Shopify vs WooCommerce.
Shopify when you want to sell and let someone else run the servers. WooCommerce when you need to own the code, the data and where it is hosted. Below is each one on price, payment fees, hosting, card security, checkout, catalog limits, B2B and built-in AI, taken from the vendors’ own pages on 22 October 2026.
Twelve questions, two platforms.
Shopify prices are from its US pricing page. Shopify prices by region, so check the figure for your country.
| Question | Shopify | WooCommerce |
|---|---|---|
| What it is | A hosted commerce platform. You pay a monthly plan; Shopify runs the servers, the checkout and card security. | A free plugin that turns a WordPress site into a store, on hosting you choose. wordpress.org shows 7+ million active installations. |
| Licence | A proprietary subscription service. | Open source under the GPL. You can read and change every line. |
| Published price | US, billed yearly: Basic $19, Grow $49, Advanced $299 a month ($25, $65 and $399 billed monthly). Plus from $2,300 a month on a three-year term, $2,500 on one year. | The plugin is free. You pay for WordPress hosting and for paid extensions, usually yearly: Subscriptions $279, Bookings $249, Product Bundles $79. |
| Payment fees | Shopify Payments card rates are set by plan and country; Shopify's own US guide gives 2.5%–2.9% + 30¢. Paying through another provider adds a Shopify fee: 2% on Basic, 1% on Grow, 0.6% on Advanced, 0.2% on Plus. | No platform fee. WooPayments charges 2.9% + $0.30 per US card, 1.5% more for international cards, with no monthly fee. Any other gateway charges its own rates. |
| Hosting and load | Included, with unlimited bandwidth. Shopify reports 99.99% uptime on average during its biggest flash sales. | Your host. WooCommerce recommends PHP 8.3+, MySQL 8.0+ or MariaDB 10.6+ and 256 MB of memory. Its order tables (HPOS) have been the default for new stores since version 8.2. |
| Card security (PCI) | Shopify is certified PCI DSS Level 1. | WooCommerce's own guide says PCI compliance is ultimately the store owner's responsibility. A hosted gateway such as WooPayments, Stripe or PayPal shrinks the scope. |
| Catalog limits | Up to 2,048 variants and three options per product. Shopify notes some themes, apps and channels handle no more than 100 variants. | No cap in the software. Large catalogs depend on hosting, caching and database tuning. |
| Staff accounts | None on Basic, 5 on Grow, 15 on Advanced, unlimited on Plus. | Unlimited WordPress users, with a Shop manager role. |
| Checkout changes | Limited on Basic to Advanced, full on Plus. Checkout UI extensions in the information, shipping and payment steps are Plus only. Shopify Scripts stopped running on 30 June 2026; Shopify Functions replaces them. | Full code access through hooks and the checkout block. Every change is yours to test and to carry through updates. |
| Extensions | Over 16,000 apps in the Shopify App Store, most billed monthly. | WordPress plugins plus the WooCommerce Marketplace, most billed yearly. |
| B2B | Built in on Basic, Grow, Advanced and Plus: up to 3 B2B catalogs below Plus, unlimited on Plus. | Through extensions. We found no first-party B2B extension; the marketplace's main one is third-party, at $149 a year. |
| Built-in AI | Sidekick, the admin assistant, is included (features vary by plan). Agentic Storefronts lists products in AI assistants such as ChatGPT, Copilot, Perplexity and Google AI Mode, and Catalog, Cart and Checkout MCP servers let outside agents shop the store. | WooCommerce 10.9 (23 June 2026) added product and order abilities through the WordPress Abilities API and an MCP adapter. WooCommerce labels it a developer preview. |
Read on each vendor’s own pages on 22 October 2026; the sources are listed below. Shopify no longer lists per-plan card rates on its pricing page, so we quote the range from its own guide. For the site itself, see Webflow vs WordPress. Plans change often, so check the source before you budget.
Each is the right answer for someone.
Choose Shopify when
FitsYou want to sell, not run servers: hosting, checkout security and traffic spikes become Shopify's job, and you expect to add channels such as point of sale, marketplaces or AI shopping assistants.
Watch forMonthly app fees add up, the checkout only changes where Shopify allows it, and using a gateway other than Shopify Payments costs a percentage of every order.
Choose WooCommerce when
FitsYou need to own the code and the customer data, host in a specific country, or run product and pricing logic that hosted platforms fight.
Watch forUpdates, security, backups, PCI scope and speed under load are yours. Without an owner for them, the free plugin is the expensive option.
