How to Choose an Ecommerce Platform in 2026

Choosing an ecommerce platform comes down to five decisions: hosted or self-hosted, the full cost of selling once payment and app fees are counted, whether you sell B2B as well as B2C, which systems the store must connect to, and how hard it will be to move later. Decide those before you compare themes, because a beautiful store on the wrong platform costs far more to fix than a plain one on the right platform.

For most new stores, a hosted platform is the safer start. For owners who already run WordPress or have a developer, self-hosted can be cheaper and more flexible.

Hosted or self-hosted

This is the first fork in the road, and it decides who handles security, updates and uptime.

• Hosted platforms such as Shopify, BigCommerce, Wix and Squarespace run the servers, checkout and security for you. You pay a monthly plan and focus on selling. The trade-off is less control over code and URLs, and you live with the vendor’s pricing and policy changes.
• Self-hosted software such as WooCommerce is free and open source. You choose your hosting, payment provider and extensions, and you own the site and data outright. In exchange, updates, plugin conflicts, backups and security become your job or your developer’s.
• Enterprise platforms such as Adobe Commerce serve large retailers with complex catalogs and dev teams. Pricing is quote-based, and implementations are long and costly.

If nobody on your team will own technical upkeep, choose hosted. If you already run a content-heavy WordPress site and work with a developer, WooCommerce is often the better value.

Add up the full cost of selling

The plan price is the smallest part of the bill for most stores. Build a 12-month estimate that includes each of these:

1. Plan fee. Shopify Basic is $29 a month billed yearly or $39 monthly, Grow is $79 and Advanced is $299. BigCommerce Core is $29 billed yearly, Growth is $79 and Scale is $299. Squarespace Basic is $19 billed yearly.
2. Card processing. Every platform charges a processing rate on each order through its own payments service. BigCommerce lists online card rates starting at 2.89% plus $0.29 per transaction.
3. Fees for outside payment providers. Shopify adds a fee if you skip Shopify Payments. BigCommerce charges 2% on Core, 1% on Growth and 0.6% on Scale for orders run through providers outside its embedded list. Squarespace Basic adds a 2% fee on store sales.
4. Apps and extensions. Reviews, subscriptions, loyalty, advanced search and shipping rules often come from paid apps. On Shopify especially, these subscriptions add up fast.
5. Themes, development and hosting. A premium theme is a one-time cost. Custom development and, for WooCommerce, managed hosting are ongoing.

Also check sales ceilings. BigCommerce’s Core plan covers up to $30,000 in trailing 12-month sales and Growth up to $100,000, and plans upgrade automatically above those limits. A store growing quickly can move up a tier sooner than planned.

Match the platform to your catalog and sales model

B2C stores

Most direct-to-consumer brands need a fast checkout, good mobile themes, discount tools and easy selling on social channels and marketplaces. Shopify is strongest here, with a polished checkout, a huge app and theme ecosystem, multichannel selling and Shopify POS for in-person sales.

B2B and wholesale

Wholesale buyers expect customer-specific pricing, net payment terms, quotes and quick reorder. BigCommerce builds more of this in, with customer groups from the Growth plan up and price lists on its Performance plan. Adobe Commerce adds company accounts and quoting for large B2B operations. If wholesale is a large share of revenue, test these features with a real customer’s order before you choose.

Small catalogs and service businesses

Design-led brands, makers and service businesses selling a few products often do best on Wix or Squarespace, where the store, bookings and website live in one editor. Larger catalogs and multichannel sellers will find inventory and reporting thinner than on dedicated platforms.

Integrations that keep the store running

List every system the store must talk to, and confirm a maintained integration for each one:

• Payments: the platform’s own payments service, plus PayPal, Apple Pay, Google Pay and buy now, pay later options your customers expect.
• Shipping and fulfillment: label tools such as ShipStation, a 3PL’s order feed, or carrier rate calculation.
• Sales tax: since the Supreme Court’s 2018 Wayfair decision, states can require sellers with enough sales into the state to collect tax. Check for built-in tax calculation or an integration with Avalara or TaxJar.
• Email and SMS marketing: Klaviyo, Mailchimp or the platform’s own tools, with purchase data flowing in for abandoned cart and post-purchase flows.
• Accounting and inventory: QuickBooks or Xero, and an ERP or inventory system if you sell across several channels.
• Marketplaces and ads: Amazon, Google Shopping, Meta and TikTok product catalogs.

To compare platforms on ratings, starting prices and free trials, see our ranked list of the best ecommerce platforms.

Content, search and marketing tools

Organic search and content drive a large share of sales for many stores, so check how each platform handles them before you commit.

• SEO control: editable titles, meta descriptions, URL handles, canonical tags and structured product data. Hosted platforms cover the basics well, while WooCommerce on WordPress gives the most control over content and URLs.
• Blogging and landing pages: if content marketing is part of your plan, test the blog editor and page builder. WordPress remains the strongest content system of the group, and Wix and Squarespace make visual pages easy.
• Site speed: run a sample product page through Google PageSpeed Insights during the trial. On WooCommerce, speed depends heavily on your host, theme and plugins.
• Built-in marketing: discount codes, abandoned cart emails, gift cards and product reviews. Check which are native on your plan and which need a paid app.

A platform that makes it hard to publish a buying guide or edit a category page will cost you traffic every month you use it.

Security, compliance and ownership

Any store that accepts cards must meet PCI DSS. Hosted platforms handle most of that burden for their checkout, which is one of their biggest advantages. On WooCommerce, your hosting, plugins and payment gateway setup all affect compliance, so use a reputable host and a gateway that keeps card data off your server.

Privacy rules matter too. If you sell to customers in California or the EU, you need a cookie consent tool and a way to handle data access and deletion requests. Most platforms offer apps or settings for this, but you are responsible for configuring them.

Finally, think about ownership. Ask how you would export products, customers, orders and content if you left. Wix, for example, is harder to migrate away from than most competitors.

Migration and how to test before you commit

If you are moving from another platform, protect your search traffic first. Map every old product, category and content URL to its new address and set up 301 redirects before launch. Shopify uses fixed URL patterns for products and collections, so most migrations to it change URLs.

Then test the platform with real work, not a demo store:

1. Use the free trial to import a sample of 50 to 100 products with variants, images and inventory.
2. Run test orders through the checkout on a phone, including a discount code and a guest checkout.
3. Install the apps or extensions you would need and price them.
4. Connect your shipping, tax and email tools and confirm data flows both ways.
5. Ask a team member who will run the store day to day to process an order, a refund and an exchange.

Shopify offers a short free trial, BigCommerce offers 15 days with no credit card, and Squarespace offers 14 days. WooCommerce is free to install on a staging site. If a task feels awkward during the trial, it will feel worse at 500 orders a week.

Questions to ask in every demo

• What is our total monthly cost at our expected order volume, including payment fees?
• Is there a fee for using our preferred payment provider?
• Are there sales thresholds that force a plan upgrade?
• Which B2B features are included on the plan we are considering?
• Do you integrate natively with our shipping, tax, email and accounting tools?
• How do we export products, customers and orders if we leave?
• Who handles PCI compliance, security updates and uptime?

Frequently asked questions