Top 16 Shopify Alternatives to Consider – Which Is Best For Your Store in 2023?

Shopify is a good ecommerce platform. No doubt about that. But there are so many great Shopify alternatives that also deserve your attention. For instance, WooCommerce is a winning ecommerce platform and is the best out there! Why? It is open-source, fully customizable, offers freedom of migration, and full scalability. As your store grows, so will your demands, and the platform you choose should be able to adjust accordingly.

In this blog, we have listed Shopify alternatives like WooCommerce, Magento, and BigCommerce, so you can easily avail features like product categorization, updating inventory stock, and more. WooCommerce, because of WordPress, has a great CMS, which means if you want a blog for your ecommerce store, you should definitely look for Shopify alternatives.

Pick an ecommerce platform that suits your needs from the get-go by reading our list of the best alternatives to Shopify!

We have found some of the best alternatives to Shopify and created a comparison to help you choose the best ecommerce platform.

Now, let’s delve into the comparison table.

A Brief Comparison of Common Shopify Alternatives

We have created the following table to give you a better idea about how other alternatives to Shopify compare. See below:

The 16 Most Popular Shopify Alternatives

Now, let’s go deeper and look at the top Shopify alternatives and what they bring to the table.

1. WooCommerce

The tiniest amount of research about ecommerce applications will lead you to WooCommerce. You can set up your own WooCommerce store by going through the WooCommerce tutorial we have created for your help.

For many entrepreneurs, WooCommerce is one of the best Shopify alternatives. It’s completely free to use, open-source, and best of all, highly rated when it comes to gauging visitor experience. Some users even claim it’s better than Shopify in many regards.

Scalability is a bit complicated; you will need to invest in the more expensive version to get the advanced functionality. But apart from that, WooCommerce has everything that you could ask for. You can build a site with an expensive cart in a matter of minutes.

It’s also responsive, so mobile-friendly websites are easy to set up. You just have to pay for the hosting. And, unlike Shopify, you don’t need to pay a monthly premium: you can get their advanced features for a one-time payment only. However, you should know that troubleshooting isn’t a strong suit for WooCommerce.

Coupled with reliable ecommerce hosting solutions, you can significantly boost the speed of your WooCommerce website. You can even pair it up with a bunch of abandoned cart plugins to boost your store’s performance.

If you want to upsell after a sale, you can set this up on your website so that customers can add new products or recommendations with just one click as well.

Pros:

• No transaction fees
• Seamless integration for WordPress
• Several features guaranteeing maximum creativity
• Post-purchase one-click upsells
• Very easy to set up
• Freedom to sell unlimited products on your store
• Access to hundreds of free extensions + premium ones

Cons:

• No hosting included
• You will need tech skills
• Can be a bit clunky
• Your hosting might be slow. Choose a dedicated WooCommerce host, like Cloudways’ Woocommerce hosting, to ensure fast speeds.

That’s not all. Cloudways also offers the WooCommerce Starter Bundle, which comes with 1-click integration for all popular plugins that you need to start your ecommerce journey. The bundle includes plugins like Stripe Gateway, PayPal Checkout, Cart Abandonment Recovery, Kadence Email Designer, and several others.

It’s the only thing you need to launch your WooCommerce store within minutes.

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User Interface:

Source: WooCommerce

WooCommerce vs Shopify – Which Should You Choose in 2023?

2. BigCommerce

BigCommerce is a great choice if you want a simple, no-frills experience, as well as the flexibility of using a drag-and-drop editor when setting up your website.

The platform has a range of stunning themes, although only seven are free across all industries. You will have to pay for the premium ones, which definitely makes it better than Shopify in terms of customization.

However, when you compare the load times on BigCommerce with others, you will realize that they are slightly slow.

The prices start from $29.95/mo for the basic plan and go all the way to $299.95/mo, so you have to choose accordingly. Your costs will vary depending on the number of goods you sell, and the revenue you generate.

