One of the two most comparable couples among eCommerce platforms is Magento vs. WooComerce. They’re both famous. But, is one doing better than the other?
The full comparison of Magento vs WooCommerce will lead you to a conclusion in the range of this article, regarding features, performance, protection, pricing, support, and more.
Overview
In short, both Magento and WooCommerce are used to build online shops with the most basic features of e-commerce, such as inventory management, payment, and so on. In certain ways, however, they vary from each other.
Magento is an independent e-commerce website with a codebase that is open source.
First launched in 2007 by Varien, with a lot of products and models, Magento has continuously gained popularity. The number of websites using Magento for e-commerce has reached 250,000+. Magento offers two editions, described in the article Magento Open Source vs Magento Commerce (also called Magento Community Edition vs Magento Enterprise Edition). In addition, the most premium version is Magento Commerce Cloud (Magento ECE) with additional features that distinguish it from Magento Open Source and Magento Commerce.
WooCommerce, On the other hand, a plugin will transform a website based on WordPress into an online store. First recognized in 2011, but according to figures, WooCommerce has powered over 28 percent of all online stores so far. As WordPress occupies about 50 percent of the CMS market share worldwide, this portion is not a surprise.
Magento Vs WooCommerce: Full Comparison
Key Features
Magento has a version rich in free community features that are not often available on other platforms. Such as the capacity to accommodate several storefronts, and support for multi-language, and multi-currency. Since it is open-source, Magento does exactly what you want, so you can customize and create the features you need by coding.
Magento Commerce is much more premium with a lot of exclusive features, especially including-
- Category permissions
- Gift cards
- Advanced catalog search
- Customer segmentation
- Email reminder
- Reward & Loyalty
- Store Credit
Magento Commerce stands out from most when it comes to operating B2B firms. Built-in B2B features such as shared catalogs, company accounts, Fast Order, quotes, company accounts, and so on can be accessed by users. For wholesalers, it is also worth considering.
If you choose to use the Open Source version, depending on your business requirements, you will need to install more Magento B2B modules separately.
On the other hand, besides the free one, WooCommerce does not implement an Enterprise edition. Magento (especially premium editions) supports more built-in features and does not need as many extra extensions as WooCommerce, unlike WooCommerce.
Winner: Magento
Scalability
Companies will face new costs and technological obstacles as it comes to scaling up. That’s why scalability is an aspect that you need to remember before you connect with any e-commerce platform.
How’s Magento scalable?
Magento is a robust platform for e-commerce, so scalability is not outside its reach. The fact is that hundreds of thousands of items can be hosted by this site at once.
You can rely on Varnish Cache with Magento 2, the leading caching tool that allows you to develop your online store without compromising its performance. Adding new functionality or algorithms will not impact the pace of your website.
In addition, Magento 2 is compliant with a large range of statistical tools from third parties, such as Google Analytics, New Relic, MixPanel, etc. In terms of discovering potential trends, it is the most strong e-commerce site, offering useful insights for scaling up or down.
Compared with Magento, WooCommerce has the same scalability. It is the issue of whether the assets of your WordPress hosting can handle it. Usually, a range of hosting providers’ solutions are provided to customers, including having your dedicated server. Controlled WordPress options from providers including SiteGround and WP Engine are also available.
Also Read: WooCommerce vs. Shopify: Which is Best eCommerce Platform for You?
SEO & Marketing
WooCommerce users can find SEO capabilities very similar to WordPress as a WordPress Extension.
Magento is certainly going head to head at this stage. In search engines like URL alteration, 301 redirects, canonical tags, etc., you will find most of the essential features required to maximize the visibility of your website. What’s more there? It also provides built-in tools for Sitemap and Google, while WooCommerce includes extensions for these functions.
Regarding marketing, with a premium range of features such as catalog promotion pricing, versatile coupons, control of newsletters, and more, Magento 2 is invincible. As these characteristics are part of the heart of Magento, they are all simple to use.
Winner: Magento
Performance
It is not a light-speed platform for both Magento and WooCommerce, but there is no winner.
Compared with WooCommerce, to run properly, Magento requires more server capacity. Since the position of your hosting server will impact loading time, a dedicated server is needed by the platform, which can be a little heavy on your budget. We cannot ignore, however, that Magento can accommodate a greater number of items efficiently than WooCommerce.
On average, the Magento pages that compose the sales funnel of a classic consumer waste 665 milliseconds to load, which exceeds Google’s “under 500 milliseconds” goal.
A stand-alone plugin will obviously not boost the efficiency of WordPress websites when it comes to using WooCommerce unless you install additional plugins that can improve the speed and other performance-related parameters.
Here comes the drawback that could have a big impact on performance: Since WooCommerce features are minimal, online WP-based stores typically need more additional plugins to meet business needs, which will slow down the pace. Of all tracked WooCommerce shops, the average loading time reached 776 milliseconds.
