11 MIN READ

Ecommerce is a growing phenomenon throughout the world. Millions of businesses turned online after the pandemic era. I’m sure you are one of the million businesses who want to sell more and more but don’t know which platform is best! You have heard success stories about Shopify, but what about other options? What about Ecwid? A platform that helps you turn your own website into an e-commerce business without going into technical coding thing? 

What is Ecwid? Why is Shopify popular? Which should you choose, Ecwid? Or following the trend, should you go for Shopify?  What about the customer service, the possibilities, is it user-friendly? Is it beneficial? Is it flexible? Should you opt for AI-chatbots to provide stellar customer service?

Well, so many questions but I’m here to solve all your worries.

To answer these questions, we will compare Shopify and Ecwid in the following points:

• Popularity
• Ease of use
• Community support
• Customer service
• Customization
• Pricing and more!

This comparison will conclude which one is the best platform. Ready to find out which is the best e-commerce platform in 2022? First thing first…

What’s the main difference between those 2 platforms?

• Ecwid allows you to change your existing site into an e-commerce business. In short, Ecwid is a plugin.
• Shopify, on the other hand, is a fully-fledged platform. It is a fully hosted platform, and it is the best solution for people who do not want to deal with hosting, servers, infrastructure, etc.

Features of Ecwid: 

• No start over – you can connect your existing website with Ecwid.
• No transaction and start-up fee
• Change or cancel the plan at any time
• Can integrate with Shopify
• Unlimited bandwidth
• 40 Plus payment methods

Features of Shopify:

• Free tools
• Unlimited register
• Omnichannel support
• Shopify Lite POS included
• 100 payment gateways
• Integration with Oberlo

In short, if you already have a website that you want to convert into a running eCommerce business, then Ecwid is the best option. On the other hand, if you want to start a brand new eCommerce business and benefit from all the built-in features of an online store, then go for Shopify. But we can’t just base our judgment on this!  So, let’s dive into the detailed comparison!

1) Shopify or Ecwid? Which is more popular?

We know Shopify is head and shoulders above Ecwid, with more than 23% shares in the US when it comes to popularity.  It hosts approximately 1 million stores in almost 175 countries. As you will see in the following points, it has its flaws even though it’s a popular platform. On the other hand, Ecwid has lower popularity at less than 1% shares in the US. It hosts approximately 110k stores in around 58 countries. It has a total of 19,590 websites using the platform.

Verdict: Shopify is more popular than Ecwid in 2022.

2) Ecwid or Shopify: What Integrates Better?

Ecwid is easy to get started with and has a clean interface. It is a lot easier to use than Shopify because it doesn’t require any coding skills at all! All you have to do is pick a template, add products and start selling. Since it is a plugin for existing websites, you can integrate your newly created online store with eBay, Facebook, and other popular platforms. As you can see, it is easy to use, and in addition, you can access it from anywhere.

It’s also easy to update your products, shipping options, payment methods, and much more! In short, you can easily create a web page that has the Ecwid store already built-in. But Shopify is more than just easy to use! It is a fully-fledged eCommerce platform and provides you with lots of built-in features:  Like a product feed, where you can upload all your products, and they will be automatically added to the store.

In addition to that, for every product you add, the site automatically creates a new blog post, and you can add a description of your product along with pictures. It is also easy to add HTML and JavaScript code as you wish. In other words, it’s limitless!

Check this store example of Partake:

Another example from Manitobah:

3) Shopify or Ecwid – Ease of Use?

Both the platforms are easy to use, provide seamless integration options, and are user-friendly. Ecwid’s interface is a bit more minimalistic and straightforward. On the other hand, Shopify’s interface is more sophisticated and modernized. It doesn’t matter if you are a novice or professional; the dashboard system of both platforms is easy to use and provides functional features. You just install the Ecwid plugin system on your website, and you’re ready to go.

Similarly, Shopify provides a couple of predefined themes and templates which you can use right away or customize as per your business needs. With Shopify’s extensive coding language support, you can also build your own theme. Even Shopify also gives you drag and drop support to customize the look and layout of your website. Both Ecwid and Shopify provide an easy installation process, and even somehow, the Shopify system is a bit difficult compared to Ecwid. Still, in the long run, Shopify provides more features and functionalities.

Ecwid’s easy-to-use interface needs no explanation – it is clean, minimalistic, and straightforward, making the basic e-commerce process a smooth walk.

