If you’re going to be starting your own ecommerce site, it’s important to use the platform that works best for your needs. Both Magento and Woocommerce offer plenty of customisable features that can help you grow your business and provide a user-friendly experience for customers using your site – but which is best?
In this guide we’re going to go over the pros and cons of both the Magento platform and Woocommerce plugin, so you can make an informed decision best suited to your needs. Let’s take a look!
Magento vs. Woocommerce - what’s the difference?
The main difference between Magento and Woocommerce is that Magento is its own platform, while Woocommerce is a plug-in that you can add to any WordPress website to facilitate e-commerce. Magento accounts for around 30% of e-commerce retailers, while Woocommerce represents around 26%.
Magento vs. Woocommerce - which is better?
When it comes to e-commerce, there’s technically no ‘better’ option – it all comes down to what your needs are, your level of experience, and how much money you’re ready to invest into your online shop.
To help you make an informed decision, we’re going to go over a couple of important factors to consider when setting up your e-commerce website, and how both Magento and Woocommerce fare for each consideration:
Price
Cost is naturally going to be one of the first things you consider when setting up an online store, and Magento and Woocommerce both offer two different pricing options:
- Woocommerce is a free plug-in that can be integrated into any WordPress site. While basic usage is free, you can buy premium features and themes to make your site more functional and aesthetically pleasing. These premium features can end up being costly, with some features only available via an annual subscription.
- Magento is an open-source platform for e-commerce, and their Community Edition is free to use. However, you’ll need to pay for your hosting costs and any other costs associated with your domain name and web address. Magento does offer a premium version of their platform, Magento Enterprise Edition, which is costly but offers enhanced ecommerce features.
While both options are free, it’s important to note that Magento is slightly more complex to use; this can mean extra costs if you need to hire developers to implement certain features or get your site up and running.
Beginner-friendly
If you’re just starting out with your e-commerce store, it’s fair to say that you want something simple and easy to use. For those starting out, Woocommerce is probably the best option, especially if you’ve already got a WordPress domain set up. This is because Magento, while offering robust and powerful customisation options, does require some expert knowledge to get running efficiently. Woocommerce, on the other hand, is slightly easier to use, and can be integrated directly into your WordPress website.
SEO options
SEO is the future of e-commerce: PPC advertising is unreliable, highly competitive, and incredibly expensive. Now, many e-commerce owners are looking to drive organic traffic to their websites using SEO techniques that pay off in the long term – so it’s important that your e-commerce platform is suitable for SEO optimisation. So, what are the SEO options for both Woocommerce and Magento?
- Magento SEO features: Magento comes with plenty of SEO-optimisation features, including robots. txt file, sitemap, page redirection, and more.
- Woocommerce SEO features: As it’s built into WordPress, Woocommerce is inherently SEO-friendly, and comes with its own SEO features that allow you to optimise product listings and landing pages.
While both offer excellent SEO optimisation potential, you’ll mostly access these through the purchase or installation of extra features or extensions. As Magento is more complicated, those using the platform should look into Magento SEO consulting in order to optimise both on-site and off-site content efficiently.
Security
Security is essential when it comes to any e-commerce website: you need to be able to guarantee that you can protect your customer’s payment details, as well as their private information. So, how do Magento and Woocommerce fare when it comes to security?
Both platforms offer various security extensions, but Magento also enhances site security by regularly releasing updated security patches for Magento websites. The downside to this is that you’ll need to hire an expert (or have the expertise yourself) to regularly install these patches.
Bottom Line
Overall, both platforms offer a comprehensive range of e-commerce features, and both work well if you’re looking to shift from Shopify or any other e-commerce platform. The ‘better’ option all comes down to your needs, experience, and how much you expect to pay for your e-commerce store.
