Shopify Pricing, Features, Reviews & Comparison of Alternatives

Pros
Shopify is where it's at if you want to get involved in the whole Direct 2 Consumer craze! You could literally have a store, up and running and transactional in 10 minutes assuming you're computer / web literate, have a bank account, and a product to sell...For getting up and running with hundreds of attractive themes to choose from (not all on Shopify.com, there are online stores that sell themes...) you really can't beat the ease of Shopify – with just the right amount of freedom, and automation to make sure you can get your products and logo looking their best, and not accidentally break the whole thing. And if you know a little HTML/CSS, the sky is really the limit in terms of customizing the theme. Plus there's a Shopify "App Store" that offers every possible function you could imagine if you wanted something not natively offered such as pop-ups, rewards clubs, or wholesale pricing.

Cons
In the beginning, I found it a bit cumbersome to deal with large catalogs with lots of variants (color / size) per sku. But Shopify and their lightning-fast chat support are nothing if not good listeners and they've made editing part of, or your whole catalog, much easier than ever before, with tons of filters for tailoring your product selection on the back end, to making almost any variable from Title, to Inventory, to Weight, easily bulk editable. So the thing I'll say that still stinks, is that all the apps charge subscription fees, which is super annoying, especially if you rely on a bunch of them. I would much rather pay a one and done license fee as opposed to $3 a month for my mailing list manager app, $16 a month for my Wholesale price tiering app, and $5 for my abandoned cart retrieval system. It adds up to a big, never-ending headache.

Rating breakdown

Likelihood to recommend: 10/10

Pros
When I launched Shopify originally, I was looking for a solution that would accommodate online sales for my organization as well as in-person sales at our conferences. I had physical and digital items, and I needed something could take care of it all. That's what I found in Shopify. It was easy to implement and it helped the organization increase sales 35% YoY. Since then, I've launched a half dozen Shopify sites, and I just love how easy and flexible the platform is.

Cons
My only complaint about Shopify is how much of the platform requires apps. There are a lot of things that some of their competitors offer as a part of the platform that Shopify leaves to their app developers, and it's hard to get nickle-and-dimed when I want to add subscriptions or gift messages or anything else.

Rating breakdown

Likelihood to recommend: 10/10

Pros
Basic system for creating a website, adding products, and selling online is excellent and easy to use.

Cons
It takes a lot more work and understanding to put your own products on the shopify platform. I have followed shopify for a few years, and still learning about new functionality and possibilities, such as api.

Rating breakdown

Likelihood to recommend: 5/10

Pros
It is easy to get a website up and running. Adding products is easy.

Cons
WHERE DO I BEGIN: -inventory records only go back three months...I was horrified to find out I lost 4 months of inventory records. -to print a receipt...you need to buy and download an app...it is awkward to use and takes a couple minutes for the receipt to upload before you can print it. -to have employees log in you need to download and app and pay monthly -you can not do a credit on someone’s account if they return something...You need to either return their money or give them a gift card it is awkward and difficult to use. -if you mark an order pending payment you cannot take payment on the POS system. -you cannot add any vender information that is not visible to your customers. -the duplicate feature when adding products doesn’t work properly....to hard to explain what should be duplicated and what shouldn’t but trust me it wasn’t created by someone that understands business

Rating breakdown

Likelihood to recommend: 2/10

Pros
Free themes: A friendly dashboard to complete your website in a blink of an eye Real cheap: With only $29 you can design, track your product, manage your clients, and so on... High secured platform: It gives you the power of creating your website and never ever worry about getting hacked or struggle with the server downtime. Unlimited plugins and APPS: Yes it's like having an iPhone and you want to download an app for it, the Shopify app store is limitless any kind of app and plugins is available, and easy to install. Customer service is available 24h/7 by email/Online Chat/ FAQ Community: Huge community and video explanatory contents. YOU NEVER STRUGGLE.

Cons
Sometimes downloading a lot of APPs might make your website slow on loading, just need to be careful about what app you're integrating and just work with the MOST HAVE APPS.

Rating breakdown

Likelihood to recommend: 10/10