Your website success also depends too much on whether you want Magento or WooCommerce:
- Hosting provider.
- Size of the application and number of functionalities
- Image size
Security
Ecommerce sites are still one of the cybercrime’s most lucrative targets, where hackers can steal user credentials such as payment information and use them for bad purposes. If that is the case, the victims are not just clients, but corporations also get a poor name. For this reason, any online company should pay adequate attention to security.
Magento takes the security lead since the platform provides dedicated security fixes to remove any bugs that occur. To ensure the highest security, Magento websites should be updated regularly. It is, however, a challenge for those with a technical mind to submit Magento security patches. Your answer is to get assistance from a reputable Magento agency if you have no knowledge about coding.
The security features of WooCommerce, meanwhile, are more simple and very limited.
Winner: Magento
Pricing
Pricing is one of the main factors in deciding between WooCommerce and Magento. There are major variations in an individual platform for e-commerce, while the other is a WP website plugin.
Magento
We all know that a FREE version known as Magento Community Edition is provided by Magento. This edition’s software code is free to download and can then be modified and configured to suit business needs. Obviously, you do have to pay for imperial services such as web hosting, SSL certificate, the domain name (estimated in Ecommerce Development Cost Breakdown).
On the other hand, with your annual salary, the expense of using Magento Commerce and Magento Commerce Cloud is rising. With Magento Commerce, if your income ranges from $0.0, the expense starts from $22,000. Similarly, according to the related range of sales, Magento Commerce Cloud costs about $40,000.
WooCommerce
Although WooCommerce is a FREE download plugin, extensions appear to be costly to meet its limitations (some even require annual subscriptions). In addition, compared to Magento’s free alternative, WooCommerce provides less simple e-commerce functionality. So, for your company, which one is more optimal?
There’s no question that WooCommerce is more economical than Magento, but as the number of your clients rises and your company scales, issues will arise. Because of the great scalability of whatever version you use, middle to large companies are therefore advised to use Magento. Or if you have a specific goal for development and expansion, here’s the same advice.
Winner: Depends on your business needs
Extensions And Plugins
There are drawbacks to the e-commerce site itself. This is where extensions meet advanced and personalized business specifications. Fortunately, users of both e-commerce platforms can use thousands of extensions/plugins on their websites to expand their features. Via third-party plugins, both Magento and WooCommerce cater to all problems.
Although several premium features are built into the Enterprise plan, Community edition users can be assured of out-of-the-box features when buying extensions from Magento Marketplace. This is a massive store of more than 3,600 Magento extensions that are free and premium. Everyone must pass a strictly technical and content review process of the QA team of Magento before it is officially listed on the marketplace.
WooCommerce also has an extension store that collects hundreds of plugins across all your requirements for logistics, technology, and marketing.
Support
Both Magento and WooCommerce have a large worldwide customer base to support store owners when they run into issues.
Support for Magento varies between editions greatly. Users of the Magento Community may only consult and request assistance from official documents and groups. The most widely used outlets are Magento Support Center, Magento DevDocs, Magento Forums, or technical blogs written by accredited Magento partners like BSS Commerce Confluence. On the other hand, companies using Magento Enterprise are provided full-fledged official support via email or live support.
As with Magento Community Version, aside from outlets such as WooCommerce Docs, WooCommerce Blog, WordPress Support Forum, and so on, WooCommerce users will not experience any official support.
Winner: Magento
Ease Of Use
WooCommerce captures the hearts of consumers with respect to friendliness for beginners. The plugin adds WP websites with simple e-commerce functionality while maintaining the parent platform’s ease of use. WooCommerce provides users with a quick user interface from the WordPress dashboard and pretty good customizability. This point is a small bonus for store owners who have no e-commerce experience.
In addition, consumers of Magento appear to be individuals who have at least basic technological knowledge. Amateur users can find it difficult to use the customization platform, which requires coding skills. If you do technical stuff yourself, this is going to be a major issue. But if you’re not a tech-minded guy, getting a specialized technical team or obtaining dedicated help from Magento agencies like BSS commerce is advisable.
Winner: WooCommerce
Magento Vs WooCommerce: Which One Wins The Battle?
In short, both Magento and WooCommerce have their own advantages, but their target users can vary. You need to define what kind of user base you are before constructing your store with one of these two platforms.
Magento is a comprehensive platform generally used by medium to large-scale organizations. For large sites with a big inventory and visits, the excellent scalability makes it perfect.
If premium features are not appropriate for your needs, a good choice is a free version. It’s advisable to find guidance from seasoned Magento development agencies if you’re planning for a Magento web store. BSS Commerce is an example that you can approach for consultation.
In comparison, for those who are already familiar with WordPress, WooCommerce is a simpler website. The solution best suits small businesses that need scalability, functionality, security, and so on at a medium level.
