01 / Guides
The fundamental difference
Shopify is a rented platform (SaaS). You pay monthly and Shopify handles hosting, security, updates and the checkout. You choose a theme and apps and manage your products.
WooCommerce is a free, open-source plugin for WordPress. You install it on your own hosting and own everything, but you are also responsible for everything: server, updates, backups, security and speed.
02 / Guides
Shopify vs WooCommerce: the decision table
Shopify prices below are the euro prices on Shopify's European pricing pages in November 2026.
| Criterion | Shopify | WooCommerce |
|---|---|---|
| Platform fee | Basic €27/month (€19 billed yearly), Grow €74 (€56), Advanced €384 (€289) | €0; you pay for hosting, domain and extensions |
| Transaction fees | With Shopify Payments, card fees only (Basic: 1.8 % + €0.30). With another provider, an extra 2 % / 1 % / 0.6 % to Shopify | Only your payment provider's fees |
| Hosting and security | Included, with SSL and a PCI-compliant checkout | Your responsibility; hosting quality decides speed |
| Maintenance | Minimal; Shopify updates the platform | Ongoing: WordPress, WooCommerce, plugins and PHP need updates and testing |
| Design | Themes and a visual editor; full freedom with Liquid code or Shopify Hydrogen | Full freedom; quality depends heavily on theme and page builder |
| SEO | Solid out of the box; fixed URL structure (/products/, /collections/) | Full control of URLs and content; strong for content-heavy shops |
| Extensions | Apps from the Shopify App Store, many with monthly fees | Thousands of plugins; many premium extensions with yearly licences |
| Switching later | Products, customers and orders export as CSV; theme and apps stay behind | You own everything, including database and code |
| Best for | Shops that want to sell quickly and grow without a tech team | WordPress sites with a shop, highly custom catalogues, full control |
03 / Guides
What each one really costs
Shopify costs are predictable: plan, payment fees, apps. Apps are where budgets drift: five apps at €10 to €20 a month cost more than the Basic plan. Before installing one, check whether your theme already does the job.
WooCommerce is free software, but the shop is not. Typical market ranges: suitable WordPress hosting for a shop €10 to €40 a month, a premium theme €50 to €100, and common premium extensions €50 to €300 a year each. The biggest line, though, is maintenance: someone has to update, test and fix what breaks after an update.
Our article on what an online shop costs lists every line for launching and running a shop.
04 / Guides
Maintenance: the line most people underestimate
A WooCommerce shop is WordPress, WooCommerce, a theme and often 20 to 40 plugins from different vendors. Any update can trigger a conflict: the checkout suddenly shows an error, payment confirmations stop arriving or the site slows down. Without a staging site, backups and someone who tests after updates, that is a real business risk.
On Shopify most of this disappears. The trade-off is that you follow Shopify's decisions: when Shopify changes prices, features or checkout rules, you move with it. For most small and mid-sized shops that trade is still a good one.
Local rules apply on both platforms. In Germany, for example, shops need unit prices and legally reviewed terms; WooCommerce uses plugins such as Germanized or German Market, while Shopify has unit pricing built in. In Portugal, invoices generally have to come from tax-certified invoicing software that you connect to either platform.
05 / Guides
SEO and speed
Both can rank well on Google. Shopify includes a sitemap, canonical tags and basic structured data, but enforces URLs with /products/ and /collections/. WooCommerce with WordPress and a plugin such as Yoast or Rank Math gives full control and is stronger when the shop lives on guides, a blog and long category content.
On speed, Shopify starts ahead because hosting and CDN are included. A WooCommerce shop can be just as fast, but only with good hosting, proper caching and few plugins. The most common slowdown is the same on both: too many apps and third-party scripts.
06 / Guides
Privacy, payments and selling across Europe
With Shopify, Shopify is your data processor and its data processing terms are part of the agreement; data is also processed outside the EU. With WooCommerce the data sits on your server, for example with an EU host, although payment, shipping, tracking and newsletter plugins still send data to third parties.
If you sell into other EU countries, check local payment methods. Shopify Payments supports methods such as iDEAL, Bancontact, BLIK and MB WAY for customers in the relevant countries. On WooCommerce it depends on the payment plugin. Both handle multiple languages: Shopify with Markets and built-in translations, WooCommerce with plugins such as WPML or Polylang. Our article on multilingual websites covers the SEO side.
07 / Guides
Our recommendation
Choose Shopify if…
you want to sell quickly, have no tech team, prefer predictable monthly costs to never-ending maintenance and would rather not be responsible for security and checkout.
Choose WooCommerce if…
you already have a strong WordPress site with lots of content, need very specific logic (configurators, unusual pricing rules) or want full control over server and data, and someone handles maintenance.
Consider Shopify Hydrogen if…
the shop is the heart of your business and you want design and speed without theme limits, while Shopify handles checkout and payments behind the scenes.
08 / Guides
Already on one of them?
Switching for its own sake rarely pays. Moving from WooCommerce to Shopify makes sense when maintenance and plugin problems cost more time than the shop earns, or payments keep failing. The reverse makes sense when Shopify apps cost more than a custom solution.
We handle moves from WooCommerce to Shopify, with products, customers and redirects. In any migration, the priority is keeping your Google rankings: every old URL needs a 301 redirect to its new address. To see how a headless Shopify store works, read Shopify Hydrogen explained, or look at the store we built for Drop Bike in Lisbon.
FAQ
Common questions
01Which is cheaper, Shopify or WooCommerce?
WooCommerce is free but needs hosting, extensions and maintenance. Shopify starts at €19 a month billed yearly in Europe, plus payment fees and apps. For a small shop without a tech team, Shopify is often cheaper overall.
02Which is better for SEO, Shopify or WooCommerce?
Both can rank well. WooCommerce gives more control over URLs and content and is stronger for content-heavy shops; Shopify is solid but has a fixed URL structure.
03What transaction fees does Shopify charge?
With Shopify Payments you pay card fees only, 1.8 % + €0.30 on Basic in Europe. With another payment provider, Shopify adds 2 % (Basic), 1 % (Grow) or 0.6 % (Advanced).
04Is WooCommerce really free?
The plugin is free. Hosting, a theme, premium extensions and above all maintenance are not, so budget for them before comparing with Shopify.
05Can I move from WooCommerce to Shopify later?
Yes. Products, customers and orders can be migrated. The critical part is 301 redirects for every old URL, so you keep your rankings.
