eCommerce platform refers to a software solution that helps businesses launch and run a virtual store. Specifically, this includes everything from hosting services and payment gateways to inventory management. More about these best selling platforms, are you ready to learn the best eCommerce solutions to power your store? Here are 8 top eCommerce platforms:
Let’s do a big drum and dive into it!
Types of Ecommerce Platforms: Hosted vs. Open-source
Some of the best eCommerce platforms are hosted solutions, and others are open-source. In case you haven’t been acquainted with these notions, let us give you a walkthrough of hosted vs. open-source platforms right below.
Hosted platforms | Open-source platforms | |
Cost of ownership | Require monthly subscriptions with different pricing tiers. | Free to download and install, but sellers have to pay other fees to run your store (hosting, domain names, etc.). |
Setup, ongoing maintenance, and support | Easy to set up, maintain, and offer dedicated 24/7 customer support. | Need technical knowledge to set up, maintain, and support often comes in the forms of forums, groups, or communities. |
Customization | Allow certain customization levels. | Provide unlimited customization capabilities. |
Scalability | Have built-in scalability features for sellers. | Let users determine scalability based on technical skills and other resources. |
Security | Set up PCI level 1 as standard for all users. | Do not set up security and put full authority on users. |
Features and integrations | Offer a wide range of add-ons and integrations. | Also have tons of add-ons and integrations but require some technical skills to maneuver. |
8 Best Ecommerce Platforms for E-sellers in 2023
Ready to unlock the top eCommerce platforms of 2023 yet? Let’s now discover our 8 best candidates along with their pricing tiers, feature highlights, and more!
#1. Shopify
Being among the most popular eCommerce platforms, Shopify currently supports 4.5+ million virtual stores, including Colourpop.com and Fashionova.com. Now Why don’t we take a tour of what it can offer and how much Shopify is?
Shopify has long been well-known for its ease of use. To begin with, Shopify central dashboard is highly organized and comprehensive even for inexperienced sellers. In addition, all maneuverings on this platform is simple, and there is absolutely no coding skill needed.
Along with that, this selling platform stands out thanks to its dynamic theme-app market, which helps with customization and functionalization.
Firstly, let’s talk about its themes. Every theme available on Shopify has been carefully selected and designed for the best mobile responsiveness and incredible loading speed. Moreover, when using paid themes by Shopify, sellers have greater chances of optimizing their UX design and perhaps raising sales potential. And if you are still uncertain about Shopify themes, you can make us of its unlimited free trial, then decide.
In alignment with themes, sellers are recommended to make use of third-party add-ons and expand the store’s functionality. If you asked us, Shopify add-ons are always strictly selected by its in-house team.
Besides, the platform has a powerful algorithm that recommends the most suitable apps for users. This is to ensure online merchants will get the most out of Shopify functionality while they face certain limitations due to the hosted shopping cart features.
Note: Don’t forget to check Shopify inventory management apps, Shopify product review tools, SEO supporters, and page builders. These are the most significant sections in the Shopify app store.
Shopify’s pricing
Shopify's pricing | ||
Basic | $39/ month | |
Shopify | $105/ month | |
Advanced | $399/ month | |
Save 25% by choosing Shopify annual plans! | ||
Top eCommerce platforms – Shopify’s feature highlights
- Generate one order management system for an entire store
- Charge no transaction fees if sellers use Shopify payment processor
- Offer built-in SEO features and add-ons to enhance overall invisibility
- Grant access to powerful Shopify analytics (product insights, sales, and customers analysis)
- Enable cart abandonment checking
- Provide merchants with facilities to set up dropshipping businesses easily
- Match SMEs demands with Shopify POS system (Point-of-sale)
Who should use Shopify
Undoubtedly, it will make an ideal choice for SMEs and dropshipping businesses. Besides, many consider Shopify one of the best eCommerce websites for the POD sector, given its excellent infrastructure for non-inventory-based stores.
Still looking for more information? Check out our latest post on the pros and cons of Shopify right here!
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#2. Wix
Along with Shopify, Wix reputes among the best eCommerce platforms for small businesses. But why? To answer that, let’s glance at a brief Wix review right below!
First and foremost, Wix impresses users with its intuitive drag-and-drop site builder, as well as provides them with detailed instructions to create websites with ease. Besides, when using Wix to build virtual stores, you can access the following methods:
- Wix Editor: A platform that helps to build and edit websites with a full package of features. Customizing elements, choosing themes, and adding texts, are all available with the Wix Editor.
- Wix ADI (Artificial Design Intelligence): The Wix ADI is a bit more advanced than the Wix Editor because it learns about you. At first, it will ask you some questions, including what your site serves or what you sell. Afterward, based on the accumulated information, the Wix ADI will build a website that looks stunning and matches your purpose the most.
- Velo by Wix: This tool is responsible for accelerating your process of building web applications. Especially, the Velo by Wix is highly recommended for e-retailers since it helps with visuals, shop functionality, and interactions.
Furthermore, other reasons motivating sellers to go for this top eCommerce website include Wix’s affordable pricing tiers, platform versatility, and excellent showcasing experience. Should your business align with any of the mentioned points, consider Wix!
Wix’s pricing
Wix's pricing | ||
Business & eCommerce plans | ||
Business Basic | $17/ month | |
Business Unlimited | $25/ month | |
Business VIP | $35/ month | |
Enterprise plan: depending on customer's demand | ||
Top eCommerce platforms – Wix’s feature highlights
- Enable effortless site establishing with Wix’s drag-and-drop website builder
- Offer tools (Wix Editor, Wix ADI, etc.) to build websites easily from scratch
- Provide Wix SEO Wiz, which walks you through key steps to optimize websites
- Grant access to beautiful and elegant website themes
- Have an excessive range of add-ons and extensions to functionalize your store
Who should use Wix
According to LitCommerce’s experts, Wix has outstanding visual, flexibility, ease of use, and robust SEO features. As a result, it is the best eCommerce platform for businesses wanting to showcase, especially service providers. And it would not demand you any coding skill, which means no in-house coding team is in need!
#3. BigCommerce
Like Shopify and Wix, BigCommerce is pretty much a dominant factor in terms of the top eCommerce platforms. Here is a brief but comprehensive BigCommerce review.
Overall, BigCommerce is among the industry-leading SaaS eCommerce platforms with incredible functionality. Particularly, this selling site is highly compatible with B2B businesses or stores with large inventory. When selling on BigCommerce, retailers surely benefit from its rich built-in features, including inventory management, professional performance analytics, powerful SEO features, and many more.
Adding to that, BigCommerce has robust customization for users. In spite of being a hosted solution, customization limits are not an issue for BigCommerce users. Given the robust API by BigCommerce, developers can then get access to underlying codes to customize their stores as desired. Notably, BigCommerce’s great sense of customization helps to reduce seller’s reliance on third parties remarkably.
Yet, due to the hosted cart features, BigCommerce will still offer non-techies enough resources to create online stores in minutes.
BigCommerce’s pricing
BigCommerce's pricing | ||
Standard | $39/ month ($29/ month for annual bills) | |
Plus | $105/ month ($79/ month for annual bills) | |
Pro | $399/ month ($299/ month for annual bills) | |
Top eCommerce platforms – BigCommerce’s feature highlights
- Allow multichannel selling with multiple storefronts, currencies, integrations, etc.
- Handle massive traffic with incredibly fast loading speed
- Offer great scalability with the freedom to expand your business
- Have powerful SEO features to optimize stores on search engines
- Give newbies the tools to create a store but saves room for tech-savvy to develop as they wish
- Provide frictionless checkout experience via potent API
- Charge no transaction fees on any plan
Who should use BigCommerce
As mentioned above, this top eCommerce platform will be a perfect fit for stores with large inventory or businesses of medium to large scale.
#4. WooCommerce
Aside from being one of the top eCommerce platforms, WooCommerce is truly a dominator of open-source eCommerce websites. Due to the self-hosted features, WooCommerce is free to install and does not limit your customization capabilities. However, there will still be compulsory fees, including hosting service, domain registration, themes, and ongoing maintenance.
Going into more detail, WooCommerce offers wonderful eCommerce functionality for every seller. The rationale behind it refers to selling features that are achieved through WooCommerce with 55,000+ plugins. How impressive is that! Specifically, you can have order tracking, customer engagement, or any inventory management tools on your website.
Still, they are conducted with technical expertise and coding skills. If considering this aspect, WooCommerce can get a bit triggering, even when it gets recognition as a user-friendly open-source eCommerce platform.
Get to know more about this selling website through our latest WooCommerce review!
WooCommerce’s pricing
WooCommerce's pricing | ||
Hosting cost | $120/ year | |
Domain registration | $15/ year | |
Theme cost | Up to $100/ year | |
Shipping cost | Up to $108/ year | |
Payment gateway cost | Up to $30/ month | |
Marketing cost | Up to $348/ year | |
Ongoing maintenance and security | Up to $379/ year | |
Top eCommerce platforms – WooCommerce’s feature highlights
- Track order status and shipment (shared with your customers) through extension
- Allow customer engagement through numerous add-ons
- Have unlimited customization capabilities
- Generate detailed and practical business analytics when in use
- Offer 55,000+ extensions to customize any store
Who should use WooCommerce
Even though WooCommerce has a strong sense of customization and functionality, the idea of using the platform for large enterprises isn’t really the case. However, this would work smoothly for small to medium businesses with some coding knowledge.
