Compare WOOCOMMERCE VS MAGENTO, which system is right for you?

WooCommerce vs Magento – This is one of the most compared platforms. With their close and fierce capabilities and still being very popular in the market, it may not be easy to choose a winner for you. Because the features from each platform are full of powerful efficiency, ready to help you do business. Therefore, it becomes the source that makes you decide which one to choose to be your helper.

Luckily, we are here to help guide you through your decision. It may not be the best solution, but when you have the information in hand, you can make a better decision that is best for you.

Each platform has its own loyal fans and strong support teams, but we have decided to ignore those voices and provide the most unbiased opinion to help you make an informed decision.

In this article, we will compare WooCommerce vs Magento – key features, performance, security, pricing, ease of use for beginners, and even product management. Hopefully, after reading this article, you will be able to choose which platform solves your problems and is right for you.

So without further ado, let’s take a look at what’s there.

WooCommerce vs Magento: What are their unique strengths?

WooCommerce is a plugin for the WordPress platform. It combines a wide range of features for an e-commerce solution while maintaining ease of integration with the main platform.

Magento is an ecommerce platform that is perfect for web development professionals and medium to large online stores. It has some of the most powerful features in its category, making it ideal for stores with higher capacities.

WooCommerce vs Magento: What are the differences in features?

What each platform offers

For those of you who want an overview, we’ll try to cover everything you need to know about both platforms, then we’ll go over the comparison results and decide who deserves to be crowned the champion.

WooCommerce

WooCommerce is a familiar name to most WordPress users. This wildly popular ecommerce platform hosts over 400,000 websites and has almost every functionality you need to run an online store, plus many advanced capabilities through its extension system.

Key features :

• Supports unlimited number of products
• Comes with a powerful extension system in the form of a WordPress plugin.
• Allows you to choose the payment processor you want using almost any extension.
• Offers a wide range of premium and free themes

Highlights:

• Create a store for free, except for the web hosting service fee that you have to pay yourself.
• It is easy to implement if you already have experience with WordPress.
• There is a lot of learning documentation available for users. You can also contact the team behind the project if you have any further questions.
• Integrates with Google Analytics using Extensions
• SSL is supported but you need your own certificate.

Disadvantages :

• If you don’t use WordPress, you’ll need to learn how to use both platforms again.
• Theme and Extension costs can add up very quickly.

So is it good for beginners ?

WooCommerce is a great option for users with no ecommerce experience – but twice as easy if you’ve used WordPress before. If you haven’t already, check out WooCommerce’s excellent documentation. There are also plenty of great tutorials online.

price :

It is an open source platform that anyone can download and install on their server as they wish. It does come with some premium extensions that can be quite expensive, and some require an annual subscription, but other than that, the cost of your web hosting service will depend on the size of your organization and the packages your provider offers.

We have quality web hosting that works well with WooCommerce, but the top ones we recommend to our customers are SiteGround and InMotion, which will cost you around 240 baht / month (try not to go with any cheaper packages as they may not be optimized for ecommerce setups).

Magento

While WooCommerce has tried to present itself as a community solution, Magento has shifted its focus more towards corporations. However, that doesn’t mean that small businesses can’t benefit from its functionality. Remember that Magento has a free Community Edition, which is already very powerful, and an Enterprise Edition for larger companies. For the purposes of this comparison, we’ll focus on the Community Edition’s features only.

Key features :

• Support unlimited number of products, as many as your self-hosted platform can handle!
• Comes with its own theme creation and layout system
• It has a powerful API that can be connected to third-party solutions.
• It has a very smart admin interface and product builder.

Highlights:

• It was built to support the expansion of your business. Magento should have no problem managing a large store, as long as your host can handle the size of the space.
• Shoppers can check out faster with a streamlined process. Plus, guest checkout is now open by default.
• Direct integration with PayPal, Authorize.Net and Braintree

Disadvantages :

• Magento seems to be more developer-oriented than user-friendly, so it can be quite complicated to learn on your own.
• The Enterprise Edition is quite expensive, but that’s probably because their target market is mostly high-end.

So is it good for beginners ?

To be honest, Magento is not as beginner-friendly as WooCommerce and Magento. However, it can be used by referring to the extensive documentation and if possible, the platform is very capable, making it suitable for users who need to quickly scale their store.

price :

Magento Community Edition is open source and free for anyone to use, so your specific costs will depend on your hosting provider. On the other hand, users interested in the Enterprise Edition will have to have a pretty big budget.

How is the work efficiency ?

Loading time is already a big issue for websites, but it’s even more important for online stores. If your site takes too long to load or feels slow, many customers will leave your site, and revenue could disappear in the blink of an eye just because it’s slow!

