Transaction Fees: The Difference Most Comparisons Bury
Shopify's fee structure
Shopify charges additional transaction fees on plans where you don't use Shopify Payments as your processor, on top of your monthly subscription. If you want to use a different payment processor for any reason, that fee adds up meaningfully at scale. BigCommerce's own comparison page documents the fee structure differences in detail.
BigCommerce's fee structure
BigCommerce doesn't charge additional transaction fees regardless of which payment processor you use. For merchants processing significant volume through a non-Shopify-Payments processor, this is often the single biggest cost difference between the two platforms.
What's Included vs What Requires an App
BigCommerce's built-in feature set
BigCommerce includes more advanced features natively, multi-currency, B2B functionality, and more sophisticated product options, without needing third-party apps for capabilities that Shopify often requires an app subscription to unlock.
Shopify's app-ecosystem approach
Shopify's philosophy leans the other way, keep the core platform simpler and let its enormous app ecosystem fill in specific needs. This gives Shopify merchants more choice and flexibility in exactly how they solve a problem, at the cost of potentially stacking several app subscriptions to match what BigCommerce includes by default.
Catalogue Size and B2B Fit
BigCommerce tends to handle very large product catalogues and B2B-specific requirements, like customer-specific pricing and bulk ordering, more comfortably out of the box. Shopify can absolutely support large catalogues too, but B2B-specific functionality more often means an app or a Shopify Plus-tier feature rather than something available by default on lower plans.
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Ease of Use and App Ecosystem Size
Shopify's app marketplace is considerably larger than BigCommerce's, which matters if your store needs a very specific, niche integration, there's a meaningfully higher chance Shopify's ecosystem already has it. Website Builder Expert's hands-on testing covers the app ecosystem differences and usability in detail from independent testing.
Shopify's admin interface and onboarding are also frequently cited as simpler for a merchant with no technical background managing the store day to day.
Which Platform Fits Which Business
If you're running a smaller catalogue, want the simplest possible setup, and value having the largest possible app ecosystem to pull from, Shopify is the more common fit. If you're running a larger catalogue, have B2B requirements, or process high transaction volume through a processor other than Shopify Payments, BigCommerce's fee structure and built-in feature set often make more financial sense.
Neither platform is universally better, and we'd rather tell you honestly which one fits your specific catalogue and business model than push whichever platform we happen to prefer building on that week.
The Reality of Migrating Between Them
Moving a store from Shopify to BigCommerce, or the reverse, involves careful handling of product data, customer records, and order history, plus setting up 301 redirects so you don't lose existing search rankings in the process. This is genuinely more involved than most merchants expect going in, and it's one of the most common reasons stores end up needing a developer rather than attempting a DIY migration.
Where We Fit
If you're comfortable evaluating your own transaction volume, catalogue size, and B2B needs and choosing based on that, this decision doesn't require us. Where we come in is for merchants who want an honest technical assessment of which platform actually fits their numbers, or for migrations between the two that need careful data handling and SEO preservation to avoid losing rankings through the move.
That's the same work behind our dedicated BigCommerce development practice and our Shopify development work, $30 an hour, written scope before any billing starts.
Akash Singh
·View full profileCTO and Co-Founder, CV Infotech · Gurugram, India
Akash has been building software for clients in the USA, UK, Australia, and Canada since 2012. He leads a 100% in-house team and personally manages every client relationship and technical decision. Francisco Escobar has worked with him since 2012. Steven has trusted the team with his AI platforms since 2019. 512 verified 5.0 reviews on Freelancer.com.