The Top 17 Absolute Best Shopify Alternatives for 2021
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Shopify offers your business endless growth opportunities. There are over 3.000 Apps within the Shopify App Store and they even provide their own fulfillment network.
However, Shopify doesn't necessarily have to be the best solution for your business. You may be bothered by the additional transaction fees for third-party payment providers - just want an easier solution or simply want to build a beautiful storefront with Squarespace.
No matter what's the reason, there are lots of great Shopify alternatives.
In this post, I'm going to give you an introduction to each Shopify alternative, including the pros and cons, payment methods, pricing, and main features compared to Shopify.
So if you want to know which Shopify alternative is best suited for your business, you've come to the right place.
Let's dive right in.
The Best Shopify Alternatives for Small and Mid-Sized Businesses
Here's a list of the best Shopify alternatives for small and mid-sized ecommerce businesses in 2021:
Squarespace
Squarespace is known for its awesome website builder - they provide amazing templates made by world-class designers.
However, they also offer an ecommerce platform for physical products, digital products, and services. What's also great is that they provide additional marketing tools. Thus, you can save a lot of money because you don't have to purchase these tools separately.
Pros compared to Shopify:
- Beautiful templates
- Great analytics features
- No additional fees for third-party payment providers
Cons compared to Shopify:
- No App store to enhance the functionality of your store
- Squarespace provides fewer payment options
- Overall, Shopify offers better ecommerce functionalities
Payment methods:
With Squarespace, you can connect:
- Stripe
- PayPal
- Square (supports Point of Sale)
With Shopify, you can use Shopify Payments and several other payment providers - however, you've to pay fees for using a third-party payment provider.
Pricing:
Compared to Shopify, Squarespace is much cheaper:
- Personal: $12 per month
- Business: $18 per month
- Basic Commerce: $26 per month
- Advanced Commerce: $40 per month
Square Online
Square mainly offers financial services - but they also have an ecommerce software with a Free Plan. The big benefit of using Square's ecommerce platform is that you can integrate other Square services with your online store.
Pros compared to Shopify:
- Easy to use
- Sync with your existing Square Point of Sale (PoS)
- Free Plan
- Industry-specific PoS Apps
Cons compared to Shopify:
- Online store not that customizable
- No 24/7 phone support
Payment methods:
Square Online lets you accept all major credit cards, Apple Pay, Google Pay, and Square Pay.
Pricing:
Compared to Shopify, Square Online offers a Free Plan. However, Shopify Payments has lower credit card rates than Square:
- Free: $0/month and 2.9% + 30 cents per transaction
- Professional: $12/month and 2.9% + 30 cents per transaction
- Performance: $26/month and 2.9% + 30 cents per transaction
- Premium: $72/month and 2.6% + 30 cents per transaction
Weebly
In 2018, Weebly had more than 625.000 paid subscribers.
Weebly is extremely user-friendly, and they also provide marketing tools such as Email marketing. They also offer a free plan (doesn't include ecommerce functionalities), but you can try the Weebly website builder and then go for a paid plan.
Pros compared to Shopify:
- Ease of use
- No additional fees for thrid-party payment providers
- Lower costs
- If you're already using Square services, you can integrate Weebly with these services
Cons compared to Shopify:
- No dropshipping
- Limited range of ecommerce tools
- Limited customization
Payment methods:
Compared to Shopify, Weebly offers much fewer payment options:
- Stripe
- Paypal
- Square
Pricing:
To use Weebly for ecommerce, you need to subscribe to the business plan for $25 per month.
Ecwid
Ecwid is great for businesses that want to sell products on different marketplaces like Amazon, Facebook, or Instagram - or have an existing website.
You can turn any website into an online store with Ecwid. For example, there are inbuilt integrations for:
- Wix
- Weebly
- Squarespace
- WordPress
- Joomla
- Tumblr
- Blogger
Ecwid also provides a shopping app for Android and iOS with the annual Unlimited Plan.
Pros compared to Shopify:
- Free Plan
- No additional fees for third-party payment providers
- Shopping App
- Great if you've an existing website
Cons compared to Shopify:
- Limited design
- Phone support is only available with more expensive plans
- Limited number of products with cheap plans
Payment methods:
Around 70 payment gateways, including PayPal, Stripe, and many others. There are no additional fees for third-party payment processors.
Pricing:
- Free Plan
- Venture: $15 per month
- Business: $35 per month
- Unlimited: $99 per month
Sellfy
Sellfy is the best ecommerce platform for online creators, bloggers, and small businesses who want to sell digital products, physical products, or services through their online store.
Sellfy also provides marketing tools and upselling features to increase your online sales. Here's a Sellfy review you should check out.
