Shopify or WooCommerce? For most entrepreneurs who mainly want to sell and spend as little time as possible on technology, Shopify is the safer choice: hosting, security and updates are taken care of and you pay a fixed monthly fee. WooCommerce fits better if you already have a content-heavy WordPress website, want full control over your code and have someone who keeps up with maintenance. This article compares the two honestly: costs, payment methods such as iDEAL, speed, maintenance, flexibility and switching later.
The short version
- Shopify is a ready-made platform: you rent your shop including hosting and maintenance. Quick to launch, few worries, but less freedom.
- WooCommerce is a free WordPress extension that you host yourself. Lots of freedom, but you're responsible for hosting, updates and security.
- The costs sit in different places: with Shopify in the subscription and paid apps, with WooCommerce in hosting, paid plugins and maintenance.
- If neither fits, for example because your ordering process is unusual, custom development or a combination is the better route.
The biggest difference: renting or managing it yourself
Shopify is software you rent. Shopify takes care of the servers, security, updates and checkout. You set up your shop, pick a theme and add features with apps. That keeps things simple: when something technical needs doing, Shopify does it.
WooCommerce is open-source software you install on your own WordPress website. The plugin itself is free, but you need hosting, and you (or your developer) keep WordPress, WooCommerce and every plugin up to date. In return you get full access to the code and the database, and you can in principle change anything.
Costs: what are you paying for?
Exact prices change regularly, so let's look at how the costs are built up.
Shopify
- A fixed monthly fee for the subscription, depending on the plan you choose.
- Transaction costs per payment. With Shopify's own payment solution you only pay the payment fees; with an external payment provider, Shopify often adds an extra percentage on top.
- Apps. Many extra features, such as reviews, filters or integrations, are apps with their own monthly fee. They add up quickly.
- A theme can be free or cost a one-off amount.
WooCommerce
- Hosting. Cheap hosting is tempting, but a webshop needs fast, reliable hosting, and that costs more.
- Paid plugins and extensions, often with a yearly licence, for features that Shopify covers with an app or the platform itself.
- Maintenance. Updates, security and backups take time or a maintenance contract. This is the cost most often forgotten.
- Transaction costs go only to your payment provider, not to WooCommerce.
Adding it up: WooCommerce looks cheaper because the software is free, but with good hosting, plugins and maintenance the difference is often smaller than you'd expect. Shopify's costs are more predictable; with WooCommerce you have more say over where your money goes.
Payments: iDEAL and local payment methods
For Dutch customers iDEAL is essential, and both platforms support it. On Shopify that works through its own payment solution or an external provider. On WooCommerce you connect a payment provider through a plugin. With Shopify, watch for the extra transaction fee when using an external provider; with WooCommerce, check that your payment provider's plugin is well maintained.
Speed and reliability
A slow shop costs sales. Shopify runs on infrastructure built for peak traffic, such as around Black Friday, and you don't have to do anything for that. Many heavy apps can still slow your shop down, though. With WooCommerce, speed depends entirely on your hosting, theme and number of plugins. Set up well it can be very fast, but keeping it that way takes more know-how.
Maintenance and security
For many business owners this is the deciding factor. On Shopify the platform is updated and secured for you. On WooCommerce, WordPress, WooCommerce and every plugin need regular updates. Skip them and you take on security risks; apply them without testing and an update can break your checkout. If nobody will take this on structurally, don't choose WooCommerce.
Flexibility and custom work
WooCommerce wins on freedom: you can change the code, the database and the checkout completely. Shopify is more limited, especially around the checkout, but with apps, theme changes and custom code it stretches further than many people think. A few examples of what we built on Shopify:
- Glasfixer: a webshop with a price calculator for made-to-measure glass. Customers enter dimensions and thickness and see the price straight away, without a quote. The shop launched with three products and saves Glasfixer 10 hours a week.
- MyBeauty247: Shopify with custom code for thousands of products, linked to several marketplaces, with all orders in one overview. Delivered within a tight deadline.
- TurkijeOnderweg: a multilingual webshop with its own React front end and Shopify behind it for orders and admin, with the whole ordering process on one page.
- QuickerWhite: a Shopify webshop built from scratch, focused on design, speed and conversion.
Switching later: how locked in are you?
You can move away from either platform, but it's always a project. Products and customers usually export well; order history, URLs and integrations need more care. Watch your search visibility in particular: make sure old product pages redirect to the new ones, or you'll lose rankings in Google. With Shopify you depend on the platform and its terms. With WooCommerce you own everything, but you're also responsible for everything.
Which one fits you?
Choose Shopify if
- you mainly want to sell and have no time or appetite for technical management;
- you want to launch quickly with a reliable checkout;
- you like predictable monthly costs;
- you expect to grow or have busy peak periods.
Choose WooCommerce if
- you already have a content-heavy WordPress website and want to add a shop to it;
- full control over code and data matters to you;
- you have a developer or maintenance partner who handles updates and security structurally.
Tip: when comparing, don't count just the software but everything you spend per year: subscription or hosting, apps or plugins, transaction costs and maintenance. Set that against your expected revenue and the choice often becomes obvious.
When neither fits: custom
Sometimes a standard platform doesn't fit, for example with a very specific ordering process, complex price calculations or integrations no app handles well. Then you can have a fully custom webshop built, or choose a combination: your own front end with Shopify behind it for payments and order management, as with TurkijeOnderweg. That way you keep the reliability of a platform and the freedom of custom work.
Need help choosing?
We mostly build on Shopify and fully custom, and advise per situation what fits best. We also migrate existing webshops, including products, customers and order history, and stay available after launch for maintenance and further development. Read more about having a webshop built, browse our cases or plan a free intake.