#5. PrestaShop
When it comes to PrestaShop, e-sellers are impressed by its dynamic add-on market. According to the latest update by the house, there are currently more than 4,000 extensions for merchants to customize their shops and expand the sense of functionality. Furthermore, as you launch your business on PrestaShop, you can access its 2,200+ themes.
Regarding other aspects of eCommerce, PrestaShop can make a great choice for niche product sellers. Explaining it more clearly, PrestaShop allows e-merchants to have multiple storefronts from one installation. This helps them establish suitable sales channels for their products, in case they belong to different branches. Compared with other marketplaces or platforms like Etsy, PrestaShop seems to have a winning point.
PrestaShop’s pricing
PrestaShop's pricing | ||
Hosting cost | $48 to $168/ year | |
Domain registration | $10 to $15/ year | |
Theme & add-on cost | $35 to $200/ year | |
Ongoing maintenance and security | $5 to $1000/ year depending on traffic and needs | |
Top eCommerce platforms – PrestaShop’s feature highlights
- Optimize SEO to its fullest levels with 194+ devoted modules
- Enable stunning store customization with 2,200+ themes
- Have more than 250 options for payment gateway integrations
- Stay responsive on any device
- Allow sellers to have multiple storefronts from one installation
Who should use PrestaShop
In general, PrestaShop is likely to make an ideal choice for e-sellers of small to medium scale. Adding to that, niche product sellers can take advantage of the platform’s features to open multiple storefronts from one installation.
Multchannel Selling Has Never Been Easier with LitCommerce
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#6. Adobe Commerce (Magento)
Unquestionably, Adobe Commerce (formerly Magento) is the best platform for large enterprises. Being a self-hosted solution, Adobe Commerce does not charge you any initial cost to download or install. But every seller would have to pay for hosting, domain, security, maintenance, and support, just like WooCommerce.
Talking about Adobe Commerce, we cannot go without security. As far as we know, Adobe Commerce has developed a Security center to guarantee every customer’s data is safe and secure. Accordingly, Adobe Commerce may be a fit for medium to large-scale businesses.
One last note about Adobe Commerce is that you should have a strong in-house technical team to handle tasks. This results from Adobe’s Commerce user support, which may not be the most dedicated one.
Adobe Commerce’s pricing
Adobe Commerce's pricing | ||
Hosting cost | $120 to $600/ year | |
Domain registration | $10 to $20/ year | |
SSL certificate cost | Up to $600/ year | |
Theme cost | $17 to $5000+ | |
Extension & add-on cost | Up to $2000+ | |
Payment processing cost | 2 - 4% per transaction | |
Top eCommerce platforms – Adobe Commerce’s feature highlights
- Manage inventory effectively for large enterprises with diverse extensions
- Integrate with multiple selling channels and applications
- Deliver tailored promotion and contribute to enhanced order values, as well as higher conversion rates
- Offer omnichannel selling options
- Have excellent scalability for enterprise levels
Who should use Adobe Commerce
Adobe Commerce is definitely among the top eCommerce platforms for large and B2B businesses with their own technical teams. Also, remember that the actual selling fees you need to pay Adobe Commerce are pretty pricey. Hence, it would make more sense for enterprises to use Adobe Commerce.
#7. Squarespace
Coming up next on our list of the top eCommerce platforms is Squarespace. On the contrary with BigCommerce, Squarespace is among the best eCommerce platforms for small businesses, particularly content-driven ones.
Speaking more about Squarespace, the biggest reason why sellers fall in love with it gets down to high-quality and strictly selected website themes. Particularly, before you even start building your virtual store, Squarespace will give you some questions to update precisely what your site is for. Then, this eCommerce platform will suggest the most stunning and suitable themes.
Moreover, non-techies will have no difficulties launching their online businesses because of Squarespace’s drag-and-drop site editor. Perhaps, the only drawback of Squarespace refers to its lack of add-ons to functionalize a virtual store.
Squarespace’s pricing
Squarespace's pricing | ||
Personal | $16/ month | |
Business | $23/ month | |
Commerce (Basic) | $27/ month | |
Commerce (Advanced) | $49/ month | |
Top eCommerce platforms – Squarespace’s feature highlights
- Have impressing website themes for sellers
- Let users take advantage of its drag-and-drop website editor to build stores with ease
- Provide full services to establish virtual stores or websites from scratch
- Grant access to HTML and CSS for further customization and development
- Help to optimize your website on search engines with strong built-in SEO features
Who should use Squarespace
Anyone with small-scaled businesses or focus on blogging, service showcasing, and photographing should definitely consider Squarespace seriously. Besides, if you run a medium-scaled business, Squarespace can still adapt to your demands.
