The Best Ecommerce Website Builders: Where To Sell

• Shopify Pricing: $29 – $299 per month, $1 for the first month
• Read our Shopify Review for a detailed look at the website builder

Shopify

Best for selling physical products

Outstanding

4.8

out of 5

• For established stores
• For expanding businesses
• For complex inventories

Free trial available

Paid Plans: $29 - $299 / month

Pros

• Multichannel selling
• AI tools for product set up
• 100+ payment options

Cons

• Limited store customization
• Not for very new businesses
• Additional costs for apps

Shopify Review

Try Shopify

Shopify is our top choice if you’re looking for total ecommerce success, supporting growing businesses with its high-quality sales features, such as customizable checkout pages and multichannel selling.

What I Like About Shopify

Shopify has the best sales features on the market, as well as beneficial tools to support your ecommerce business:

• The simple product backend makes it easy to add to your inventory or make changes – I particularly love using Shopify Magic, an AI-powered text generator, to create product descriptions
• Shopify’s multichannel selling tools let you sell your physical products in a variety of ways – connect with social media platforms like TikTok or get your business seen by customers shopping on online marketplaces
• There’s room to scale your business with three tiers to its website builder plans and an enterprise solution for large-scale operations
• Shopify has over 100 payment options to choose from, as well as its native Shopify Payments – this makes shopping with your business more convenient for customers since they can use popular payment processors, such as Apple Pay, without going through a third-party checkout process
• Choose from over 8,000 apps in Shopify’s app store to seamlessly integrate additional capabilities into your storefront, such as Ecommerce Booster which will audit your pages and provide SEO recommendations
• Accept payments from customers in person with Shopify’s POS products, which seamlessly sync with your online store
• Showcase your products in unique ways with the built-in Shopify 3D scanner, providing users with cutting-edge technology to create dynamic product views
• Customize your checkout page to tailor the experience for your business and customers – you know what’s best for your customers so you can decide what information and requests you make on the checkout page

What I Dislike About Shopify

While Shopify is at the top of the league when it comes to helping businesses sell online, it does have drawbacks. There are a limited number of free templates to choose from, and its section-based editor can make it difficult when it comes to designing your website. Because of this, I don’t recommend Shopify for total beginners – especially since Shopify directs you toward hiring a Shopify expert for help rather than offering any kind of tutorial.

Shopify’s reliance on its app market can also be a pain point for some. External integrations can add to your monthly costs and you’ll waste time researching the best tools when other website builders, like Wix or Squarespace, offer a lot of features in-house. For example, Squarespace’s Acuity Scheduling tool comes with the website builder, whereas scheduling and booking with Shopify must be done through a third-party app, like Easy Appointment Booking.

Who Do I Recommend Shopify for?

Shopify’s backend dashboard helps you manage and oversee your online store, providing room for your inventory to grow as you climb the ladder of success. For this reason, I recommend Shopify for businesses with complex demands and established products, as opposed to a brand just finding its footing online.

Is Shopify Good Value for Money?

Shopify offers the worst value for money out of our five recommended builders. This is largely due to the fact that Shopify’s plans range from $29 to $299 per month (billed annually), making it one of the most expensive options for business owners. Though, you can cut down on costs thanks to Shopify’s introductory deal, which gives you your first three months for $1 per month.

Where Shopify sets itself apart is that ecommerce is available from its cheapest plan – this isn’t the case with Wix, Squarespace, GoDaddy, or Hostinger. Wix and Shopify offer ecommerce at the same starting price point, but you’ll get better dedicated ecommerce features with Shopify.

• Wix Pricing: Free – $159 per month, get 10% off with the code “TAKE10”
• Read our Wix Ecommerce Review for a detailed look at the website builder

Wix

Best for selling digital products

Outstanding

4.8

out of 5

• For new business owners
• For product variety
• Good for all industries

Free plan available

Paid Plans: $17 - $159 / month

Pros

• Best online store templates
• Sell products internationally
• Personalized SEO support

Cons

• Overwhelming number of features
• Limited storage space
• Advanced sales features on top plan only

Wix Ecommerce Review

Try Wix

If you’re thinking about selling digital products, such as ebooks or music, consider Wix for your ecommerce website builder. The product backend is straightforward to use – when testing, I could simply upload the digital file, add my product information (such as a name and an image), determine the pricing, and set my inventory to mark products as “in stock”. It’s not as robust as Shopify’s dashboard, but you won’t need to monitor the number of products you have left since you’re selling digital items!