Pros:

• Multiple in-built, drag and drop visual editing tools so you can create your beautiful ecommerce store
• More than 55 secure payment gateways and no transaction fees
• Multi-channel selling
• Several free apps and features to choose from, including an in-app checkout feature for Instagram
• Fully customizable URLs and SEO function
• Ideal for different business models

Cons:

• Pricing can seem a bit complex if you are a new user
• A little difficult to setup
• Only 5 free themes
• Speeds are inconsistent

User Interface:

Source: Alejandrorioja

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3. Magento

You might have heard about Magento already. The company was purchased by eBay in 2011, and then Adobe bought it in 2018. This popular platform is ideal for established store owners, and it has a wide and established community across the globe.

When you look at the prices, it’s easy to see the reasons behind Magento’s popularity. The pricing is very similar to WooCommerce’s, making it one of the best Shopify alternatives. While the content management software is free, you will need to pay for the hosting, the themes, and the plugins.

However, Magento is basically a CMS platform that lets you focus on selling all of your products through an open-source ecosystem, which is great for businesses looking to expand.

Magento vs Shopify vs BigCommerce [Detailed Comparison]

Pros:

• It’s quite flexible and scalable
• Cutting-edge functionality with 250K+ developers to help you set up a beautiful and functional ecommerce store.
• Several options to benefit from in terms of secure payment gateways
• Responsive design for your ecommerce store
• Multiple add-ons and extensions to choose from through its large partner ecosystem
• Excellent community support

Cons:

• Coding and technical knowledge is required to fully utilize the open-source option
• New Users may find it complex as it is difficult to manage on your own
• Quite expensive

User Interface:

Source: Aheadworks

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4. Prestashop

Prestashop is a popular Shopify alternative for ecommerce entrepreneurs on a tight budget. Technically, it’s free, but like all others on this list, you will have to buy a hosting package as well as a domain name. The company does have partnerships with Azure, WebHostingHub, and 1&1.

The company has partnerships with Azure, WebHostingHub, and 1&1.

When you compare the themes and the templates, Prestashop definitely lags behind. However, in terms of usability, it’s on the same level as Shopify.

There’s no additional transaction fee, and it supports up to 25 languages. It also has support for multiple currencies. If you hire a decent developer who has experience with Prestashop, you can easily create a fantastic online store without spending a lot of money.

Pros:

• Open source and free of cost
• No additional transaction fees
• Support for multiple languages
• A wide range of features
• Option to host your store on any server or with any hosting provider

Cons:

• Themes and templates are limited
• Doesn’t have as many features
• Requires considerable tech skills

User Interface:

Source: Doc.prestashop

How to Setup PrestaShop Dropshipping Store Using AliExpress

5. Dukaan

Dukaan can be a great choice for B2C and D2C businesses that need a comprehensive eCommerce solution.

A powerful SaaS platform, Dukaan enables you to start your own eCommerce store in under a minute. The USP of the platform is its ease of use and high scalability. Meaning you don’t need any coding skills to utilise the platform.

Dukaan offers a number of powerful eCommerce functionalities that can be conveniently found in its dashboard. Even with its advanced offerings, there’s no learning curve attached to the platform, making it truly one of a kind.

Customising a store is also quite easy. All of the themes in the platform’s library are free for use, optimised for loading speed and mobile-responsive. Furthermore, those with technical know-how can customise their store using custom CSS. Any changes you make to your store are also implemented instantly. The platform also comes equipped with integrated plugins and built-in business tools.

Pros

• Highly intuitive interface
• Easy to set up
• Sell unlimited products
• No transaction charges when connected to your own payment gateway
• No technical knowledge required
• Highly-optimized loading speed
• Supported by a global network of data centres (22+)

Cons

• Not suitable for B2B businesses
• Limited number of themes
• Basic analytics section
• Does not support dropshipping

User Interface:

6. Shift4Shop (Formerly 3DCart)

3DCart got acquired by Shift4 in 2020 and is now known as Shift4Shop.

It’s a good hosted platform for ecommerce store owners. There are several reasons why Shift4Shop is one of the top Shopify alternatives. The platform offers free end-to-end ecommerce for residents of the USA.