Choose Shopify Plus when
FitsYou need checkout changes in every step, unlimited B2B catalogs and staff accounts, or the lowest fee on other gateways.
Watch forIt starts at $2,300 a month on a three-year term. Run the number against Advanced at $299 before you commit.
Choose neither when
FitsThe product is really a configurator, a quoting tool or a marketplace with a cart attached.
Watch forThat is a custom build. A store platform can still run the catalog and payments beside it.
The plan price is the small line.
Three costs decide the budget, and only the first is on a pricing page.
Plan, apps and payment fees
Fees grow with sales, so run them at your volume. At $40,000 a month through a gateway other than Shopify Payments, Shopify’s own fee alone is $800 on Basic, $400 on Grow or $240 on Advanced, before card fees.
Theme, catalog and integrations
Our store build is from $9,000 fixed on either platform, from 6 weeks; a move between them is from $7,000. Plus, headless and B2B builds are quoted higher, as a fixed price. What each includes.
Upkeep and custom code
WooCommerce needs updates, plugin audits, backups and hosting that keeps up with sales days. Shopify takes most of that away and leaves app and Functions upkeep. Ongoing work with us is an embedded pod at $3,000–$7,500 per engineer per month.
Where each fact came from.
All read on 22 October 2026.
Do not choose on the monthly plan price. Write down your monthly sales, how many people work in the admin, which gateway you use and who will apply updates, then price both platforms at those numbers. Both of our published commerce case studies run on Shopify Plus, and we will still tell you when WooCommerce is the better fit.
Shopify or WooCommerce
Shopify vs WooCommerce: which is better for a growing store?
Shopify, when you want hosting, checkout security and traffic spikes handled for you and plan to add channels. WooCommerce, when you need to own the code and customer data, host in a particular country, or run product logic a hosted platform restricts. The deciding question is usually who will own updates, security and speed: if nobody will, choose Shopify.
How much does Shopify cost per month?
On Shopify's US pricing page, billed yearly: Basic is $19 a month, Grow $49 and Advanced $299; billed monthly they are $25, $65 and $399. Shopify Plus starts at $2,300 a month on a three-year term, or $2,500 on one year. Card processing, apps and a theme are on top. Shopify prices by region, so the figure in your country may differ.
Is WooCommerce really free?
The plugin is: it is open source under the GPL and free on wordpress.org. A working store still pays for hosting sized for its traffic, a payment gateway's card fees, paid extensions (WooCommerce Subscriptions is $279 a year, Bookings $249) and the time to keep WordPress, WooCommerce and every plugin updated and secure.
Which has lower transaction fees?
WooCommerce charges no platform fee; you pay only the gateway, for example WooPayments at 2.9% + $0.30 per US card. Shopify charges no extra fee when you use Shopify Payments, whose US card rates Shopify gives as 2.5%–2.9% + 30¢ depending on plan. If you use another provider on Shopify, it adds 2% of each order on Basic, 1% on Grow, 0.6% on Advanced and 0.2% on Plus.
Who is responsible for PCI compliance?
On Shopify, Shopify is: it is certified PCI DSS Level 1. On WooCommerce, the store owner is; WooCommerce's own guide says so. Using a hosted or off-site gateway such as WooPayments, Stripe or PayPal keeps card data off your server and shrinks what you have to prove, but does not remove the duty.
Can WooCommerce handle a large store?
Yes, with engineering. There is no product or order cap in the software. What decides it is hosting sized for the load, object caching, the High-Performance Order Storage tables (the default for new stores since WooCommerce 8.2) and a short, maintained plugin list. An unmaintained store on shared hosting struggles at any size.
Should we move from WooCommerce to Shopify?
Move when nobody owns updates and security, when the cost of keeping the store healthy is more than Shopify would charge, or when you need channels Shopify runs well. Stay when you depend on control of the code and data or on logic Shopify's checkout cannot express. Either way, every old URL needs a redirect and the order history needs reconciling, or search traffic and reporting suffer.
What does Gigabit charge to build on Shopify or WooCommerce?
A new store on either platform starts at $9,000 fixed: a custom theme, up to 500 products, payments, shipping, tax and up to three integrations. A move from one to the other starts at $7,000 fixed. We are a Shopify Partner and also build and maintain WooCommerce stores, so we have no reason to push either.
Price both platforms at your volume first.
Thirty minutes on your sales, your gateway, your team and who keeps the store running, and which of the two fits that.