Of course, you can also sell physical products with Wix like you can with Shopify. Wix is a well-rounded ecommerce website builder, catering to a variety of industries and businesses with its sales features and stylish templates.

What I Like About Wix

Wix is our best-performing website builder, but it also excels when it comes to ecommerce capabilities:

• Sell a variety of products on your online store – Wix gave me two options when adding new products, physical products and digital files, so business owners can customize their inventory easily
• Wix POS enables you to upgrade your selling options and sell to customers at physical locations, whether that’s a retail store or pop-up
• Wix has over 120 temples designed specifically for ecommerce stores, meaning businesses can choose from a range of stunning designs tailored to their industry, such as “Electronics” and “Home & Decor”
• Wix’s email marketing options are great for promoting your store, targeting customers with customized campaigns, and encouraging them back to your store with automated abandoned cart recovery emails
• Wix’s internationalization tools will help you expand your store’s reach, including features like auto-translation and international SEO support
• Personalized Wix SEO and keyword support helps push your digital products to the right customers and get your online store seen by Google
• Outstanding shipping options, such as free shipping and priority shipping, give businesses a choice on how to best serve their customers when it comes to delivery
• The Wix Owners App lets you manage and run your store on the go – process orders and keep an eye on your business from your mobile device

What I Dislike About Wix

During my testing, I was disappointed to see that the top sales features and ecommerce support are only available on Wix’s most expensive plan (the $159 Business Elite plan). For example, your storage space is limited on the Light, Core, and Business plans which can limit your website’s growth  – in comparison, storage is unlimited across all Squarespace plans.

I also found Wix’s interface a little overwhelming to navigate, which can be an annoying hurdle to overcome when you’re trying to set up your online store. While its editor is very user-friendly, you have to understand where things are and what to click before you can really get to grips with managing your storefront’s look.

Who Do I Recommend Wix for?

Wix’s straightforward backend and comprehensive set of sales features make it a fantastic choice for businesses that sell digital and physical products across a range of industries. While both its editor and ecommerce tools are a lot easier to get to grips with than Shopify’s, it isn’t as well-suited for businesses that want to scale their store.

Is Wix Good Value for Money?

Wix is better value for money than Shopify, but it’s not as cost-effective as the other builders on this list. Wix’s pricing is fairly expensive and ranges from $17 to $159 per month (billed annually), having increased its fees in May 2024.

In addition to its four premium plans, there’s a free plan which can be a good place to test things out, and an additional Enterprise plan for industry-leading businesses.

You’ll need the $29 per month Core plan to start selling online. This provides basic ecommerce features, such as abandoned cart recovery, and it’s a suitable starting point for small businesses looking to embark on their ecommerce journey.

• Squarespace Pricing: $16 – $52 per month, get 10% off with code “WBE10”
• Read our Squarespace Ecommerce Review for a detailed look at the website builder

Squarespace

Best for selling services

Excellent

4.7

out of 5

• For service businesses
• For creatives
• For beginners

Free trial available

Paid Plans: $16 - $52 / month

Pros

• Great scheduling tool
• Aesthetic template options
• Unlimited products and storage

Cons

• Limited room to grow
• Not suitable for larger stores
• Bad for international selling

Squarespace Ecommerce Review

Try Squarespace

Do you own a service-based business, like a salon? Maybe you’re a fitness instructor looking to connect with clients online. Squarespace takes third place in my ecommerce website builder ranking, claiming the spot thanks to its impressive scheduling capabilities and ease of use.

Squarespace has seen real improvement in our ecommerce research since last year, providing a valuable range of sales features and tools to help you promote and offer products, services, and appointments to your customers. While it’s ideal for service-based businesses, Squarespace is also a top choice for creatives – artist websites and portfolio owners can choose from over 150 high-quality templates and create a beautiful storefront with ease.

