Shopify vs WooCommerce — 2026 verdict.

Shopify and WooCommerce together power most of the world's small-to-mid ecommerce. They're both excellent — and they're built around opposite philosophies. Shopify is a hosted, managed SaaS with predictable costs and constrained flexibility. WooCommerce is a self-hosted, open-source plugin that gives you total control at the cost of operational responsibility. Pick wrong and you'll either fight the platform forever or spend years maintaining infrastructure you didn't want.

The 30-second answer

Shopify wins for: first-time merchants, sub-£100k revenue, ecommerce-only operations, teams without technical resources, and brands prioritising speed-to-market. WooCommerce wins for: content-led brands, multi-revenue-stream businesses (services + products), SEO-ambitious operations, stores past £200k revenue, and anyone who wants long-term ownership without monthly platform fees.

Build cost comparison

Shopify theme customisation: £1,500–£4,500. Custom Shopify build: £4,500–£15,000. WooCommerce theme-based: £2,500–£6,000. Custom WooCommerce: £4,500–£15,000. Build cost is roughly equivalent — what differs dramatically is the ongoing cost.

Monthly running costs

Shopify: Basic £19/mo, Shopify £49/mo, Advanced £259/mo, Plus £1,800+/mo. Add typical app stack (£100–£500/mo). WooCommerce: Managed hosting £30–£200/mo, plugin licences ~£20–£60/mo amortised, optional maintenance £50–£200/mo. On a typical SMB store WooCommerce comes in £80–£300/mo cheaper.

Transaction fees — the hidden cost

This is the biggest financial difference and the one most easily missed. Shopify charges an extra 0.5–2% on every transaction unless you use Shopify Payments. WooCommerce takes nothing extra. On £500k revenue using Stripe instead of Shopify Payments, the Shopify penalty is £2,500/year. Multiply across years and it dwarfs every other cost difference.

Three-year total cost on a £200k store

Shopify (Basic + apps + Shopify Payments): ~£18,000–£25,000. WooCommerce (managed hosting + plugins + maintenance): ~£12,000–£20,000. The gap widens as revenue grows because Shopify pricing scales with success but WooCommerce hosting typically doesn't.

SEO and content

WooCommerce sits on WordPress, which is the gold standard for content-led SEO. Full URL control, Rank Math/Yoast, custom post types, programmatic SEO, schema flexibility — all available out of the box. Shopify has improved but still forces /products/ and /collections/ URL structures, has a thinner blog engine, and lacks the plugin sophistication. For content-driven ecommerce, WooCommerce wins clearly.

Scalability and operations

Shopify scales infinitely with no operational burden — that's the whole pitch. You pay more and Shopify handles infrastructure. WooCommerce scales as well as your hosting and developer support; the operational responsibility is yours. For lean teams without technical resources, Shopify's reliability is genuinely valuable. For teams with engineering capacity, WooCommerce's control and cost structure are usually preferable.

My framework

Under £50k revenue, no developer, ecommerce-only: Shopify Basic. £50k–£500k, content-led, has access to a developer: WooCommerce. £500k+, multi-store, B2B, US/global: Shopify Plus or bespoke headless. Service business with products on the side: WooCommerce. Pure DTC, brand-first: Shopify. Pick by your actual operating model, not by what's loudest on Twitter.