#8. GoDaddy
Continuing our top list of eCommerce platforms, let’s give GoDaddy a quick check and see if it fits your business model. Here is what we have got about GoDaddy.
On the first hand, it is a hosted shopping cart solution, which means GoDaddy is easy to build, even for beginners. In contrast with open-source eCommerce platforms, maintenance issues or security won’t be a problem. So, if you are new to the eCommerce world, choosing a hosted software is not a bad idea at all.
In addition to its ease of use, when sellers go live on GoDaddy, they will get the most effective social media integrations, such as Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and Google My Business. More of it, GoDaddy provides you with the ultimate mobile-responsive design that helps your customers achieve the most pleasant shopping experience on any device.
Last but not least, GoDaddy is highly recommended for e-merchants who are on a budget and looking for valuable plans for their money. Therefore, we would say you give it a try!
GoDaddy’s pricing
GoDaddy's pricing | ||
Basic | $9.99/ month | |
Premium | $14.99/ month | |
Commerce | $16.99/ month | |
Commerce Plus | $29.99/ month | |
Top eCommerce platforms – GoDaddy’s feature highlights
- Integrate with the most popular social media platforms
- Conduct reports and analytics to track performance and adjust overall strategies
- Have plentiful shipping options that adapt to sellers’ demands
- Let users, including new and experienced set up their store at ease
- Offer outstanding on-site inventory management
Who should use GoDaddy
Considering all features, GoDaddy is probably the best eCommerce platform for startups and small businesses.
Ecommerce Platforms: Essential Features to Look for
Regardless of what platform you choose, always look for the following eCommerce features. They are the basic functionality a business needs to succeed online. Let’s check them out!
- Payment process: Any eCommerce website must be able to accept and process payment. Normally, a platform will offer certain payment processors. Nonetheless, there may still be limitations, considering factors such as business sizes or product types. Therefore, you may need your own payment processors in some cases.
- Inventory management: The next fundamental feature of eCommerce platforms is inventory management. This refers to keeping track of product quantity and ensuring you never oversell or stock out.
- Security guarantee: When it comes to ranking top eCommerce platforms, security plays a massive role. As you choose an eCommerce site to kick off, check if it offers security features such as SSL certificates, password protection, or PCI compliance.
- Analytics: Evidently, knowing your sales performance and the current audience helps to implement more effective strategies. Consequently, it makes a good reason to find an eCommerce website providing thorough analytics.
- Mobile optimization: Do you know 50% of eCommerce purchases in the 2022 holiday season was through mobiles? Or 79% of mobile users shopped online in the past 6 months? These impressive statistics have shown how important mobile optimization is. So why not go for a platform that functions properly on mobile devices?
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Top Ecommerce Platforms for E-sellers – FAQs
- 1. What is the best eCommerce platform?
- Shopify: Best for SMEs and dropshipping businesses.
- Wix: Best for showcasing products and services.
- BigCommerce: Best for medium to large-scale businesses with great customization.
- WooCommerce: Best for small to medium businesses with some technical knowledge.
- PrestaShop: Best for small to medium businesses and niche product sellers.
- Adobe Commerce: Best for enterprises who have strong technical teams.
- Squarespace: Best for small businesses, bloggers, photographers, and service providers.
- GoDaddy: Best for small businesses and startups.
- 2. What is an open-source eCommerce platform?
An open-source eCommerce platform (or so-called self-hosted solution) is any platform that allows you to access, download, and install the original code. These platforms are free to install initially, but you will have to pay for several fees, including hosting services and domain registration. The most important thing about using open-source platforms is that you need some technical expertise and coding skills to maneuver desired customizations.
- 3. What are the two biggest eCommerce platforms?
Currently, the two biggest eCommerce platforms are WooCommerce (open-source), which accounts for about 30% of online stores worldwide, and Shopify (hosted solution), running more than 4.5 million virtual shops.
It’s A Wrap!
That’s the end of our top eCommerce platforms in 2023 for online merchants. On this list, we have walked through 8 suggestions, along with their feature highlights, pricing, and compatibility. From the given list, we believe you have compiled a comprehensive comparison of eCommerce platforms in general and chosen what is best for your store.
If you still have any question relating to the topic, don’t hesitate to contact us for further consultancies. Also, we are working on a Retailer Blog and Facebook community to update the latest trends, growth hacks, and selling tricks in eCommerce. Hence, should you be interested in the field, simply stay tuned and join us We are looking forward to your participation and sharing!