What I Like About Squarespace

Squarespace has a lot of impressive qualities as an ecommerce website builder:

• Squarespace’s Acuity Scheduling tool lets you create appointments, set availability, tweak booking preferences, and more – the feature does cost extra though with plans starting from $16 per month
• Squarespace’s drag-and-drop editor and user-friendly interface makes setting up your online store hassle-free – during testing, Squarespace came out on top as the easiest website builder to use
• The newly revamped Blueprint AI saves you time and energy when building your website from scratch – all I had to do was choose my preferred designs and styles over the five-step process, then Squarespace generated a template for my business
• Squarespace’s sales features keep getting better, even outperforming Wix in areas such as customer accounts, product reviews, and more.
• Over 150 Squarespace templates, filterable by industry type, such as “Events” and “Fitness” – I found all of Squarespace’s templates to be stylish, modern, and trendy
• Unlimited products and unlimited storage is available with every Squarespace plan – in comparison, Wix caps businesses after 50,000 products and you have to subscribe to a more expensive plan to unlock limitless storage

What I Dislike About Squarespace

Unfortunately, Squarespace isn’t ideal for larger ecommerce stores. There’s limited room to scale your business – while Squarespace’s plans accommodate unlimited products and storage space, they lack the impressive features on offer by Shopify, such as multiple inventory locations, or Wix’s internationalization capabilities.

With Squarespace, you also have to pay more to unlock advanced shipping, advanced discounting, and subscriptions. These features are only available on the most expensive plan, Commerce Advanced, which costs $49 per month (billed annually).

Who Do I Recommend Squarespace for?

I’d recommend Squarespace to businesses that offer services online thanks to its powerful Acuity Scheduling tool. However, to use this feature you’ll have to pay an additional monthly fee, starting at $16, on top of the price of your chosen plan, so I wouldn’t recommend this to services businesses on a low budget. Instead, Wix is a great alternative that includes access to scheduling tools on its $29 Core plan.

Is Squarespace Good Value for Money?

Our research found that Squarespace’s plans are great value for money, second only to the more affordable plans offered by GoDaddy. Squarespace’s pricing increased in April 2024, and now ranges from $16 to $52 per month (billed annually).

Ecommerce capabilities are available from Squarespace’s $23 per month Business plan, but if you’re interested in selling services, I recommend choosing the Commerce Basic plan for $28 per month since this provides you with additional sales tools.

• GoDaddy Pricing: $9.99 – $20.99 per month
• Read our GoDaddy Ecommerce Review for a detailed look at the website builder

GoDaddy

Best for selling locally

Very Good

4

out of 5

• For local businesses
• For small stores
• For the budget-conscious

Free plan available

Paid Plans: $9.99 - $20.99 / month

Pros

• Beginner-friendly editor
• Fastest set up time
• Local promotional tools

Cons

• Too simplistic for full creative control
• Limited scalability with commerce plan
• Boring template options

GoDaddy Ecommerce Review

Try GoDaddy

GoDaddy is the best ecommerce website builder if you’re looking to sell products locally, as well as online – complement your in-person storefront with a digital space to match. You want the right customers to find your business, and GoDaddy’s marketing tools can help you promote your brand across the relevant search results.

GoDaddy’s ecommerce performance has improved since last year’s research, particularly when it comes to website features and design options. But GoDaddy isn’t as powerful as Shopify, Wix, or Squarespace.

What I Like About GoDaddy

When testing GoDaddy myself, I found the following standout features to support ecommerce success:

• GoDaddy’s marketing tools, such as SEO and social media integration, will help you connect your optimized store with your target audience
• GoDaddy’s own POS system will help sync your online and in-person sales – this is a great add-on if you’re looking to maintain a physical business presence as well as set up an online store because you track everything from your GoDaddy home
• Pre-designed elements with a local focus, such as maps and contact forms – while this is a feature common to all the builders on this list, it’s especially key when trying to promote your business locally
• A personalized SEO dashboard to effectively optimize your online store – determine your keywords, enhance your content, and personalize how your site will be displayed on Google
• The speedy setup time means you can get online quickly and start serving local customers right away – I got my basic website up and running in under 30 seconds, making GoDaddy the quickest builder to get your business online
• Process purchases using GoDaddy Payments with lower transaction fees than every other builder – accept payments from popular options, such as Apple Pay and Google Pay, and generate pay links to sell your products anywhere

What I Dislike About GoDaddy

GoDaddy’s let down in a few areas, particularly scalability and features. It’s not the most suitable ecommerce website builder if you’re looking to grow and expand your business quickly because of its single commerce plan and lack of advanced sales features.

