Last Updated on November 17, 2022
Picking the right site builder is vital when building a website; it became much essential when creating an online store. Picking the wrong website builder can make your business scaling impossible and may cause the site to migrate to another platform.
There are various website builders that do not allow for that scenario to occur. Wix and Shopify are also some of them. Although the name of both builders is often found in the list of best website builders, only one can top the other.
Both builders offer various templates, payment processors, SEO features, marketing tools, and more. To make sure you use the right builder for your business, we will provide you with a Wix vs Shopify comparison.
What are Wix and Shopify?
Both Wix and Shopify are website builders, and on the surface, they share some similarities. Both platforms offer users all the required features to build a website or online store without needing to code.
Although various similarities between both platforms can be seen, they both are built with different purposes in mind.
Wix is conceived as a platform for building content-based websites such as:
- Brochure sites
- Blogging
- Photography portfolios
- News sites
While on the other hand, Shopify is designed to be the solution to creating an online store, meaning all of its features are dedicated to selling and nothing else.
However, over time, the sets of both features have changed considerably, and now Wix offers a lot more selling features, and Shopify’s content management tools have also significantly evolved too.
Wix Pricing vs Shopify Pricing
Pricing is one of the main differences between both website builders. While all plans of Shopify involve fees, a website on Wix can be created for free.
Although Shopify offers a 3-day free trial, it is on the short side, and when the trial is over, users are required to make a Shopify subscription to further use the builder. However, unlike other website builders, Shopify gave its users full functionality on the trial version, allowing users to test the platform and business ideas.
On the other hand, Wix allows users to create a website for free but is very limited in functionality. The free plan of Wix does not allow users to create a domain name with it and also does not allow them to get Google Adsense approval. Moreover, the Wix ads are also hard-to-avoid.
To use Wix to its fullest potential, though, the user will need to purchase its premium plan.
Wix Pricing
The pricing plan of Wix divides into two different categories’ Website Plan’ and ‘Business and eCommerce Plan.’ Both plans offer different pricing, and for Wix, ‘ Website Plan’ divides into four categories, while ‘Business and eCommerce Plan’ divides into three.
Wix Website Plan
- Connect Domain – $1.09/month
- Combo – $1.53/month
- Unlimited – $2.27/month
- VIP – $3.98/month
Wix Business and eCommerce Plan
- Business Basic – $2.76/month
- Business Unlimited – $3.67/month
- Business VIP – $6.12/month
All the plans of Wix offer additional storage, access to certain functions, video hours, eCommerce features, bandwidth, and more. Furthermore, a domain can be added with all of Wix’s plans or with just the separate ‘Connect Domain plan.
All the plans of Wix follow a feature-to-price ratio, and each plan category is suited for specific websites.
Shopify Pricing
Shopify offers three different categories, divided into three parts – ‘Basic Shopify,’ ‘Shopify,’ and ‘Advanced Shopify.’ Shopify subscriptions can be made for monthly, annually, 2-years, and for 3-years. Moreover, users can test the platform for 3-days without making any purchases.
Basic Shopify – $29/month
Shopify – $79/month
Advanced Shopify – $299/month
With the most basic plan, Shopify allows users to build a complete and fully functional online store and also allows users to sell through Facebook pages.
In conclusion, the prices of Wix are much lower than Shopify. However, in terms of security, APIs, task automation, and other functions of Shopify are better than Wix, making Shopify a much better choice to go with.
Wix vs Shopify: Templates
Wix and Shopify offer various pre-designed templates for users (in Shopify, templates are referred to as themes).
Both platforms only require users to install a template to their dashboard and add text and images to it to form the site’s or store’s design.
The default color, typeface, and other features can be customized, and additional features can also be added with ease on both platforms.
Quantity of Templates
Wix offers users over 800 pre-built templates, while Shopify only provides 9 themes for free. Even after considering all of Shopify’s premium themes, there are only over 100 themes available in it. However, take note that additional Shopify themes can be purchased from theme markets such as ThemeForest, etc.
Ultimately, in terms of the number of templates, Wix is the winner. The number of templates is much higher in Wix, but what about quality though?
Quality of Templates
Both site builders offer attractive and professional-looking templates and also allow users to customize them according to their needs.
The quality of both site builder templates is impressive, but as you may have expected, the themes of Shopify are highly-focused on eCommerce functionality, while the templates of Wix are versatile.
In all, Shopify is the choice to go with if you are looking for dedicated eCommerce templates. However, the best Shopify themes require users to pay a bit extra.