For those outside of the USA, the prices start at $29/mo and go all the way to $229 per month. For this price, you get a range of SEO tools, emails for following up on abandoned carts, and personalized products.

You also get Facebook sync, incredibly versatile functionality, and an excellent web design service that provides you with SSL certificates at relatively reasonable rates.

However, the service is a bit sluggish, and there’s little variety in the themes. On top of that, you won’t find many praises sung about their support offerings either.

Pros:

• Support for several common payment gateways
• Excellent store speeds
• Customizations via HTML and CSS are possible
• Incredibly fast load times
• Unlimited listings
• Much more advanced than Shopify with no transaction fee
• Affordable for beginners as well as big companies

Cons:

• Service is sluggish
• Support isn’t highly rated
• The mobile UX on Shopify is better
• You will face issues when upgrading.
• User experience and dropshipping is much better in Shopify
• Slightly difficult to set up for beginners

User Interface:

7. Volusion

Volusion is one of the more popular Shopify alternatives. This cloud-based shopping cart serves more than 200,000 businesses and is quite popular with smaller businesses and companies that are looking to scale upwards. Volusion’s nifty one-click checkout feature offers convenience to your customers.

The platform also gives you access to a wide range of plugins and features that you can integrate within your online store.

It’s great for shipping businesses. However, you will need to know how to keep your shipping costs low.

Keep in mind that the bandwidth is metered, so if you go over the limit, the company might charge you around $7 per GB.

The prices usually vary between $15 and $35 each month and give you access to a host of new features, like different categories, subcategories, and gift certificates.

While most of the work is done through a GUI, you will need some basic coding skills to set your store up. Plus, the product function is relatively weak. Perhaps the real limiting factor is the bandwidth limit, which requires you to pay more as your store grows.

Pros:

• Very easy to use
• Support for different payment processors
• An excellent mobile app
• Free access to SEO and analytics tools for easy analysis and reporting
• A range of free, excellent themes
• No worries about transaction fees
• Unlimited product listings
• Instant calculation of shipping and tax rates

Cons:

• Other hosting options usually have more features
• You will need minimal coding skills
• Doesn’t integrate with PLA’s and Pinterest
• There’s a monthly bandwidth limit
• The product search function is weak
• Limited apps compared to Shopify

User Interface:

Source: Shivarweb

8. OpenCart

OpenCart is a free Shopify alternative with a relatively modernized platform that allows you to create professional-looking websites that you can customize according to your needs. Furthermore, there are shopify development companies that reduces hurdles and gives customize, feature rich shopify store development assist.

The documentation is strong, and it has a pretty robust user base. It also supports thousands of add-ons and third-party modules, which is what most ecommerce clients usually want.

Pros:

• Ideal for most ecommerce stores
• Quite flexible and supports a range of payment gateways
• Very fast setup and quick launches
• Supports multiple payment gateways

Cons:

• Not as easy as Shopify to use
• The support and documentation are not easy for a layman
• Certainly not the easiest platform to use
• Not as many add-ons as Shopify

User Interface:

Source: docs.opencart

9. Squarespace

If you are looking to get your online business off the ground and have a relatively small product portfolio, Squarespace might be just what you need.

The platform comes with an excellent website-building tool and gives you various templates to choose from.

You can build an excellent online store with just a little tweaking. The cheapest plan costs $19 per month, and the advanced package costs $49, giving you an unlimited number of pages, blogs, galleries, contributors, a free domain, storage, and a lot more.

But you should know that Squarespace only accepts online payments via PayPal and Stripe.

It also contains some marketing features, like AdWords, MailChimp, and tracking for Amazon Affiliates.

Pros:

• Ideal for smaller stores
• Very easy to set up
• No need for coding knowledge
• Impressive themes
• Gives you the freedom to use your own product photography and templates + offers a large selection of beautiful templates to give you an impressive online store.
• The website builder is easy to navigate so you can easily work on the backend

Cons:

• Doesn’t allow integration with the tracking code API to track store visitors
• Support is limited
• Multi-channel features are limited
• Website loading time is a bit slow
• You don’t get as many add-ons as you will with Shopify

User Interface:

Source: es.squarespace

10. X-Cart

Developed by Qualiteam, X-Cart is fast, streamlined, and relatively easy to use.