For example, I was disappointed to see that GoDaddy provides no way to remove transaction fees, even if you upgrade your plan. In comparison, Hostinger offers 0% transaction fees on its only ecommerce plan. GoDaddy also relies on users to report fraudulent transactions rather than automatically detecting these cases itself – Shopify’s fraud analysis tool will handle this for you.

Additionally, GoDaddy’s templates and AI website builder create dull results, paling in comparison to the beauty of Wix or Squarespace’s templates. You’ll struggle to create a unique and modern-looking online store.

Is GoDaddy Good Value for Money?

GoDaddy is the best value for money ecommerce website builder, offering cheap ecommerce plans for businesses. GoDaddy’s pricing ranges from $9.99 to $20.99 per month (billed annually), but you’ll need the $20.99 Commerce plan, GoDaddy’s most expensive tier, for the full range of ecommerce capabilities.

You can start building your website and pages with GoDaddy’s free plan, though. While this isn’t a permanent solution for an ecommerce business, since you won’t be able to sell products without the Commerce plan, it can be a great way to test out the builder before subscribing to a plan.

Who Do I Recommend GoDaddy for?

With its simplistic editor and user-friendly settings, GoDaddy is ideal for beginners, supporting businesses as they begin to grow their online presence. I’d recommend GoDaddy for businesses with brick-and-mortar stores that want to start selling their products online, thanks to its robust POS system.

• Hostinger Pricing: $2.99+ per month
• Read our Hostinger Review for a detailed look at the website builder

Hostinger

Best for selling as a side hustle

Very Good

4.2

out of 5

• For side hustles
• For beginners
• For the budget-conscious

Free trial available

Paid Plans: $2.99 - $3.99 / month

Pros

• Drag-and-drop editor
• Impressive AI tools
• Sell unlimited products

Cons

• Limited scalability
• No app market
• Simple templates

Hostinger Review

Try Hostinger

Hostinger completes my list of the top five ecommerce website builders, offering businesses a simple and affordable option to start selling online. You don’t need to break the bank to unlock Hostinger’s ecommerce tools and it’s quick to get things set up. When testing the builder, I had a functional storefront up and running in minutes.

However, Hostinger can’t compete with the industry’s best when it comes to scalability and advanced sales features. With only one ecommerce plan, there’s no room to grow, and you can’t tap into an app market for extra functionality.

What I Like About Hostinger

Hostinger’s ecommerce plan offers a handful of standard, yet simple, sales features. It’s perfect for a small store that doesn’t require all of the bells and whistles of an advanced platform.

• Sell unlimited products with Hostinger – Wix, for example, requires you to subscribe to its Business Elite plan ($159/mo) to increase its product limit, whereas Hostinger offers this benefit for just $3.99 per month
• A variety of payment options to process payments – connect with over 20 payment methods, including Stripe, PayPal, and Apple Pay
• No transaction fees to pay since Hostinger doesn’t charge for them
• Hostinger’s suite of AI tools are included with the ecommerce plan, including AI-generated heatmaps to track visitor behavior and tools to support text and image creation
• Improved SEO features, such as keyword support and the option to noindex your site – this is useful to boost your site’s visibility and ranking
• Internationalization tools to sell globally – Hostinger supports 70 languages, though any additional languages require manual translation
• Business support is available via Hostinger’s helpful AI chatbot and onsite editor tutorials and guidance

What I Dislike About Hostinger

While I recommend Hostinger for side hustles and beginners because of its simplicity and affordability, it’s not a suitable website builder for expanding online stores. With only one ecommerce plan, there’s no room to grow further. Shopify, for example, has three premium plans and a custom option for enterprise-level businesses, helping both small and large-sized companies.

