Shift4Shop vs Shopify: The Ultimate Ecommerce Platform Comparison
Table of Contents
- Introduction
- Who is Shift4Shop?
- Cost Comparison: Shift4Shop vs. Shopify
- Search Engine Optimization: Which Cart is Better for SEO?
- Design and Ease of Use: Which Cart is Easier to Use?
- Out of the Box Functionality: Which Cart Has More Features?
- Third-Party Ecosystem: Which Cart Has More Developer Support?
- Blogging: Which Cart Has a Better Blogging Platform?
- Pros and Cons of Shift4Shop vs. Shopify
- Conclusion
Shift4Shop vs. Shopify: Which Ecommerce Platform is Better?
If you're looking to start an online store, you've probably heard of Shopify. It's one of the most popular ecommerce platforms out there, and for good reason. But recently, a new player has entered the game: Shift4Shop. In this article, we'll compare Shift4Shop vs. Shopify to help you decide which platform is right for your business.
Who is Shift4Shop?
Shift4Shop is a fully hosted ecommerce platform that was created by Shift4 Payments, one of the leading providers of payment processing and technology solutions in the world. They acquired 3dcart in 2020 and made their ecommerce platform 100% free when Shift4 is used as the main payment processor. This move sent ripples throughout the ecommerce community, as all of a sudden, you could get access to a fully hosted shopping cart as powerful as Shopify without paying any monthly fees.
Cost Comparison: Shift4Shop vs. Shopify
When it comes to cost, Shift4Shop is the clear winner. While Shopify's base plan starts at $29 per month, the true cost of running a store on Shopify can quickly add up due to the monthly fees associated with third-party apps. In contrast, Shift4Shop offers a fully featured store for free, with no monthly fees. The catch is that you must qualify for their payment processing plan, and if you do not use Shift4 to process payments, you'll get charged a monthly fee that is equivalent to Shopify's pricing plans.
Search Engine Optimization: Which Cart is Better for SEO?
When it comes to SEO, Shift4Shop has the edge over Shopify. Shopify's biggest limitation with SEO is that you can't optimize your URLs for SEO. In contrast, Shift4Shop allows you to generate whatever URL slug that you want, which makes shopping cart migration seamless. Shift4Shop also offers a suite of built-in SEO tools out of the box, which allows you to implement sitemaps, redirects, canonical URLs, meta tags, rich snippets, and more.
Design and Ease of Use: Which Cart is Easier to Use?
Shopify is simpler and easier to use than Shift4Shop. Shopify's base cart doesn't do much, but it's easy to use and has a beautiful user interface. In contrast, Shift4Shop has attempted to include as much functionality as possible out of the box, which can make it a little confusing to understand all the menu options. However, Shift4Shop has every feature under the sun, and it's free.
Out of the Box Functionality: Which Cart Has More Features?
Shift4Shop has practically everything out of the box, with a zero dollar price tag. Shopify's base cart doesn't do much, and you have to pay for plugins to customize your store. Shift4Shop offers a full-blown affiliate program out of the box, which is a relationship where you as the merchant pay an influencer or site owner a commission for every sale they drive to your store. Other notable functions that Shift4Shop offers out of the box are product waiting lists, wholesale customer groups, gift registries, loyalty programs, and more.
Third-Party Ecosystem: Which Cart Has More Developer Support?
Shopify has a much larger third-party app ecosystem than Shift4Shop, which means that if there's a cutting-edge new ecommerce feature or tool, it almost always arrives on Shopify first. Shopify's third-party app ecosystem is easily an order of magnitude larger than Shift4Shop. However, Shift4Shop has deep pockets and may try to throw money at the problem to get up to par with Shopify in this department.
Blogging: Which Cart Has a Better Blogging Platform?
Shift4Shop has more features for effective blogging than Shopify. The SEO tools for Shift4Shop allow far greater flexibility for your posts, and free email marketing allows you to promote your blog posts for free.
Pros and Cons of Shift4Shop vs. Shopify
Pros of Shift4Shop
- Free to use
- Every feature under the sun
- Better SEO tools
- More features for effective blogging
Cons of Shift4Shop
- More complicated to use
- Smaller third-party developer pool
Pros of Shopify
- Simple and easy to use
- Larger third-party app ecosystem
- More third-party developer support
Cons of Shopify
- Expensive due to monthly fees associated with third-party apps
- Can't optimize URLs for SEO
Conclusion
In conclusion, both Shift4Shop and Shopify are great ecommerce platforms, but they have different philosophies. Shopify is simpler and easier to use, but it's expensive due to monthly fees associated with third-party apps. Shift4Shop is more complicated to use, but it's free and has every feature under the sun. If you hate getting nickel and dimed and you don't want to deal with a bunch of disparate apps and code from different companies, then Shift4Shop is an attractive solution. However, if you need cutting-edge ecommerce functionality and a larger third-party app ecosystem, then Shopify is the way to go.
