Shopify vs Magento

10 years ago

Hi bizman21,

Shopify is a hosted cart solution. It is proprietary, not open source, you have no access to the source code on Shopify. However you can develop your own theme and plugins for Shopify.

Magento CE is an open source script that you install on your own hosted server where you have complete control of the code.

Magento also offers a hosted solution similar to Shopify that is called MagentoGo

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kjamesnv

10 years ago

You can not customize Shopify like you would with Magento. Magento has 1000's of 3rd party extensions that can add every conceivable feature and developers can add other features as needed. However if a stock Shopify store meets all of your needs then it may be a good solution.

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1 reply

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Solid Commerce

10 years ago

Lots of good information in this thread.

Basically, you'll want Magento if you have big plans for your store in terms of specific functionalities. Magento is ready to go for all kinds of extensions, and there are a ton of licensed developers who can help you get to where you need to go, so to speak.

Shopify, on the other hand, is going to be a lot simpler in terms of setup and execution, provided that it can do everything you want it to do for you right out of the box.

But I'd do your research and make sure that this is the case before moving forward. As mentioned, Shopify is proprietary, so you won't be able to change things that don't suit your needs.

Thanks
1 reply

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amcg

10 years ago

Originally Posted by Solid Commerce

Lots of good information in this thread.

Basically, you'll want Magento if you have big plans for your store in terms of specific functionalities. Magento is ready to go for all kinds of extensions, and there are a ton of licensed developers who can help you get to where you need to go, so to speak.

Shopify, on the other hand, is going to be a lot simpler in terms of setup and execution, provided that it can do everything you want it to do for you right out of the box.

But I'd do your research and make sure that this is the case before moving forward. As mentioned, Shopify is proprietary, so you won't be able to change things that don't suit your needs.

Good advice, Shopify is great starting out and offcourse you will want to switch to your own platform once you have sufficient scale. I think many folks (including me) have made the mistake of doing the latter before the first.

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Etoot

10 years ago

hi bizman21,

Magento is the best of all for an eCommerce solution. Whenever I make a new eCommerce site magento remains foremost and top priority.

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Jasonsmith123

10 years ago

Originally Posted by bizman21

Can someone help me understand the pros and cons between the 2.
I have a Ecommerce business currently using Magento, currently have 12 skus, never plan on having more than 200-300 SKUs. We have access to good developers for Magento although it is a bit costly. Regardless if we switch to Shopify we still plan on having developers handling the majority of the work.
My main question is what does shopify lack or possibly prevent you from doing that Magento does better. Also is Shopify open source?

There are lot of replies to you with lot of factors in consideration i have sorted out some important ones:
Estimating

As you climb the valuing arrangement scale, you may end up attracted to Shopify's plans over Magento's, as they are much more liberal as to the amount of items you can offer.

Installment Gateways

The alternatives you get with Shopify are significantly more broad – you can mix a much more extensive reach of installment passages into your stores.

Characteristics

I think Magento Go is apparently preferable at over Shopify: offering your store in various dialects, giving markdown codes and combining with Ebay.

Convenience

For me Shopify is the surely victor here – its interface is clean, insignificant and, by and large talking, natural. Shopify might be a spot eccentric in the matter of adding subpages to the route and adding substance to certain pages, yet all in all it is great suited for the individuals who are new to site building.

Arrangements

Shopify ones (to my eyes in any case) unquestionably being stronger in manifestation: they are much more contemporary and smooth as far as look and feel. Obviously, both Shopify and Magento Go permit you to customise your models broadly

Appreciatively, both items offer free trials (2 weeks on account of Shopify and 30 days on account of Magento Go). Likewise with all my item correlation audits, I prescribe you attempt both out to before focusing on single one.

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TheCodex

10 years ago

Magento does everything better.

Just look at the showcase for Magento vs Shopify and ask yourself "which one looks like it's being used by more successful companies?"

Ecommerce Templates & Online Store Template Examples — Shopify

Customer Showcase | Magento

The only question that will come up w/ Magento is can you use it or afford to work with someone who can.

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kjamesnv

10 years ago

Originally Posted by TheCodex

Magento does everything better.

.

I am a HUGE fan of Magento ( and have used it for 3+ years) but its definitely not the right tool for EVERY job. For a simple site, with a small catalog and just basic needs then Magento is probably not necessary.

There are lots of people who use Shopify, Volution, Big Commerce etc and they are perfectly happy with a hosted solution.

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2 replies

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OnlineStoreHelp

10 years ago

Originally Posted by kjamesnv

I am a HUGE fan of Magento ( and have used it for 3+ years) but its definitely not the right tool for EVERY job. For a simple site, with a small catalog and just basic needs then Magento is probably not necessary.

There are lots of people who use Shopify, Volution, Big Commerce etc and they are perfectly happy with a hosted solution.

I agree with most of what you say.