Unfortunately, Hostinger’s sales features are also fairly underwhelming. You’ll get access to standard tools for inventory management and to schedule appointments, but payment and shipping options are limited. Plus, email marketing isn’t a built-in feature, making it difficult to promote your products online.

In addition, while Hostinger supports a wide range of languages, store pages can’t be translated which is a major letdown for businesses looking to target other regions.

Is Hostinger Good Value for Money?

Hostinger is great value for money and the most affordable ecommerce website builder on this list – with Hostinger, you don’t have to break the bank to get online. Previously only offering a single plan, the builder now offers two, with Hostinger’s pricing ranging from $2.99 to $3.99 per month (billed annually).

You’ll need the $3.99 per month Business Website Builder plan to sell online. Not only does this plan give you access to ecommerce tools, but the upgrade also comes with Hostinger’s suite of AI tools, including an AI Logo Maker and AI Image Generator.

Who Do I Recommend Hostinger for?

Hostinger’s time-saving AI tools and easy-to-use editor make it ideal for those looking to set up a side hustle or test whether ecommerce selling is right for them. But, if you’re looking to sell full-time and grow an online business, you’ll need a builder with a more powerful and scalable set of tools, like Shopify.

Each ecommerce website builder and plan has something unique to offer – you need to assess what works best for your business needs since every store has different priorities.

Some important areas to consider include:

• Determine your type of business – Do you run a small, medium, or large business? Do you need a lot of storage and inventory space? What type of products do you need to sell? If you’re looking to sell digital products or online courses, make sure your website builder permits this.
• Setting a budget – What are you willing to pay for your ecommerce website builder? Do you need room to grow and expand? Will prices increase dramatically if you upgrade to a higher plan? Are there additional costs to be aware of, such as apps or templates? Make sure you select a solution that remains affordable for your business over time.
• Confidence in building an online store – Do you feel comfortable building an online store? I recommend choosing a builder that offers a drag-and-drop editor to make designing your website as easy as possible. Is the backend dashboard intuitive and simple to navigate?
• Knowing where to sell – Do you want to sell via your website or across multiple channels as well, such as social media? Do you want to sell in-person too? Look for a builder that lets you seamlessly sync your digital and in-person sales, or opt for a solution that allows multichannel selling to help you get your products seen by more customers.
• Serving your customers – What payment options are available? How can you enhance the sales funnel to deliver positive customer experiences? Consider navigation, email marketing tools, and customer engagement features, such as contact forms and social media integration.

We put 16 builders through our rigorous research process to bring you our shortlist of the top five ecommerce website builders. Our in-house research team carried out over 200 hours of data collection across 398 areas of investigation.

Our testing is carried out regularly to make sure we bring you accurate and research-backed recommendations that are reflective of the current state of the ecommerce website builders.

Our seven core research categories are:

• Sales Features – 40%

We look at the ecommerce capabilities of a website builder, from payment options to transaction fees.

• Website Features – 15%

Looking at the quality and quantity of a website builder’s functionality, such as blogging tools, AI, and SEO.

• Help and Support – 12%

Testing the support channels and resources provided by a website builder to help business owners in need of guidance.

• Design Functionality – 10%

We review how many templates and design options cater to online stores.

• User Experience – 10%

We test every ecommerce website builder ourselves to assess their usability and accessibility.

• Customer Score – 8%

Looking at how each ecommerce website builder performs against its competitors.

• Value for Money – 5%

We examine what you can get for your money with each available pricing plan.

Each category is given a unique weighting, favoring the areas we know are most important to ecommerce businesses, such as sales features. Each builder is then awarded a star rating out of five.

The ecommerce website builder you choose will depend on the needs of your business. For example, if you’re looking to sell services, Squarespace is a great option. But, Shopify is our top-rated ecommerce website builder, outperforming the rest of the market when it comes to high-quality sales features.

So, once you’ve chosen your ecommerce website builder, it’s time to build your online store. You can read our expert guides on how to sell online and how to accept payments to help you get started.