Here is a Small Comparison of Features:

Features	Ecwid	Shopify
Free Plan	Yes	No
Paid Plans	Standard(29/month) Essentials ($49/month) Unlimited ($99)	Basic ($29/month) Standard ($79/month) Advanced ($299/month) Shopify Plus ($2,000+/month) Shopify Lite ($9/month)
Discounts for NGOs	Yes	Yes
Transaction Fee	No	0.5%-2% from monthly sales
Automatic shipping rates calculator	No	Yes
Inventory Tracking feature	Yes	Yes
POS	Via apps	Built-in POS lite and upgraded
User-friendly	Yes	Yes
Compatibility with bigger marketplaces	Suitable for marketplaces	Grows with time
Compatibility with social media	Yes	Yes
Dropshipping	Yes	Yes
Aesthetics	Just a site theme	75+ themes
Customer Service	Limited	Good
Digital product Size	25 GB	5 GB

4) Ecwid vs. Shopify: Ecommerce Features?

Ecwid comes with a “WYSIWYG” editor and allows you to add any features you want. You can use it as a simple online store or build something complex such as an online magazine, blog, etc.

It is free and does not have limitations regarding your product list, bandwidth usage, items sold, payment methods, shipping rates, etc.

But Shopify is entirely different!

It does not offer free plans and comes with many limitations. For instance, you cannot use your own domain name or email hosting without paying for a plan.

On the plus side, Shopify provides lots of built-in features such as shipping options, tax calculator, payment methods, product variations, discounts for your products, reporting tools for business insights, user roles, and permissions.

Here is what both platforms offer for e-commerce benefits:

Payment Gateways:

Shopify leads here with more than 100 payment gateways, including PayPal, Apple Pay, etc. They even have their own integrated and famous payment gateway called Shopify Payments. It means they provide better security and charge fewer transaction fees.

Benefits of more payment gateways: 

• Higher customer trust: The rule is simple; the more the payment gateways, the more the customers will trust your store.
• More payment options: You don’t want to lose a customer who wants to pay another way than you have as a payment method.
• More miniature cart abandoned In: the case of your customers want to pay through a different payment gateway, you can just add it right there and then. This reduces the chances of your customers leaving the cart.

Ecwid also offers payment methods such as PayPal and Stripe but has less than 40 gateways in total. So, you have fewer options which means you might lose some potential customers. In short, Shopify takes the lead here as it offers more benefits for its users.

Security:

That’s an essential eCommerce feature. Both Shopify and Ecwid rely on Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard. This is a security feature that prevents “cardholder data” exposure. It is the most powerful security standard globally that has been endorsed by all the major card brands such as Visa, Mastercard, etc. So, that’s a win-win situation for both platforms.

Products Management and Holding

Shopify allows you to have unlimited products in your store even in their basic plan, whereas Ecwid only allows you to have 2500 unless you avail their plan worth $99/month. In addition, Shopify has a multichannel inventory feature that tracks your products across all sales channels, not just your online store. So, Shopify leads here as well as it is more beneficial for retail brands and manufacturers.

Inventory Management

Both platforms allow you to add and manage multiple products and inventories. You can also add product variants, images and run promotions on any of them. You can even avail their android and iOS apps to manage your product listings. While Ecwid provides automatic sync to major marketplaces such as Amazon Walmart, you don’t need to pay extra if you want to sync your products with an external channel. It also gives a feature of low-stock alerts to inform you as soon as one of your products runs out of stock.

On the other hand, Shopify provides a multichannel inventory feature that keeps your inventory up-to-date across all sales channels, not just your online store. In short, Shopify has all the features that Ecwid has. However, with Shopify, you have a plus. It lets you export your inventory to a CSV file and upload it again to another platform when the need arises.

Verdict: So, if Ecwid is good, Shopify is a little better here.

Product Varieties:

Ecwid leads here as it allows you to sell digital products such as ebooks, music downloads, etc. If a user buys these digital products from your Ecwid store, the platform directly sends them the link to download the product. Shopify allows digital products as well. But there is a limit with Shopify. You can’t share a file that exceeds 5 GB, whereas Ecwid enables you to share as lengthy a file as 25 GB.

Verdict: I believe Ecwid is the winner here.

5) Shopify or Ecwid – Which has Better Pricing?

That’s the most important part, and Ecwid already wins it since the platform offers a free plan. Both the platforms offer subscriptions which are as follows:

Ecwid Monthly Plans:

Ecwid Yearly Plans:

Shopify Plans:

Key Points about Pricing for Ecwid:

• Ecwid has four plans, but none of them comes with hosting and domain
• It has a plus with a free plan of 2500 products holding your store at no cost.
• A yearly subscription offers you an additional 17% off.

Key Points about Pricing for Shopify:

• Shopify plans include hosting and domain
• It has three regular plans that you see in the screenshot above
• They have two additional pricing for small entrepreneurs and major enterprises.
• Shopify Plus that starts at starting at $2000 a month
• The lite version of Shopify starts at $9 a month
• Shopify doesn’t have any free plans but a free trial that lasts for 14 days

Transaction Fee: 

Ecwid and Shopify both charge transaction fees. Shopify charges .5% to 2% of your monthly sales. The charges also depend on whether you use their payment gateway or not. On the other hand, Ecwid leads here as they do not charge any transaction fee. They offer 100% free payment processing no matter which payment method you choose.

