Starting a business is the dream of many though success is never guaranteed. With the internet and ecommerce, the opportunity to find success is no longer limited to local selling but can now have small sellers expanding their audience across the world. These sites require platforms that easily collect and distribute information about one’s products and audience while being the place to make the purchases worldwide. Because the platform is so important it is vital to know which platforms are good and which ones should be stayed away from.

There are many reasons as to why a platform would be superior or inferior to others. Features and integrations can differentiate a great platform and the best ones. Many of these platforms have templates to start your store with multiple different options right off the bat. Some allow much more variety than others, while several stay moderately basic in all the aesthetic decisions. Woocommerce and Webflow are examples of platforms that allow a lot of design decisions, while GoDaddy and Wix have a limited library of potential if used without specific coding backgrounds.

Nearly all these platforms have a subscription-based interface while making a small percentage of everything sold. It is important to look up these percentages and transaction stipulations before committing to a single platform depending on your demographic and purpose of selling. If you are planning to sell cheaper items in scale, then a dollar amount fee would be impractical as it would impede on the profit margins. Instead, a percentage would be more rewarding, while more expensive items at a set dollar amount fee would be better on profit margins.

Features like discounts, email marketing, custom domains, cross platforming, plugins, social media implementation, and login accounts are things that differ between each platform and their plans. Even though each has their own features it is more difficult to compare the differences because most have multiple plans that are focused to your purpose of selling. This should encourage you to not only look at the platforms but compare plan prices and balance them with your desires with the platform to see if it falls short of your expectations.

This list is made based off reviews, features, prices, customizability, and popularity:

Best
1. Shopify
2. Squarespace
Great
1. Square Online
2. Woocommerce
3. Webflow
Average
1. Ecwid
2. Big Cartel
3. BigCommerce
4. Wix
Poor
1. Volusion
2. GoDaddy