Register now or log in to join your professional community.
You have a number of free and paid options when it comes to selecting the ideal eCommerce platform for your online store. It should come as no surprise that SaaS-based ecommerce solutions will be substantially more expensive. This is because they are in charge of your web hosting, as well as providing support and updates.
Open-Source solutions, on the other hand, are far less expensive than SaaS-based approaches.
There are many different types of open-source eCommerce software available now for any business. Their key advantages are as follows:
· Most of them are free.
· Platforms give the business a customizability opportunity.
· You can scale your online shop anytime.
· Most platforms with open source have developed community support.
In this Ans, I’m going to share the open-source eCommerce software comparison.
Magento Community Edition
Many online retailers think that Magneto is the best open-source eCommerce platform. Why? Because currently, it holds about 26% of the e-commerce software market. That fact makes Magento an industry leader. It’s the best eCommerce platform for large businesses handling a large amount of traffic and looking for great technical, installation, and troubleshooting support. However, it does not suit all companies. There are different plans on this platform. For instance, Magento Enterprise Edition, mostly used by big companies, costs about $22,000 a year.
Nevertheless, Magento also has a solution for small and medium companies. With a Community Edition, online retailers can enjoy loads of features for free.
Shopware
Shopware is one of the most popular e-commerce platforms nowadays. Founded in 2000, it became a perfect solution for shops of any size. The platform supports multiple storefronts, multiple languages, and currencies right out of the box.
Shopware's architecture is modern and tough. Templates, plugins, and extensions can be added according to a well-defined development process and can be easily integrated into the admin environment.
Among the main advantages of Shopware are its symbiosis of technology and design, simple setup and administration of the Shopware shop, on-premise and cloud-based solutions, high flexibility and marketing orientation. Moreover, there is a Shopware community with discussions of almost any relevant topic.
OpenCart
OpenCart is one of the most popular PHP eCommerce platforms. It suits perfectly to online retailers, who have a small business and are not technological persons. This solution is easy to set up. OpenCart has basic e-commerce functions that might be helpful to start your first online shop. However, this can also be a disadvantage if you plan to scale your business and launch marketing activities.
Meanwhile, in the first stages of setting up an OpenCart website, you need to hire an e-commerce agency to help you with some code. To add more functions and to make your online shop more flexible, you can use tons of different plugins.
OpenCart weak point is that some plugins do not always work together and have poor compatibility. Another drawback is updated that may never come. If you are not scared to put your business at the mercy of software developers, you can use this solution.
PrestaShop
This best open-source e-commerce software is very popular among online retailers. For this reason, we decided to add PrestaShop to this open-source eCommerce platforms reviews and see PrestaShop pros and cons.
PrestaShop has the intuitive admin panel. Users can easily install an e-commerce website. With this platform, you can determine the level of technical control since there are both self-hosted and fully hosted options. Moreover, both of them are free.
With over 250,000 stores using the ecommerce platform, PrestaShop is very popular due to its ease of use. It definitely can be considered as the easiest ecommerce platform.
Zen Cart
Zen Cart platform has many users and a great supporting community. If you need a platform with developed product management features, this one will fit your business. This open-source website builder has over 150,000 members in the support community.
What advantage will you get with Zen Cart? The main advantage as we said before, is great product management. Users are free to create sales, specials and control inventory.
However, pay attention that adding too many products may slow down the system. If your business offers many products, you should consider another open-source eCommerce software.
It's impossible to declare which platform is the best without knowing the size, scope, and needs of your company.
You don't need to pay for complex modules and extensions if you only want a basic web store. High-performance platforms, on the other hand, are better suited to your business if you want to surprise website visitors with a colorful design and special features and you have enough funds. Alternatively, you can hire an eCommerce development firm like WebClues Infotech, which is one of the fastest-growing offshore development companies and has been dubbed the top e-Commerce development company for over 7 years. Their services are widely used, ranging from start-ups to large-scale companies, thanks to their unique and in-depth software solutions. It was recognised for superior delivery and project maintenance on time. For the best eCommerce development, contact them right now.
