Choosing between Shopify and WooCommerce isn’t just a tech decision — it’s a business strategy decision. The wrong choice costs you months of migration pain, lost sales, and wasted developer hours.
At Growww Tech, we’ve built 200+ stores on both platforms for Indian D2C brands. Here’s our honest, data-backed comparison — no affiliate bias, just what works.
| Choose Shopify If… | Choose WooCommerce If… |
|---|---|
| You want to launch fast (1-2 weeks) | You need complete customization |
| You don’t have a developer on team | You have a WordPress developer |
| You’re spending on ads and need uptime | Budget is extremely tight (<₹500/month) |
| You want built-in Indian payments | You need complex B2B workflows |
| You plan to scale to ₹1Cr+ monthly | You sell digital products or courses |
| Component | Basic | Shopify | Advanced |
|---|---|---|---|
| Platform fee | ₹1,994/mo | ₹7,447/mo | ₹30,164/mo |
| Theme (one-time) | Free – ₹15,000 | Free – ₹15,000 | Free – ₹15,000 |
| Essential apps (5-8) | ₹2,000 – ₹5,000/mo | ₹2,000 – ₹5,000/mo | ₹2,000 – ₹5,000/mo |
| Transaction fee (Indian payments) | 0% | 0% | 0% |
| Total monthly | ₹4,000 – ₹7,000 | ₹9,500 – ₹12,500 | ₹32,000 – ₹35,000 |
| Component | Budget | Standard | Performance |
|---|---|---|---|
| Hosting | ₹300 – ₹500/mo | ₹2,000 – ₹5,000/mo | ₹8,000 – ₹15,000/mo |
| Theme | Free | ₹3,000 – ₹8,000 (one-time) | ₹5,000 – ₹15,000 (one-time) |
| Essential plugins | Free – ₹2,000/mo | ₹3,000 – ₹8,000/mo | ₹5,000 – ₹12,000/mo |
| Developer maintenance | ₹0 (DIY) | ₹5,000 – ₹10,000/mo | ₹15,000 – ₹30,000/mo |
| Security (SSL, firewall) | Free – ₹500/mo | ₹1,000 – ₹3,000/mo | ₹2,000 – ₹5,000/mo |
| Total monthly | ₹800 – ₹3,000 | ₹11,000 – ₹26,000 | ₹30,000 – ₹62,000 |
Key insight: WooCommerce looks cheaper on paper, but once you add reliable hosting, security, developer maintenance, and premium plugins, it costs the same or more than Shopify at scale.
Winner: Shopify. The Shopify Payments + Razorpay integration is seamless. WooCommerce payment plugins often break after updates or have compatibility issues with themes.
For Indian D2C brands, shipping integration is critical. Here’s how they compare:
Winner: Shopify — significantly better shipping stack for Indian operations.
Page speed directly impacts conversions and SEO. A 1-second delay reduces conversions by 7%.
Winner: Shopify — unless you invest ₹10K+/month in WooCommerce hosting and a developer to optimize it.
Winner: WooCommerce — if content marketing and organic SEO are your primary growth channels, WooCommerce’s WordPress foundation is unbeatable.
Winner: Shopify — for brands planning to scale aggressively, Shopify removes infrastructure headaches entirely.
Despite Shopify’s advantages, WooCommerce is the better choice in specific scenarios:
For 80% of Indian D2C brands selling physical products, Shopify is the right choice. Here’s why:
For content-heavy businesses or brands with strong technical teams, WooCommerce gives you more control — but that control comes with responsibility.
Platform choice is one of three or four things that meaningfully affect your launch timeline. We build on both Shopify and WooCommerce — we’ll diagnose product type, AOV, COD ratio, team capability, and growth plan in 30 minutes and recommend the right one. No bias toward either. We’ve done both for 200+ Indian D2C brands. ₹385Cr+ revenue processed. 4.5x average ROI. 98% retention.
If Shopify wins, the build is ₹50,000 fixed-price with no AMC — bug fixes for what we ship are included for the lifetime of the store, and you ship on the Growww Tech custom theme customised to your brand.
Start a WhatsApp chat: Message the Growww Tech team on WhatsApp →
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