Most users struggle to choose the best eCommerce software. There’s just so much stuff out there. There are different requirements to compare: price points, features, capabilities, designs, etc.
We want to help you navigate through all the noise and point you to the leading eCommerce software out there so you can make an informed decision about building an online store.
Some of the eCommerce software featured here will be free, some premium, but you will surely find a tool that suits your needs perfectly!
What to Look for in Ecommerce Software
Not all eCommerce software is created equal. While all of them claim that they’re “all you’ll ever need,” sometimes that’s not the case. There are tons of different features, and some of the more specific features come at different prices.
While this is universal, here’s what you should expect from your perfect eCommerce software:
The Shortlist: Seven of the Best Ecommerce Software Compared
Shopify
- Price: from $9/month
- What it is: a login-based online system
- Sell physical products, digital products, services, direct mail.
- Qualities: 9/10
- Ease of use: 9/10
- Executions: 9/10
Shopify is probably the most well-known eCommerce software of them all. Users love it because of how easy it is to use and what it offers.
Shopify is quite excellent no matter what you want to sell, be it physical products, digital products, services, or even dropshipping products. Shopify can handle them all.
Shopify also does a good job of staying in the middle and being friendly to both novice and advanced enterprise users. This makes it perfect if you plan to scale up your e-commerce endeavors over time.
Design-wise, Shopify offers various templates to choose from, many of which are aimed squarely at niche industries. For example, a quick search in the Shopify theme store reveals various themes for jewelry stores, clothing, furniture, and even wineries.
Shopify also has very reasonable prices. There are five different pricing plans/tiers based on the level of functionality your store requires:
- Getting started with a basic setup is very cheap at just $9 per month for Shopify Lite. It gives you the tools to insert Shopify Buy buttons on any existing website. You can also post your products on places like Facebook and Facebook Messenger.
- The basic plan is $29 per month. This is probably the one most people will choose. It allows for unlimited products and a full eCommerce store with all the essentials (and access to the App Store).
- For $79 a month, you can set up more staff accounts and use things like gift cards and professional reports. There are also slightly lower credit card fees.
- Advanced Shopify goes for $299 per month. It is intended for aspiring wholesalers.
- Finally, there’s Shopify Plus, a plan that provides enterprise-class solutions for wholesalers.
Some notable features you get with Shopify:
- Unlimited everything: orders, products, file storage, bandwidth
- 24/7 customer service
- Level 1 PCI compliance
- Ready for mobile trading
- Point of Sale Equipment
- apartment
- Free SSL certificate for your shop
- You can process credit card payments
- Let Shopify calculate shipping costs and taxes automatically
- Build your online store website using drag and drop
- Blogging module included
- Works with multiple languages
- Set up customer profiles
- Your customers can have their accounts
- Optimized for the search engines
- Built-in social media integration
- inventory management
- Set up product variants
- reporting module
2. Analision
Analision is a Multichannel Inventory & Order Management Software that allows you to manage your inventory across multiple channels in real-time for your fast-growing brands.
Starting Price at 149.00 per month
Features
- Kitting and bundling
- Product Management
- Order Management
- Real-Time Updates and Reporting
Analision is a brilliant tool for business owners who need to keep track of all inventory and sales. Connect your Amazon seller account in Analision to automate listing, order management, and shipping to grow your sales on eBay.
3. BigCommerce
Price: from $29.95/month
BigCommerce is another very popular solution for eCommerce software. It offers a lot of what you would expect from a quality eCommerce platform, in an easy-to-use package.
Getting started on your adventure with Bigcommerce is very similar to getting started with Shopify. All you have to do is sign up at Bigcommerce.com, go through the setup wizard (where you specify what you want to sell and what you want your store to look like), and your store will be up and running in no time.
BigCommerce lets you sell any product and even configure a bunch of different parameters that describe those products.
There’s plenty to choose from in terms of themes and store designs too – especially if you want to save some money and use a free theme – these look really good! Many consider Bigcommerce templates to be the best in the business. They look modern and professional.
The overall price is similar to Shopify, but you don’t get a 9-month plan. Most functions are already integrated. For example, the marketing tools are much more advanced than BigCommerce.
4. Squarespace
Pricing starts at $18 per month (when paid annually). If you want to build an eCommerce store on Squarespace; the lower rates are for regular sites only.
Squarespace has made a name for itself as arguably the easiest-to-use website building platform of them all. It’s also an all-in-one platform. This means that it caters to all your website needs, no matter what they may be.
You can use Squarespace to build a blog, a business website, a podcast website, and, yes, an eCommerce website too. And not just any eCommerce website, but a highly optimized website that allows you to sell products effectively while utilizing auxiliary tools like advanced analytics, merchandising tools, and integrations with Instagram to sell products.
The Squarespace experience begins during sign-up, when you’re asked a few questions about the purpose of your site, what you want to sell, and how.
For example, Squarespace lets you sell standard products and digital downloads, offer services, book appointments, sell memberships, and more.
Design-wise, Squarespace is THE king when it comes to template quality and versatility. You can find optimized design templates for any website purpose or type of eCommerce store. You can then customize this template to your liking using Squarespace’s drag-and-drop visual builder.
5. SellerActions
If you are selling custom or handmade products on Amazon and want to import text-based customization from Amazon to Shipstation, then SellerAction is a great tool for you.
While ShipStation does not integrate fully with Amazon Handmade or Amazon Custom, SellerActions has developed a process that leverages ShipStation’s open API to update customization details and import Amazon Handmade orders.
Pricing is $49/month.