Shopify vs. Shopify Plus

Overview
ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price
Shopify
Score 8.8 out of 10
N/A
Shopify is a commerce platform designed for both online stores and retail locations. Shopify offers a professional online storefront, a payment solution to accept credit cards, and the Shopify POS application to power retail sales.
$29
per month
Shopify Plus
Score 8.9 out of 10
N/A
Shopify Plus is an eCommerce solution built for enterprise-level companies that enables them to sell online and offline across social channels like Facebook , Pinterest, and marketplaces like Amazon and eBay.N/A
Pricing
ShopifyShopify Plus
Editions & Modules
Shopify Lite
$9
per month
Basic Shopify
$29
per month
Shopify
$79
per month
Advanced Shopify
$299
per month
Shopify Plus
2,000
per month
No answers on this topic
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
ShopifyShopify Plus
Free Trial
YesNo
Free/Freemium Version
NoNo
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
NoNo
Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeNo setup fee
Additional Details
More Pricing Information
Community Pulse
ShopifyShopify Plus
Considered Both Products
Shopify
Chose Shopify
We have used Magento for higher end projects. Magento is open source and therefore has better customization capabilities. Shopify on the other had, is more user-friendly, more cost effective and has superior customer service, which some Magento versions don't have at all. …
Shopify Plus
Chose Shopify Plus
Shopify Plus integrates so well with other services, and keeps all levels of the online shopping experience in one place. It really saves a developer or manager a lot of headache that can arise with other e-commerce platforms.
Chose Shopify Plus
Shopify is a much easier and more intuitive platform to use.

The mobile focus is outstanding from the other competitors and the capability to modify the store without previous code or experience makes them the best e-commerce platform.
Chose Shopify Plus
We found BigCommerce to be almost identical to Shopify in many ways, but Shopify had more apps in their marketplace and we couldn't find another significant difference at the time.
Chose Shopify Plus
Squarespace is a platform meant for creating websites/blogs that also has an eCommerce component layered on top. Conversely, Shopify Plus was build from day one with eCommerce in mind. This is evident throughout the experience, especially with regards to order management, and …
Chose Shopify Plus
We have not looked at others, Shopify is the best, hands down.
Chose Shopify Plus
Us not worrying about hosting our eCommerce store has been great!
Top Pros
Top Cons
Features
ShopifyShopify Plus
Online Storefront
Comparison of Online Storefront features of Product A and Product B
Shopify
7.4
131 Ratings
4% below category average
Shopify Plus
8.6
29 Ratings
11% above category average
Product catalog & listings8.6131 Ratings9.027 Ratings
Product management7.2129 Ratings8.028 Ratings
Bulk product upload7.6110 Ratings6.126 Ratings
Branding8.4130 Ratings10.027 Ratings
Mobile storefront7.4126 Ratings10.028 Ratings
Product variations6.3123 Ratings7.127 Ratings
Website integration9.2124 Ratings8.025 Ratings
Visual customization7.5129 Ratings9.028 Ratings
CMS4.4105 Ratings10.027 Ratings
Online Shopping Cart
Comparison of Online Shopping Cart features of Product A and Product B
Shopify
8.1
125 Ratings
7% above category average
Shopify Plus
8.0
28 Ratings
5% above category average
Abandoned cart recovery7.6116 Ratings7.127 Ratings
Checkout user experience8.5123 Ratings9.028 Ratings
Online Payment System
Comparison of Online Payment System features of Product A and Product B
Shopify
9.0
127 Ratings
8% above category average
Shopify Plus
10.0
28 Ratings
18% above category average
eCommerce security9.0127 Ratings10.028 Ratings
eCommerce Marketing
Comparison of eCommerce Marketing features of Product A and Product B
Shopify
8.0
129 Ratings
7% above category average
Shopify Plus
6.4
29 Ratings
16% below category average
Promotions & discounts7.2124 Ratings6.128 Ratings
Personalized recommendations8.432 Ratings4.123 Ratings
SEO8.5120 Ratings9.028 Ratings
eCommerce Business Management
Comparison of eCommerce Business Management features of Product A and Product B
Shopify
8.0
130 Ratings
2% above category average
Shopify Plus
7.3
27 Ratings
7% below category average
Multi-site management6.719 Ratings00 Ratings
Order processing9.1128 Ratings8.027 Ratings
Inventory management8.8127 Ratings7.126 Ratings