Pros compared to Shopify:
- Very easy to use
- Embed your store everywhere, for example on your social media profiles
Cons compared to Shopify:
- Only PayPal and Stripe
- Only up to $200k in annual sales with the highest Plan
Payment methods:
- PayPal
- Stripe
Pricing:
- Starter: $19 per Month
- Business: $39 per Month
- Premium: $89 per Month
Jimdo
Jimdo is a german company and provides easy-to-use ecommerce software for small businesses. They have a super simple website builder and very affordable pricing.
Pros compared to Shopify:
- Easy to use
- Affordable pricing
- 0% transaction fees
Cons compared to Shopify:
- Website isn't that customizable
- Not flexible
Payment methods:
Compared to Shopify, they have much fewer payment options:
- PayPal
- Credit Card
- Stripe
- Invoice
- Payment in Advance
- Local delivery
- Local pickup
- Collect-on-Delivery
- Check
Users from Germany, Austria, and Switzerland can add on additional payment methods by purchasing the Payment Options Plus addon.
Pricing:
- Basic: 15€
- Business: 19€
- VIP: 39€
Zyro
Zyro is a new ecommerce platform but it offers many awesome features and also AI functionalities. For example, you can use a content editor that automatically helps you create SEO optimized content. This is perfect for beginners who have no experience with copywriting.
Pros compared to Shopify:
- Easy to use
- Great website builder
- AI tools
- Affordable
Cons compared to Shopify:
- Complex domain handling
- Limited customizability
- Slow customer support
Payment methods:
You can choose between 50+ third-party payment providers without additional costs.
Pricing:
- Basic: $15.99
- Unleashed: $16.99
- Ecommerce: $25
- Ecommerce+: $35
Wix
Wix.com is a popular drag-and-drop website builder. But it's not only perfect to build standard websites without coding - you can also build and run an online store.
Wix.com provides over 500 templates and functionalities like collections, galleries, related products, or a customer wishlist.
Here's also a comparison between Wix and Shopify.
Pros compared to Shopify:
- Easy to use drag-and-drop builder
- 500 templates to choose from
- No additional transaction fees for third-party payment providers
Cons compared to Shopify:
- Limited storage (20GB with the VIP Plan)
- No upselling features
- Wix had SEO issues in the past
Payment methods:
With Shopify, you can use Shopify Payments and 100+ third-party payment provides. Wix.com offers WixPayments and 35+ third-party payment providers.
If you're going to use WixPayments, you've to pay these fees:
Credit Card:
- EU Countries: 1.9% of the transaction amount + 0.30 EUR
- Switzerland: 2.3% of the transaction amount + 0.30 CHF
- United Kingdom: 2.1% of the transaction amount + 0.20 GBP
- USA: 2.9% of the transaction amount + 0.30 USD
Pay Now:
- Austria, Belgium, Germany: 2.5% of the transaction amount + 0.30 EUR
- Switzerland: 2.5% of the transaction amount + 0.40 CHF
iDeal:
- 2.5% of the transaction amount + 0.30 EUR
GiroPay:
- 2.5% of the transaction amount + 0.30 EUR
Pricing:
- Business Basic: $23 per month
- Business Unlimited: $27 per month
- Business VIP: $49 per month
- Enterprise: $500 per month
Big Cartel
BigCartel is not like the other Shopify alternatives mentioned in this article. It's an ecommerce platform especially for people who sell artwork, clothing, jewelry, and photo prints.
Pros:
- Ease of use
- Perfect for artists and creators
Cons:
- Not scalable
Payment methods:
You can set up PayPal and Stripe. Big Cartel does not charge additional payment processing fees.
Pricing:
- Gold (5 products): Free
- Platinum (50 products): $9.99/mo
- Diamond (250 products): $19.99/mo
- Titanium (500 products): $29.99/mo
The Best Shopify Alternatives for Large Ecommerce Businesses
Here's a list of the best Shopify alternatives for large ecommerce businesses in 2021:
- BigCommerce
- Squarespace
- 3dcart
- Volusion
- Pinnacle Cart
- Salesforce Commerce Cloud
- WooCommerce
- Prestashop
BigCommerce
If you run a large online store, BigCommerce is a top Shopify alternative to consider. It's also an All-in-One solution like Shopify, but it comes with more in-built features you don't have to pay extra for.
That's what mainly makes the difference between BigCommerce and Shopify.
Depending on your business needs, you may go for the Essential Edition or the Enterprise Edition.
BigCommerce is especially great for multichannel selling. You can easily sell on Amazon, eBay, or on social marketplaces like Facebook or Instagram.
Pros compared to Shopify:
- Most inbuilt features
- Most scalable ecommerce platform
- Fewer transaction fees compared to Shopify
- Fantastic SEO
Cons compared to Shopify:
- Better UX with Shopify
- Shopify has better design functionalities, sales features, and an awesome inventory system
Payment methods:
With BigCommerce you can choose between 65+ payment providers without additional fees. The downside of Shopify is that you've to pay additional fees if you're using a third-party payment provider like PayPal.