Wix vs Shopify: Ease of Use
Shopify includes powerful features which automatically resize – texts, images, forms, etc., and gives a 100% response time. Furthermore, the features of Shopify automatically adjust the website according to different screens.
On the other hand, Wix uses absolute positioning, meaning web elements are positioned by pixels. In practice, this means that users will need to create two versions of their website – one for desktop and one for mobile.
While it may seem like a time-consuming process, Wix automatically sort-out the mobile version of the website, and users can make changes if necessary. This may seem like a con of Wix, but actually, it is not. Wix allows users to make their website more streamlined for different screens with ease and automatically hides superfluous elements for mobile screens.
The main difference between Wix vs Shopify’s ease of use is that Wix is a front-end interface website builder, meaning the user can see what they edit in real-time, allowing them to make changes accordingly.
While on the other hand, Shopify is a back-end website builder, meaning users will need to preview or public changes to see them.
Wix includes a simple drag-and-drop builder to customize templates, allowing users to quickly add and remove features without any trouble.
Although Shopify also allows users to build a website with drag and drop editor, its editor is a bit different from Wix’s. The Shopify builder locks things down a bit more tightly, allowing users to move a single block or section up and down a page at a time.
Although the Shopify builder may seem a bit restrictive, it does help users to create a fully responsive and mobile-friendly site. Furthermore, unlike Wix’s editor, the editor of Shopify directly customizes templates, which are then applied to pages. Although you can get used to it, it is going to be a bit confusing at first.
All in all, in terms of ease of use, Wix is the better website builder as it offers a straightforward drag-and-drop builder that can be used to quickly build almost any type of website quickly.
Wix vs Shopify: Customer Support
On paper, the customer support of Wix and Shopify are pretty much neck to neck. Both website builder offers reliable 24/7 live chat and phone call support. This allows users to get helpful guidance no matter what the clock says.
However, the support of Wix proves itself to be a bit better than that of Shopify, as it includes various articles and videos to support the user. The interface of Wix is also much better, and the builder also includes in-editor help, allowing users to pop-open customer support anywhere in the builder.
While on the other hand, Shopify requires users to go to their website to connect with customer support. This may be a bit long process, but users are guaranteed to get instant and helpful support.
All in all, the customer support of Wix is better than that of Shopify, as Wix’s customer support can be accessed directly through the dashboard, and various videos and helpful articles are also included to help users out. On the other hand, to access Shopify’s customer support, users will need to visit their official website.
Wix or Shopify
Wix is a recommended builder for anyone building a new, small business website at an affordable price without sacrificing features. Wix is an easy-to-use and drag-and-drop website builder and gives users the freedom to put their creativity to work, making it a perfect website builder for brand-conscious entrepreneurs.
Use Wix if
- Starting or running a small online store.
- Wants a variety of creative tools.
- Wants a larger variety of templates.
- Wants to run a blogging website.
- Tight on budget.
Shopify is a recommended platform for large businesses looking for a much more powerful platform for long-term growth. Unlike Wix, Shopify requires a larger budget, but it all proves to be worthwhile thanks to Shopify’s impressive sales tools and vast app store.
Use Shopify if
- Running a large business.
- Need powerful features for increasing sales.
- Need built-in analytics tool.
- Needs a wider range of payment getaways.
FAQs
1. Do Wix and Shopify have multilingual capacity?
Yes, both builders have multilingual capacity. Wix lets users make versions of the same webpage in different languages. In fact, it makes it extremely simple to do this. It allows users to translate texts, links, and SEO settings with a few clicks. Shopify also offers multilingual applications like GTranslate, but they’re not nearly as user-friendly.
2. Which builder has better SEO performance?
Wix has better SEO performance than Shopify as it allows users to add and edit meta titles, meta descriptions, and URL slugs — Wix also offers users Keyword support and more blogging features than Shopify, helping users’ sites to appear in more online searches.
3. Do Wix and Shopify have discount functionality?
Yes, both website builders offer features to create discount codes. However, with Wix, the amount of money has to be specific. While on the other hand, Shopify is much more advanced in this area and allows users to create percentage discounts.
To Conclude
Shopify is one of the most known-name for the eCommerce website builder and is packed to the core for that sole purpose. However, the subscription to Shopify may not be affordable to all, making Wix an easy and affordable builder to go with.
Wix offers various functions for eCommerce site building, and as a matter of fact, the quantity of Wix’s eCommerce features is much higher than that of Shopify’s.
To conclude this Wix vs Shopify comparison, Wix is the winner as it is much easier to use, affordable, has a wider range of features, and is SEO friendly. However, take note that if you only want to build an online store and have a big budget, then Shopify is the choice to go with.