Shipping8.2120 Ratings7.126 Ratings
Custom functionality7.2120 Ratings7.127 Ratings
Best Alternatives
ShopifyShopify Plus
Small Businesses
Ecwid by Lightspeed
Ecwid by Lightspeed
Score 10.0 out of 10
Ecwid by Lightspeed
Ecwid by Lightspeed
Score 10.0 out of 10
Medium-sized Companies
IBM Digital Commerce
IBM Digital Commerce
Score 9.0 out of 10
IBM Digital Commerce
IBM Digital Commerce
Score 9.0 out of 10
Enterprises
IBM Digital Commerce
IBM Digital Commerce
Score 9.0 out of 10
IBM Digital Commerce
IBM Digital Commerce
Score 9.0 out of 10
All AlternativesView all alternativesView all alternatives
User Ratings
ShopifyShopify Plus
Likelihood to Recommend
9.0
(144 ratings)
3.3
(29 ratings)
Likelihood to Renew
9.2
(15 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Usability
10.0
(3 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Availability
10.0
(1 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Support Rating
10.0
(2 ratings)
10.0
(1 ratings)
Implementation Rating
10.0
(1 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
User Testimonials
ShopifyShopify Plus
Likelihood to Recommend
Shopify
Shopify is a great platform for small to medium-sized businesses looking to set up an online store. It's easy to use, offers a wide range of features and integrations, and is perfect for businesses in the retail and food industry. However, large enterprise businesses with complex and custom needs may find Shopify less suitable.
Read full review
Shopify
Any business that needs to keep track of orders and payments would benefit from Shopify Plus. Customers information, orders, and payments are all saved and available for reference. You are able to refer to past orders to review trends and offer future purchase suggestions. Shopify Plus is also easy to use so it does not take long to train employees how to use this system.
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Pros
Shopify
  • It is definitely easy to set up and get going. This does not take a lot of work or effort on the user end, especially if using templates.
  • Low code platform. You can. make customizations without code.
  • The integrations are diverse and increase functionality.
Read full review
Shopify
  • Scales incredibly well. Forget about hardware concerns, load balancing, downtime, etc. and focus on eCommerce. We've seen merchants go from a few thousand dollars per month to having million dollar days, all on Shopify without having to worry about performance or scaling systems.
  • Great new features consistently being added, ahead of the curve on almost everything
  • Solid API to build on and work with, a few annoying quirks here and there for super complex use cases but overall very well documented and works well
  • Most Merchant Success Managers are good and genuinely want to be helpful
  • A fantastic user interface, very logical and easy to use
  • Tons and tons and tons of out of the box integrations. Easily the best integration marketplace of the e-commerce platforms. There's an app for that.
Read full review
Cons
Shopify
  • The main drawback that I am facing in Shopify for a long time is that their sales analytics system is not up to mark. As I am using Shopify to run different stores for my organization it does not get updated after-sales and does not provide the right analytics about the product strength and number of sales.
  • Secondly, Shopify has different apps which are best to run the store on max strength but they are very much costly like inventory management, generating multiple discount codes, and more robust customizable editing.
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Shopify
  • The Account Managers/Reps have become more scripted and seem like they are busier and handling more clients than before. It doesn't seem as personal and special anymore like when we first upgraded to Plus.
  • Shopify still has missing features in their software that might not have an app in their app marketplace available that fills this void.
  • The 24/7 support doesn't seem as dedicated as they once were.
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Likelihood to Renew
Shopify
Nothing we have used in the past or have seen thus far even comes close to offering what we get with Shopify Plus, especially for the price. You cannot even come close to getting what we are getting at the price we pay. We are beyond thrilled and Shopify Plus meets and exceeds all of our needs and expectations. We love it!