Pricing:
BigCommerce prices are nearly the same as with Shopify:
- Standard: $29.95 per month
- Plus: $79.95 per month
- Pro: $299.95 per month
However, you get for your money. Shopify has a better user experience than BigCommerce, but BigCommerce provides more in-built features.
Squarespace
Yes - Squarespace is also suited for mid-sized to larger ecommerce businesses.
3dcart
3dcart is a great option for advanced sellers. They don't have such an easy-to-use website builder like Shopify, but they provide advanced features you can take advantage of if you're experienced with ecommerce.
Pros:
- Fantastic inventory
- Awesome features
- Great SEO tools
- No transaction fees for third-party payment providers
Cons:
- You need to code HTML and CSS
- Hard to use
- No mobile app
- Not beginner-friendly
Payment methods:
Choose from over 100+ payment processors with no additional fees.
Pricing:
They offer more plans than Shopify, but their prices are nearly the same:
- Startup Store: $19
- Basic Store: $29
- Plus Store: $79
- Power Store: $129
- Pro Store: $229
Volusion
Volusion is another popular ecommerce platform.
Pros:
- No transaction fees for third-party payment providers
- Great analytics tools
Cons:
- No blogging functionality
- You can only sell physical products
Payment methods:
30 payment gateways, including PayPal, Stripe, and Amazon. They don't charge additional fees. Volusion doesn't provide an in-house payment solution.
Pricing:
Pricing is nearly the same as with Shopify:
- Personal: $29 per month
- Professional: $79 per month
- Business: $299 per month
Pinnacle Cart
Pinnacle Cart is an All-in-One ecommerce solution with a lot of useful features. You can use great features like the store builder, tools for product management, SEO tools, Marketing tools and manage orders and fulfillment.
Pros:
- No additional transaction fees for third-party payment providers
- Customer Management
- SEO tools
Cons:
- Not so good usability
- PoS isn't in-built
- More expensive
Payment methods:
Pinnacle Cart partnered up with over 25 payment providers. However, if you're going for the Standard Plan, you can only use PayPal and PayPru (for $79.99 per month).
Pricing:
Pinnacle Cart is more expensive than Shopify:
- Standard: $79.95
- Advanced: $199.95
- Enterprise: You need to request a quote
Salesforce Commerce Cloud
Salesforce is the world's largest CRM system. The company has over 50.000 employees and is based in San Fransico, California.
However, they also provide an ecommerce solution. If you want an ecommerce solution with an integrated CRM system, Salesforce Commerce Cloud would be your best bet.
Pros:
- Great for large ecommerce businesses
- Integrated CRM
- AI functionalities to improve UX
Cons:
- Might not be a good fit for small businesses
- Isn't suited for dropshipping
Pricing:
Pricing isn't transparent on their site. If you're interested in Salesforce Commerce Cloud, you can request a quote.
WooCommerce
WooCommerce is a WordPress plugin you can use to turn your WordPress site into an online store.
What interesting is that most online stores in the world are powered by WooCommerce.
Why?
Because 35% of all websites worldwide run on WordPress.
WooCommerce is free to download - but it costs you money to run your WordPress site.
Pros:
- Nearly unlimited opportunites
- 300+ themes
- Flexible
Cons:
- Shopify might be a better All-in-One solution
- Not the best solution for total beginners
Payment methods:
- WooCommerce Payments: 2.9% + 30¢ per transaction for U.S. issued credit or debit cards, +1% for transactions paid using a card issued outside the US
- 100+ payment gateways without additional fees
Pricing:
WooCommerce is a free solution. However, it costs you money to run your WordPress site.
PrestaShop
Like WooCommerce, Presta Shop is free to use. It's an open-source ecommerce software written in PHP.
Presta Shop is available in over 75 languages and they have over 300.000 users worldwide.
Pros:
- Budget-Friendly
Cons:
- No official support team
- Not for beginners
Payment methods:
PrestaShop supports all major types of payment methods such as checks, cash on delivery, bank wire, PayPal, Moneybookers, and various other payment methods.
Pricing:
Presta Shop is a free ecommerce solution.
Conclusion
Shopify is a great ecommerce platform. However, if you don't want to use it - no problem - there are lots of great Shopify alternatives.
If you want to build a large ecommerce business, you should go for BigCommerce. BigCommerce is the strongest Shopify competitor and offers flexibility and scalability.
If you want to run a small to mid-sized ecommerce business, I'd recommend going for Squarespace. Squarespace is an easy-to-use solution with lots of great functionalities. Also, they have the best templates on the market.
