This is the first question most people ask when they decide to sell online, and it is worth answering properly. Migrating later is expensive — you rebuild checkout, re-map every product, and usually lose some search rankings on the way through.
We build on both platforms and have run our own Shopify store since 2021, so what follows is a comparison rather than a recommendation. Neither platform is better in the abstract. They are better at different things.
| Criterion | Shopify | WooCommerce |
|---|---|---|
| Monthly cost | ShopifyFixed subscription, predictable | WooCommerceHosting plus plugins — cheaper at the low end, adds up as you scale |
| Transaction fees | ShopifyExtra fee unless you use Shopify Payments | WooCommerceNone from the platform; gateway fees only |
| Setup speed | ShopifyFastest — selling within days | WooCommerceSlower — hosting, security, and plugin decisions first |
| Maintenance | ShopifyHandled for you | WooCommerceYours to own: updates, backups, security |
| Customisation | ShopifyDeep, but within Shopify’s architecture | WooCommerceEffectively unlimited — you own the code |
| Content and SEO | ShopifyStrong, with some URL structure constraints | WooCommerceStrongest — WordPress is a publishing platform first |
| Checkout control | ShopifyLimited unless on Shopify Plus | WooCommerceFull control |
| Scale ceiling | ShopifyVery high, handled by Shopify | WooCommerceDepends entirely on your hosting and build quality |
Choose Shopify if
Uptime, PCI compliance and platform updates should be someone else's problem, and you would rather spend your attention on products and marketing than on infrastructure. It is the right answer for most businesses, most of the time.
Choose WooCommerce if
Content marketing is your main growth channel, you need checkout behaviour Shopify will not allow, or you are integrating deeply with systems that already run on your own infrastructure.
What the comparison leaves out
Both platforms sell things competently, and neither decides whether your store makes money. That gets decided by the work sitting either side of the platform — where checkout leaks, whether your stock and accounting systems talk to each other, how carefully a migration preserves your rankings, how the site performs on a mid-range phone on mobile data, and whether anyone is watching the drop-off points after launch.
Those are build decisions rather than platform features. If you are weighing the two platforms because you are planning a build, that is the more useful conversation to have.