WordPress, Shopify, and Magento are widely used, and popular platforms for building dynamic e-commerce websites on the internet. These are the biggest names, and businesses usually choose one of the three when thinking to open an e-commerce store.

If you’re a business owner who wants to turn their business into an e-commerce store, then you’ll naturally consider one of the following.

Here is a detailed review of each e-commerce website platform.

WordPress

Overview

WordPress is an open-source management system that runs on PHP, MySQL, or MariaDB database. The e-commerce website creating platform was launched in May of 2003 by a famous duo, American developer, Matt Mullenweg, and English developer Mike Little.

The platform is used to make web pages for websites, storing content related to the website, and publish those without many requirements. The only requirement is owning a domain and a hosting service. It’s a great choice for blog sites.

Features

  1. Simplistic Layout

If you’re familiar and comfortable using MS Word, then WordPress is a piece of cake for you. The platform has a very simple layout. All you need to do is, insert content, save, review, and publish.

  1. Supports Every Kind of Website

With WordPress, you can build all kinds of website you want, whether it’s a blog site, e-commerce store, news website, or magazine website. You can create a website with just a few clicks with your customized themes, colors, and design.

  1. Allows Third-Party Themes

WordPress offers three standard themes for you to pick from to build your website. However, it also gives you complete access to thousands of themes, if you don’t like any standard themes. Other than that, you can also upload your theme.

Pros

  1. Low-Cost Development

When you use WordPress to build a website, you only need to pay for the domain and web hosting service. The software and the built-in plugins are free to use.

  1. No Programming Language Required

WordPress is as easy to use as a word document. Users don’t need knowledge of any programming language. Additionally, you can also add images by dragging and dropping.

  1. Create Custom Designs

Even though WordPress offers unlimited access to multiple designs, users also have the option to create their designs. For example, if you’re a restaurant owner, you can create webpages according to the theme of your restaurant. Design your website just the way you like it!

Cons

  1. Low Page Speed

WordPress is a dynamic website creating tool; however, it comes with its limitations. For example, having one too many plugins can slow down your website drastically. A low-speed page-load website is a huge turn off for most users, and if it’s not fixed in time, you can use potential customers.

  1. Target for Hacking

WordPress is a widely used platform for building websites, which makes it a common and easy target for hackers. It’s frequently targeted, and the information is misused. However, to deflect hackers, all you need is a security plugin.

  1. Ownership for Features

Since WordPress is an open-source platform and free to use, you can’t control or change the nature of any features. It means that in the next update, it’s possible that the official feature you were using was taken down or removed.

Shopify

Overview

Shopify is the name of a popular e-commerce platform that is used to design and create innovative websites. Shopify offers users a variety of options like payment methods, marketing tools, tracking shipments, and customer engagement tools. It has simplified the process of tracking and maintaining orders and made it accessible to many retailers.

Shopify was launched by Tobias Lütke, Daniel Weinand, and Scott Lake in 2006. The platform uses the Ruby on Rails framework. It’s a great choice for developing an e-commerce store. Businesses can easily develop and maintain a website with Shopify without hiring a developer.

Features

  1. Unlimited Bandwidth

Shopify places no restrictions on how much traffic you can get. When you build a Shopify website, you can attract as many users as you want to do business. You can also upload unlimited product photos, content, and products.

  1. Built-in Fraud Analysis Feature

The Shopify platform comes with a built-in fraud analysis feature that is available on all the plans. The feature analyzes each order and flags any suspicious or fraudulent orders that need your immediate attention.

  1. Abandoned Cart & User Recovery

Shopify offers a very exciting feature known as the ACR or Abandoned Checkout Recovery. The feature automatically shoots emails to users who leave your website without checking out. With ACR, you can bring those customers back easily.

Pros

  1. Built-in Speed & Security only for Hosting

Users hate waiting for a page to load, and they’re also terrified of websites that don’t appear to be secure. Shopify deals with that by offering a built-in page load speed and security feature. The feature increases the page load speed and offers additional security.

  1. Excellent Marketing Support

Shopify offers basic tools for marketing with every subscription package. It makes sure that every customer has access to the SEO tools that will help their website rank in a competitive market.

  1. Sell Your Products Everywhere

The biggest advantage of using Shopify is that it supports multiple social media platforms and channels. For example, you can sell products on Facebook, Amazon, Pinterest, mobile apps, Instagram, etc.

Cons

  1. Understanding Shopify’s PHP aka ‘Liquid’

Shopify has created its PHP language known as ‘Liquid.’ The complete theme library is coded using Liquid, which makes it hard to make customized themes. Businesses will need to hire a developer who knows Liquid or switch to the premium package.

  1. Pay Extra to Get More

If you want to use more advanced features like analytical reports, advanced fraud analysis, gift cards, you need an upgrade. All the advanced features are available at a higher cost that is charged monthly.

Magento

Overview

Magento is an open-source e-commerce software that is used to build elite and high-end websites. It was created and released in 2008 by Varien Inc. to create scalably, user, and search-engine-friendly websites.

Magento offers an industry-leading solution to large businesses and enterprises. More than 100,000 e-commerce websites run on the platform.

Features

  1. Payment Methods

The platform offers multiple payment options like credit cards, debit cards, PayPal, cheques, money orders, Google checkouts, bank transfers, etc.

  1. Fully SEO-centric

Magento is a one-stop solution to all your SEO needs. It comes fully equipped with all SEO features that can boost the discoverability of your website. It offers features like, Google sitemaps, SEO-friendly URLs, meta-tag every product and information, faster-loading speed.

  1. Mobile-Friendly Commerce

The biggest feature of Magento has to be its personalized design for mobile users. It allows you to create a responsive design that can fit any screen size. Users can zoom in, zoom out, support multi-touch, media files, and all OS browsers.

Pros

  1. Easily Modifiable

Magento is an open-source platform that allows you to modify the code as per your project requirements. Additionally, the third-party integration for designs, themes, content, etc. is also easy and quick.

  1. Largest Community

Magento is a famous platform that is used in various parts of the world, and so it has the largest community. The large community inspires new plugins, extensions, tools, and features that are quickly available to the public.

  1. Offers Scalability

Magento offers scalability like no other e-commerce platform. Businesses grow as trends keep changing, and Magento offers hinder-free solutions to help you grow your online presence. As tested, it can handle 500,000 products and thousands of transactions within an hour.

Cons

  1. Not Easy on the Pocket

Magento has many versions that range from free to very expensive. It’s not for every business to afford. So, the premium packages are targeted at large businesses, and the free version is available for the public.

  1. Not Many Developers

Even though Magento is a huge community, it still doesn’t have many developers to offer. Magento is a complex system to understand, and it requires object-oriented understanding to work with it. It has over 20,000 files and 200+ databases that require time and patience to master. A Magento developer doesn’t come cheap.

  1. Dedicated Hosting

To run a Magento website, you need to use a host dedicated to Magento. If you try using a third-party host, that will not work and will prolong the development process. So, make sure to configure it in a server that you and your developer know how to work with.

WordPress vs. Shopify vs. Magento Which one is better?

We understand the uncertainty of choosing the right platform for you and your businesses. The e-commerce market is at an all-time high, and everyone has a website, even if it’s a single webpage. However, to choose between the three understand that WordPress is an old-fashioned tool that isn’t completely reliable. Shopify is an affordable platform that is very user-friendly and offers constant support. Magento, however, has the potential to take your business to the next level faster than the other platforms. So, choose your platform wisely. Good luck!