I am actually not a huge fan of Magento only because I have seen way to many broken sites that used Magento and the developer couldn't figure out things as simple as shipping. I know one customer that two years after their site was built, the shipping algorithm still doesn't work. Yet I have one customer that has hacked zen cart into doing exactly what he wants to do.

That being said, Magento is an extremely powerful solution, it is the semi-truck of shopping carts. But, not everyone needs a semi, some need a little sports car that zips them around, and that is what Shopify is. In between you have carts that run the gambit from Bigcommerce that gives more functionality out of the box than Shopify to Opencart which gives you about 90% of what Magento does without the bloat or difficulty developing.

I know a lot of people come in here asking, should I use X or Y? Which one is better. Based on what little I have the OP write, I think Magento is overkill. But I can't be certain Shopify is right for him/her without a better understanding of what they need from their cart.

And just because PayPal owns Magento in no way implies it is a better cart (I hate that argument). Since Google supports and hosts VQMod for Opencart you could make the argument that Google supports Opencart and given the developers I have met at eBay versus Google, I will take the Google developers any day.

So the question is, do you have lots of categories and subcategories? How difficult are your shipping options? What are you using to accept payments? Do you need to track inventory by SKU? Home complicated are your options or option sets? Do you want a responsive design? Are you ok with a dedicated Mobile CSS? Do you need to connect to eBay or Amazon? Are you running a multi-cart or multi-vendor scenario? Or a single store you run yourself? Does it need to connect to an accounting system or to a POS system? What specific features do you need?

Once you answer this we can give you better insight into what cart we think will solve those needs.

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TheCodex

10 years ago

Originally Posted by kjamesnv

I am a HUGE fan of Magento ( and have used it for 3+ years) but its definitely not the right tool for EVERY job. For a simple site, with a small catalog and just basic needs then Magento is probably not necessary.

There are lots of people who use Shopify, Volution, Big Commerce etc and they are perfectly happy with a hosted solution.

I'll stand corrected, I agree that with a simple catalog you can do better than Magneto.

Now, if we're talking about having lots of products and SKUs?

Magneto all day long.

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adamsmithus

10 years ago

Advantages to Hire Magento Developers

Effective Magento theme design or theme-implementation.
Magento ecommerce website development.
Magento designing / customized Magento theme development services.
Ecommerce store development.
Shopping cart solutions.
Web integration services.
Redesigning or redevelopment of Magento sites.
Web maintenance services.

Nice information is shared that makes to become genius magneto developer.

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shopmages

10 years ago

Hi. I can say only: NO SAAS, its too limited.
For simple stores -> go for Prestashop - at least version 1.6. But 3 years ago I started with Magento, then I tried other platfroms and one thing I must say - maybe in 2-3 year time Presta will be as good as Magento. While all SAAS like shopify, bigcommerce, volusion -> will never beat Magento in flexibility. And one major thing - your SAAS store is not your store.period. customer base is not 100% safe. period.

If you like full flexibility nad thousands plugins and not to hire developers for extra $$$$ for every change, consider Magneto. Why ? because almost everything you need is available with plugins. And the quality of those plugins are the best on market comparing to other e-commerce self-owned platforms. Of coures invest in FREE community version.

Magento 1.8.1.0 is the best. You don't need extra powered server. You can start on shared - later add some optimizations and maybe invest in Full Page Cache (plugin for only $129 NOW). And the store will fly. Even on hosting for 9.95$/month.

Paul
CEO shopMAGES.com
Magento Extensions and Themes Marketplace

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Tom Evans

10 years ago

The two shopping carts are unique in their own ways. I would still recommend Magento Go to users that do not find Shopify appealing. I recommend signing up for a free trial with both shopping carts and decide which one is best for your online store.

V/S

Shopify
Rating: 9.70 out of 10
Free Trial: 14 days
Cost: $14/mo. to $179/mo.
Transaction Fees: None/2%
Setup Fees: None
Bandwidth: Unlimited
Products: 25 to unlimited

Magento Go
Rating: 8.75 out of 10
Free Trial: 30 days
Cost: $15/mo. to $125/mo.
Transaction Fees: None
Setup Fees: None
Bandwidth: 4 GB to 32 GB
Products: 100 to 10,000

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snowdown

10 years ago

100% Magento I would say

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thejimy

10 years ago

As a longtime developer of online stores I can say there are only two solutions that I would ever consider for my customers. Magento or prestashop (version 1.6). I don't mind to suggest SaaS solutions to customers if they fit their needs and sometimes this is the case and better then an individual solution.

However every customer that used a hosted store solution reached always a point where some things just wouldn't be possible.

Shopify has a good system for shops to start with or to test out a market. But unless you have a really strong argument for switching to it from your current solution, I would advise strongly against it.

On a side notice, Prestashop is often overseen over Magento but it's easy, very capable, uses the newest technologies and comes with more out-of-the-box features than Magento. You had need to buy plugins or use the enterprise Magento to get the same, like perfect page caching as example. Also development is much more active. See my most recent store realized with it for what it can achieve: fischkaufhaus.de

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Shopify vs Magento

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