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Shopify
No answers on this topic
Usability
Shopify
I think most people are able to suer Shopify that have used a computer. There are some features that take a bit longer to learn. If you are not a creative person it may be a bit more difficult to learn the website customization, but with a help guide or tutorial it will only take a few tries to understand how to work the interface
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Shopify
No answers on this topic
Support Rating
Shopify
In terms of support I give Shopify a 9 out of 10 because they're always very friendly and thorough, and they personally can't solve my problem for me they always point me in the proper direction with the proper information I need to move forward
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Shopify
Always are quick to answer our questions and help us find a solution
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Implementation Rating
Shopify
Just start now and make the switch, the sooner the better. You will love it and it is really a simple process
Read full review
Shopify
No answers on this topic
Alternatives Considered
Shopify
The old platform that I used could not help us to meet our requirements. It was not helping us properly, then I got to know about Shopify and started using it. After 1 month [of] usage of Shopify we could understand that this is the best platform [for E-commerce] to make better sales and goodwill. Shopify helped us to get a proper idea of the analytics of the website. Shopify [supports] most of the [applications] and helps us to make better results.
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Shopify
Shopify had the quickest go-to-market and most robust API among the products we compared. CommerceCloud required a VERY LONG integration phase that we just didn't have time for. BigCommerce fell short on the number of features and API coverage that we needed. Overall Shopify gave us the most bang for the buck.
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Return on Investment
Shopify
  • It got the store up quickly so the client could start selling. She was previously selling products on Etsy and Facebook and wanted to consolidate everything onto one website, so the main thing Shopify solved was to reduce the store owner's time in managing all her products on multiple sites. Also, we had previously built a website on Wix with all the custom functionality and branding she needed - a truly great, high-end website - but it performed so slowly that it was unusable. So the speed at which Shopify can be set up and then works on the page is appreciable.
  • The website was manageable by the client - she could figure the system out herself after a while so she saved money on costs for hiring developers. She did have to hire developers to customize some of the plug-ins but costs are all relative; it wasn't a high investment compared to building a full e-commerce website. With the complexity and size of her product base and the functionality and branding she wanted to have in a website, and the potential of her business, she would have needed to invest well over $10,000 to get to where she really needs to be. In the end she kept the budget under $5000.00.
  • Costs kept climbing with plug-ins having to be added with everything. My client became more involved in building the website and began to try multiple plugins, and she did not have the skill base to evaluate the plugins functionalities so she chose plugins that did not do everything she needed, and then ended up paying the plugin developers to customize the plugins. So on one hand, it's pretty amazing to be able to bring up an e-commerce website as quickly as a week or so, but on the other hand if you need anything customized or deeper functionality in regards to product searching and filtering on the web page, and management on the backend, it quickly goes beyond the skills of the average person to manage, and above their expected budget as well. In the end my client really did not get anything close to the functionality for the website we had originally envisioned.
  • Shopify was the easiest way we could find to bring the client's products to a global market. We evaluated several other platforms and the functionality simple did not seem to be adequate, so Shopify seemed like the only solution that could do enough of what we needed and still stay within this client's budget. Really the problem in this project was not platform per se but that the budget wasn't large enough. Shopify managed to provide a solution for an ecommerce store with thousands of products on a tiny budget, so in the sense of pure functionality it provided the best value of all the platforms we evaluated. The solution still isn't big enough for this client's business though so, without having insights into this client's post-build sales results, my guess is that because her new website did not make her products easier to sort through, and she likely didn't have much more budget left to invest in SEO and other marketing of the website, her sales probably didn't increase substantially as a result of having built the website. So I think this project all in all did not likely have a high ROI.
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Shopify
  • Shopify Plus has been a very cost effective solution for us.
  • As our business grows, it's easy to train new hires on how to use Shopify Plus.
  • What we've lost in the missing features of Shopify we've made up for in the other areas.
Read full review
ScreenShots

Shopify Plus Screenshots

Screenshot of The home screen of your Shopify admin, including proactive home cards and reporting and live view insights.Screenshot of Your Shopify Plus store is ready for mobile commerce. Customers can browse and buy from your store with an optimized experience on device.Screenshot of Editing products across sales channels.Screenshot of Easily edit colours, typography, settings, and drag and drop sections for each of your store's templates with the theme editor.