6) Shopify POS vs. Ecwid POS: 

Shopify POS is a feature that lets you turn your retail store into an online store and help your offline customers make purchases with their smartphones. You can create a custom mobile checkout experience that customers can use just as easily. It is suitable for small businesses that have only brick-and-mortar storefronts or who want to sell online and in person. 

Shopify gives you the lite version of POS with all its plans, but the upgraded version costs $89. Upgraded POS that lets you manage your advanced inventory, faster order tracking, and you can even sync orders and products with other platforms such as eBay, Etsy, etc.

On the other hand, Ecwid POS doesn’t work independently, but you have to connect to third-party apps like Clover.

7) Shopify or Ecwid – Which has Better Dropshipping Compatibility?

Shopify offers compatibility with almost all major dropshipping platforms to automate your business. That’s an automated way to handle your inventory and shipping. It is compatible with platforms like Oberlo that connects you to thousands of suppliers from Aliexpress, etc. You can easily connect your Shopify store to Aliexpress and automatically sync the products on your website.

On the other hand, Ecwid also connects you to suppliers like Alibaba, but it requires so much manual work and third involvement. But overall, Shopify provides smooth, seamless, and automated connectivity without any third-party help.

8) Design and Customization:

Shopify wins here as it gives you access to industry-standard themes, templates, and store designs. You can easily apply your design or template to your website. You get 10 free themes and options to buy more themes and templates from the Shopify app store and customize them as per your need. But on the other hand, since Ecwid isn’t itself an e-commerce platform but an e-commerce plugin that connects you to other e-commerce platforms, it doesn’t offer many design and customization features.  It gives you a simple interface like a banner and covers images to show up on your store website. In short, Ecwid is a bit tricky as you might need a professional designer to make it perfect.

Check this design from Klean integrated with Ecwid:

9) Customer support:

Shopify wins here again as they provide 24/7 customer service via phone, email, contact form, etc. They also have a community forum where you can find the answer to all your questions.

Key Features of Customer Support from Shopify:

• 24/7 hour service via phone, email, contact form, etc.
• A community forum where you can find answers to all your questions.
• You can also help others with problems that you have already solved.

On the other hand, Ecwid doesn’t offer much customer support. They neither have live chat support and, overall poorer customer support. Knowing that stellar customer service is the key to running an online business in 2022, ignoring this point can cause you to lose business. In fact, 96% of the people believe good customer service is a decisive factor to create loyalty to a particular brand. When customer service can make or break your online store, relying on a community support system isn’t sufficient.

Clepher – A Trusted AI-powered Chatbot Builder

Customer service isn’t limited to just contacting help or support. It’s also important that you immediately receive accurate and speedy answers to your queries and concerns. Human support isn’t sufficient to manage all the queries, complaints, and issues, especially on holidays like Christmas, New Year, etc., where you can get massive traffic on the website. That’s where AI-powered chatbots provide an edge over human support. With Clepher, you can automate your customer service and installation process by simply integrating the chatbot with the e-commerce platform, be it Shopify integration or Ecwid.  It’s a real-time chatbot that lets you engage with the customers in their language and solve their technical issues faster.

Summary – Shopify or Ecwid – The best e-commerce platform in 2022?

Based on all the above points, it is clear that Shopify provides more features than Ecwid. It has a wider support base, better security, quick customization and installation, and better pricing plans. Shopify also wins when it comes to design and customer support. Ecwid, on the other hand, is perfect for you if you’re looking for a simple e-commerce system. It allows you an easy installation process and a minimalistic interface excellent for merchants who aren’t designers or developers.

It’s an ideal platform if you have a low budget and want to pursue business as a side hustler. Overall, Shopify stands somehow ahead in Ecwid regarding e-commerce platforms. If you’re looking for a comprehensive platform that can take your business’ success to new heights, then you should go with Shopify. 

On the other hand, if your business is a new or comparatively low budget that doesn’t need much customization and design features, go with Ecwid.

FAQs – Which is Better, Ecwid or Shopify?

Is Ecwid a cheaper option than Shopify?

Ideally, since Ecwid provides a free plan that Shopify doesn’t, they both offer monthly and annual plans with varied pricing.

Is Ecwid a good eCommerce solution?

Yes, Its ease of use and single-page checkout process is perfect for novice merchants.

Can Ecwid integrate with Shopify?

Yes, Ecwid can be integrated with Shopify. But, if you want to integrate these two platforms, you need a third-party app like SellSync.

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