And when it comes to performance, it can be hard to decide which solution is the overall winner, as every online store (regardless of platform) will be different in terms of functionality and size. There are also many other factors, such as the web hosting provider you choose, the content delivery network (CDN) you use, or even how you optimize your images.

Simply put, the performance of your online store depends on you and your hosting provider. In this case, both companies are considered equal in this respect.

What about safety ?

When it comes to security for e-commerce platforms, it is no joke. Every customer expects their personal data and payment details to be kept safe and secure, and providers like you need to provide them with this.

Similar to performance, the security of your online store depends largely on you. Both WooCommerce and Magento will try to help you implement a number of advanced security measures, but most of them involve extensions and manual customization. However, while no platform can guarantee 100% security, Magento leads the way in this regard, offering specific security patches for its users.

But be warned, Magento security patches are not easy to apply, and many ecommerce newbies may feel that doing so will turn people off from Magento.

However, if you take security seriously and you have experience in web development (or are willing to pay for help) – Magento is the clear winner in this regard.

Product management ?

If you’re looking for a complete eCommerce store, a good product management system can go a long way in helping you prioritize your business. WooCommerce offers a fairly open approach to product management, with options for both physical and digital products, making it incredibly easy to create new items, especially if you’re already familiar with WordPress. You can also extend the platform’s functionality using available extensions, such as the Product Add-on :

But Magento has many features that WooCommerce lacks, without the need to purchase additional extensions. For example, it supports product reviews, product grouping, favorites, advanced pricing rules and product customization. It clearly has a lot of advantages in terms of functionality – but with a relatively low learning curve.

Overall, WooCommerce might be a better option for users who don’t need advanced features in their store, as it allows you to get your store up and running faster and is particularly popular with smaller businesses, plus you can choose to extend the features later using extensions.

What about the costs? How are they different?

The main deciding point between WooCommerce and Magento is your budget. As mentioned earlier, WooCommerce is a free all-in-one service, while Magento has a Community Version along with a number of premium (paid) services. Unfortunately, the pricing for Magento’s premium options is only revealed via chat with their sales team.

Either way, it is definitely possible to create an online store that works really well on both platforms, without any hidden costs beyond the cost of hosting your website. How much it will cost to keep your store running will depend on the choice of hosting provider, which is a topic we covered earlier in this article, as well as the two paragraphs above.

While both platforms are free to use, the costs can quickly pile up if you rely too heavily on extensions. There are plenty of free extensions for both Magento and WooCommerce, but premium offerings tend to be more expensive as well.

But if you need to add extra functionality to your site, make sure to research which extensions you need before committing to a platform, and compare prices. This way, you can get the functionality you need within your budget.

Everything we’ve considered so far shows that both WooCommerce and Magento are excellent options for online stores on a budget, although the latter is only available with the Community version. It also depends on the size of your store. WooCommerce is still the cheapest option for smaller businesses, as you don’t need to install a more powerful (and premium) platform. For larger businesses, however, Magento may be the way to go.

Hosting a WooCommerce store is likely to get cheaper and easier in the future, as more and more hosts become available and know how to optimize their platform for WordPress. As mentioned, you can get a quality host for around $5/month from companies like SiteGround, BlueHost.

WooCommerce vs Magento: Who’s the winner?

If you have to choose a newbie to start with, our recommendation is definitely WooCommerce. It is very easy to install and is perfect for small tasks that require a quick store setup. It allows users to create any type of online store they want, such as family entrepreneurs…

…and such as ticket shops for special events.

However, Magento is still an excellent eCommerce solution for situations where the capabilities are seen to be more scalable, making it an ideal choice for established companies looking to make the move into eCommerce. And if you can afford the hefty price tag of the Enterprise Edition, you’ll be more than happy with the results. Still not convinced? Just ask Bulgari – they’re proud to be Magento users :

Ultimately, this comparison is about the difficulty new users may face in getting onto either platform. WooCommerce may succeed in this area, thanks to its low barriers to entry for ecommerce enthusiasts.

Summary

Picking a winner between WooCommerce vs Magento is not an easy task as there is no one-size-fits-all platform that will perfectly suit the needs of all users. While some may agree with our decision to choose WooCommerce, others may find themselves better suited to Magento. This is where you will need to consider a number of criteria including performance, security, product management and your overall budget, alongside your own specific needs. Ultimately, our decision in the WooCommerce vs Magento battle will come down to the following reasons:

1. WooCommerce is easier for new users to learn – especially if you’re already familiar with WordPress.
2. The platform has a wide range of extension hubs.
3. It can be installed at a low cost, of course your budget may vary depending on the scope of your store.

Here is a quick summary to give you a better overview of the differences between WooCommerce and Magento: