which is an important feature for search engines, can be adapted. In addition, the in­te­gra­tion of Akamai, an image software, ensures that uploaded product images are ef­fec­tive­ly down­scaled. This decreases the loading speed of the shop, which is another important – if not the most important – criterion for search engines.

No platform is perfect, and neither is Big­Com­merce. The provider regularly launches new features and continues to grow as a software provider, but that can have dis­ad­van­tages. Big­Com­merce's plethora of features makes it harder to use. This shouldn’t be a problem for ex­pe­ri­enced e-commerce retailers and for some it may even be desirable, but it can quickly become over­whelm­ing for beginners. Users should plan on a steeper learning curve and longer im­ple­men­ta­tion time for this Shopify al­ter­na­tive.

Another thing that should be con­sid­ered is Big­Com­merce’s pricing, because there’s a catch: the monthly package is tied to the number of sales. If this limit is exceeded, the next higher package must be selected. Dealers are forced to upgrade and are less flexible in the long run.

The dashboard cannot be used as ad­min­is­tra­tive surface for POS right away, and added plugins aren’t com­pa­ra­ble with those provided by Shopify. For store owners, this can be a reason to keep looking for al­ter­na­tive e-commerce software.

As a Shopify al­ter­na­tive, Big­Com­merce does well in the important areas: there are no trans­ac­tion fees, which can quickly become a problem when your business is growing rapidly. It provides stronger developer options, be it the more robust API con­nec­tion or the more extensive options for designing products and prices. While this platform is more com­pli­cat­ed to use than Shopify, it’s a good al­ter­na­tive for merchants looking to grow faster.

Shopware is an e-commerce software and Shopify al­ter­na­tive that is well-known in Germany and is gaining pop­u­lar­i­ty. It can be used to ef­fec­tive­ly implement both small and large stores. One of the biggest ad­van­tages of the provider is the open source nature of the software, which enables pro­gram­ming of your own modules, plugins, and other elements. In addition, with the cloud variant, hosting in the EU ensures that all GDPR reg­u­la­tions are complied with.

When it comes to pricing, Shopware offers two packages: the cloud solution at a monthly fee and a fixed revenue share or the hosted version of the software, which can be purchased either at a monthly cost or a one-off fee. Both packages are available as free entry-level versions. That makes this al­ter­na­tive to Shopify par­tic­u­lar­ly suitable for beginners testing the waters.

The software is suitable for both B2B and B2C shops. Functions such as tiered prices, theme page structure design or the in­te­gra­tion of a store­front are included with every package. With the paid variants, ad­di­tion­al sales channels such as Instagram or shopping feeds can be created.

Even new users will quickly find their way on the user interface: it’s simple and func­tion­al and high­lights the most important functions at a glance. The sim­plic­i­ty is main­tained even in the product detail pages. This makes working with the backend more pleasant.

Even if the community is growing, its plugin store is a weak point. Though the included apps are certified, and thus fully func­tion­al, the selection is much smaller compared to Shopify and important features have to be purchased as plugins. That includes search engine marketing and the same applies to point-of-sale con­nec­tions or design themes. However, one positive aspect of its plugin store is that each plugin and design template needs to go through an extensive cer­ti­fi­ca­tion process in order to be listed. This maintains their quality.

Shopware is a hidden gem within the e-commerce sector: it is available as self-operated open source software and as a cloud solution. The latter should offer a suitable option for most retailers. Both variants have free entry options that already contain important basic functions. However, Shopware is not as es­tab­lished as other al­ter­na­tives to Shopify and therefore has a smaller community, which is reflected in a rel­a­tive­ly small number of plugins and themes.

The main advantage of WooCom­merce is its price because the plugin is free. In contrast to Shopify and its al­ter­na­tives, there is no fixed price and no monthly fee. This makes WooCom­merce one of the most cost-effective al­ter­na­tives to Shopify.

Another advantage is the nature of the plugin. It is open source and because it is based on WordPress, it has a large developer community. This gives you full control over your online shop and allows you to flexibly adapt its design and func­tion­al­i­ty.

With WooCom­merce, you’re the manager of your online store. This means that you retain in­de­pen­dence from operators and can be sure that your store stays online. In addition, the website and the resulting traffic can be used for marketing measures.

For ideas that are difficult to implement using standard software, WooCom­merce can be a good Shopify al­ter­na­tive. The software ensures you maintain flex­i­bil­i­ty and can implement your ideas – even sub­scrip­tion models and member areas are possible. You get to realize your own business ideas.

But WooCom­merce may not be suitable for your shop ideas. One dis­ad­van­tage is a limited number of payment service providers, which binds you to their con­di­tions and trans­ac­tion fees. You need to keep this in mind when planning sales.

Many basic functions are missing in WooCom­merce. Features that are readily included with Shopify need to be purchased as add-ons here. This could sig­nif­i­cant­ly increase the price of the solution.

It also creates various issues with the technical im­ple­men­ta­tion. The func­tion­al­i­ty and quality of the add-ons aren’t always guar­an­teed because there is no cer­ti­fi­ca­tion process. To solve problems, you will need some technical know-how or to hire someone to help you.

There’s another dis­ad­van­tage once you’ve installed multiple plugins: com­pat­i­bil­i­ty issues can arise with each update of the in­di­vid­ual plug-ins. That’s because many plugins interact with others, and a problem with one plugin can lead to a disrupted payment process. These issues are a lot less likely when using Shopify and other al­ter­na­tives.

WooCom­merce is one of the most popular solutions for online shops, and there are plenty of good reasons why: entry costs are low, and it is based on one of the most popular blogging tools globally – WordPress. WooCom­merce allows great flex­i­bil­i­ty when it comes to im­ple­ment­ing your ideas. However, this freedom can lead to chal­lenges: WooCom­merce and added plugins are not certified standard solutions. Should technical problems arise, you require suf­fi­cient know-how to keep your online store running. Because many basic func­tion­al­i­ties are missing, plugins and their updates are a constant source of dis­rup­tion that you need to be aware of when opting for this Shopify al­ter­na­tive.

Each of the three Shopify al­ter­na­tives offers something for a wide variety of retailers. Beginners and pro­fes­sion­als can easily implement their online shop with platforms such as Big­Com­merce, Shopware, or WooCom­merce. Shopify is now the largest platform in the world, but it is not the only one that may be suitable for your online store. The great advantage of Shopify lies in the stan­dard­iza­tion and sim­pli­fi­ca­tion of all processes, from in­stal­la­tion to main­te­nance of the shop. However, this also has a major dis­ad­van­tage: in­di­vid­ual ideas aren’t as easily im­ple­ment­ed or can only be added in a round­about way; some design elements such as the payment process are firmly pre­scribed. Therefore, when planning out an online store, ask yourself whether you require full control and flex­i­bil­i­ty or sim­plic­i­ty.