It’s sold as an all-in-one solution to your ecommerce needs and comes loaded with a bunch of different features. The pricing plan starts from $199/mo and goes all the way up to $399/mo. You get additional features as you ladder up the package.

This powerful platform grants you unlimited number of customizations, and an experienced developer can easily use it to create an excellent store, making it a viable Shopify alternative.

However, know that in case of an issue, the company may not offer much in the way of support. They will simply blame the issue on your servers, leaving you  to fix the problem by yourself.

Pros:

• Comes with an array of advanced features
• The virtual server works really well
• Easy to set up and use

Cons:

• Developers for X-cart are hard to find, and can get fairly expensive
• The company has a reputation for blaming issues on your server

User Interface:

Source: kb.x-cart

11. Square Online Store

The Square Online Store is widely touted as an all-inclusive solution for your ecommerce needs.

If Shopify feels like overkill for your business plans, Square Online Store might be a suitable choice. Square is known primarily for its POS systems, but as of late, its ecommerce offering has also become quite popular amongst business owners.

You can choose from a free plan that charges a transaction fee with every payment.

For this, you receive shopping cart functionality, support for unlimited products, and more. Still, you get limited features, and payment processor support is limited to Square only. To use PayPal, you have to choose their higher-end plan. For beginners, it’s a great Shopify alternative.

Additionally, as your store grows, you will want to add more options for accepting payments and other ecommerce tools, but that’s not happening with the free plan. As a result, your online business could suffer.

Pros:

• Quite easy to set up
• It offers you a free plan
• Provides direct integration with Square

Cons:

• Supports only Square unless you pay a high amount to unlock PayPal support
• Scalability is a problem
• The features vary depending upon the plan you choose

User Interface:

Source: Merchantmaverick

12. Big Cartel

Big Cartel was designed primarily for a niche audience including content creators, artists, and artisans.

In fact, the website can easily be considered a direct alternative to Etsy. It favors a neat and clean aesthetic, and the company claims to have helped people sell more than $2.5 billion worth of services and goods since its inception in 2005.

They have three different packages, starting from the free gold package and going all the way up to the Diamond package, which costs $19.99 a month and gives you support for 500 products.

Pros:

• Designed for a specific niche
• Easy to manage
• Quick to set up your store
• Offers basic to mid-level ecommerce features needed to grow the store

Cons:

• Very limited functionality
• The prices are not as competitive
• Limits your ability to sell other goods or services

User Interface:

Source: Disruptiveadvertising

13. Weebly

Weebly is another convenient hosted platform for those who want a free Shopify alternative to get started.

The number of features that you get with Weebly isn’t as high as Shopify’s, but their most expensive plan is much cheaper than Shopify’s Basic Plan.

If you don’t want to spend a lot of money on a fully-functioning online store, then Weebly may be what you’re looking for.

If you want to set up a website using a simple builder, Weebly is a great choice that is easy to use right out of the box. However, when it comes to scalability, Weebly may let you down.

Pros:

• Affordable
• Quick and easy to get started
• Launch your website in minutes
• Range of apps and tools that you can choose from
• Allows you to collaborate with your team and provides membership areas
• Free domain name
• Free trial

Cons:

• Scalability is a problem
• Relatively simple so don’t expect the bells and whistles
• Not suitable for high volume stores

User Interface:

Source: Makeawebsitehub

Conclusion

As you can see, there’s no shortage of Shopify alternatives in the market. The question is, which one should you choose? It’s important that you first lay out your requirements and then compare them with the features provided by any shopping cart platform. If it doesn’t meet your needs, you don’t have to invest in it. Always choose the platform that’s right for your unique needs! Check out Cloudways support.

Here are more blogs from our alternative series that you will find interesting:

• Squarespace Alternatives
• Wix Alternatives
• Oberlo Alternatives
• Etsy Alternatives
• Magento Alternatives
• Wix vs. Shopify – Which One Suits Your Ecommerce Store?