Shopify, WooCommerce, and custom stores side by side
| Platform | Typical build cost | Monthly running cost | Best for |
|---|---|---|---|
| Shopify | $2,500 to $15,000 | Plan fee plus app subscriptions, usually $50 to $400 | Most stores that want speed and low upkeep |
| WooCommerce | $2,500 to $15,000 | Hosting and premium plugins, usually $30 to $200 | Stores that want full control or already run WordPress |
| Headless or custom | $20,000 to $40,000+ | Hosting and services, usually $200 to $1,000 | High traffic, unusual checkouts, or marketplaces |
Monthly costs are third-party fees paid to the platform and app providers, before payment processing fees.
Typical price ranges
| Project | Typical range | Typical timeline from approved scope |
|---|---|---|
| Store setup A Shopify or WooCommerce store with your products, payments, and shipping. | $2,500 to $6,000 | 1 to 2 weeks |
| Store migration Products, customers, orders, and search rankings moved to a better platform. | $3,000 to $10,000 | 1 to 3 weeks |
| Custom store with integrations A designed store connected to your stock, accounting, and marketing tools. | $6,000 to $15,000 | 2 to 4 weeks |
| Headless store or marketplace Multi-vendor marketplaces and custom storefronts for high traffic. | $20,000 to $40,000+ | 4 to 8 weeks |
The timeline starts once the scope is approved and we have what we need from you.
What moves the price
- Number of products and variants
- Platform and apps
- Integrations with stock and accounting
- Custom checkout or subscriptions
What you are really paying for
An online store is three things working together: the storefront customers see, the operations behind it, and the connections between them. The storefront is the design, product pages, search, cart, and checkout. Operations are stock, orders, shipping, returns, and accounting. The connections make sure an order placed online updates stock, triggers fulfillment, and lands in your books without anyone retyping it.
Cheap stores often skip the third part. They look fine on launch day, then cost hours every week in manual stock updates and reconciliation.
Choosing a platform
Shopify is the right choice for most stores. It is fast, secure, and maintained for you, and its app store covers most needs. You pay a monthly plan fee and subscriptions for the apps you add.
WooCommerce runs on WordPress. It suits businesses that already have a WordPress site, want full control of their data and code, or sell in ways Shopify handles awkwardly. You pay for hosting and premium plugins, and someone must keep it updated.
A headless store separates the storefront from the commerce engine. It costs more, but gives complete design freedom and top speed for high-traffic brands. Marketplaces, where several sellers list products, almost always need custom work.
What moves the price
The number of products and variants matters, but less than most people expect. Importing 5,000 products costs little more than importing 500 if the data is clean. Messy spreadsheets with inconsistent sizes and colors take real time.
Integrations matter most. Connecting the store to your warehouse, point of sale, accounting package, or enterprise resource planning (ERP) system, the software that runs stock and finance, is where custom work concentrates.
Checkout changes come next. Subscriptions, trade pricing, bundles, deposits, and custom shipping rules each add work, because checkout must never fail.
Key points
- Product data quality, more than product count
- Connections to stock, accounting, and fulfillment
- Subscriptions, trade accounts, and checkout rules
- Design: a refined theme or a fully custom storefront
What is included in the price
Every store quote from us covers discovery, a product and category plan, and the design of the home page, collection pages, product pages, cart, and checkout. It includes product import, payment and shipping setup, tax settings, and connections to the tools you named. We set up analytics with purchase tracking, test real orders end to end, and train your team to add products and process orders.
A typical timeline
A store setup goes live in one to two weeks. A migration takes one to three weeks, including redirects so search rankings carry over. A custom store with integrations takes two to four weeks. Headless stores and marketplaces take four to eight weeks, usually with a soft launch to a small group of customers first.
Costs people forget
Monthly fees add up. A Shopify store with eight apps can spend more on subscriptions each year than its build cost. We list every expected monthly fee in the quote so you can see the full picture.
Payment processing takes a percentage of every sale. Product photography, if you need it, is separate. Ongoing care, including theme updates, app reviews, and seasonal changes, usually runs $100 to $300 a month for a typical store.
How to keep the cost down
Clean your product data before the project starts. Consistent names, sizes, colors, and prices in one spreadsheet can save a week of import work.
Choose a theme close to the look you want and refine it, rather than designing every page from scratch. Spend the design budget on the pages that sell: the home page, collection pages, and product pages.
Install fewer apps. Each app adds a monthly fee, a little weight to every page, and one more thing that can break during an update. We often replace three overlapping apps with one small piece of custom code that has no subscription.
Launch with the sales channels that bring revenue today, and add marketplaces, wholesale, or international stores once the main store runs smoothly.
Key points
- Clean product data before the build
- A refined theme rather than a blank canvas
- Fewer apps, and custom code where it saves fees
- One channel at a time
A worked example
Picture a homeware brand selling about 1,200 products online and in two physical shops. Stock is updated by hand twice a day, and items sell out online after the last one has gone in a shop.
The answer is a custom Shopify store connected to the shops' point of sale and the accounting package. Online and in-store stock become one number. Orders flow to the accounting package with the right tax codes. The project falls in the $12,000 to $18,000 range and launches in about four weeks. The owner stops overselling, and two people regain several hours a day.
How to compare store quotes
Check which platform each supplier proposes and why. Ask for a list of the apps or plugins they plan to install and their monthly cost. Confirm that product import, redirects from your old store, tax setup, and test orders are included. Ask who owns the store account, the domain, and the payment provider account. They should all be in your name.