BigCommerce renamed its plans and added a new fee on some payments in June 2026, so many price comparisons you will find are out of date. This WooCommerce vs BigCommerce guide uses the prices and fees we checked on both official sites this September.
Last updated 13 September 2026. Prices checked on bigcommerce.com, woocommerce.com and stripe.com.
Quick answer: BigCommerce or WooCommerce?
Choose WooCommerce if you want to own your store, shape every page and pay no platform fee on sales.
Choose BigCommerce if you want hosting and updates bundled into one plan, and you accept plan jumps as your sales grow.
Still weighing BigCommerce or WooCommerce? Book a free call with the team that builds WordPress stores.
WooCommerce vs BigCommerce: the numbers that decide it
$0
WooCommerce: monthly platform fee, with 0% revenue share on your sales
2.0%
BigCommerce Core: extra fee on sales through a payment provider outside its embedded list
$30K
BigCommerce Core: yearly sales cap before your plan is upgraded for you
$105
BigCommerce Growth: monthly price (billed monthly) of the first plan with abandoned cart emails
WooCommerce vs BigCommerce: the basic difference
One store you own, one store you rent
WooCommerce is a free, open-source plugin that turns a WordPress website into an online store. You install it on hosting you choose, so the files, the database and your store data stay with you.
BigCommerce is a hosted store platform. You pay a monthly plan, and BigCommerce runs the servers, security and platform updates for you.
That one difference shapes the rest of this WooCommerce vs BigCommerce comparison. WooCommerce gives you control, ownership and your pick of who does the upkeep. BigCommerce takes the upkeep and sends a bill that rises as your sales grow.
Ease of use: WooCommerce vs BigCommerce
The easy start has a price tag
You want your hours spent on selling. BigCommerce hands you a hosted store, and its own team runs the servers and platform updates. WooCommerce is a free plugin on a WordPress site: you or your web team pick the hosting once, and from then on the store, the data and the design are yours. We build on WordPress, and we say so up front.
BigCommerce
- Hosting and platform updates come with every plan.
- A 15-day free trial lets you test before you pay.
- Core stops at $30K a year in sales, then moves you up to Growth.
- Abandoned cart emails need Growth or higher.
- Outside payment providers add up to 2.0% on each sale.
WooCommerce
- The plugin is free and open source.
- No platform fee and 0% revenue share on your sales.
- Your products, customers and orders stay yours to export.
- Any WordPress theme or page builder can shape your shop.
- Your shop and your blog run on one WordPress site.
- You pay for hosting, and someone has to keep the plugins updated.
If WooCommerce wins your WooCommerce vs BigCommerce check, decide who runs the updates before launch day. Our WordPress website maintenance checklist lists the monthly jobs, so you can judge the work before you commit.
Total cost: WooCommerce vs BigCommerce by store size
What you pay as your sales grow
On BigCommerce, your plan follows your sales. Once your store passes a plan’s yearly sales cap, BigCommerce moves you up to the next plan by itself, based on your last 12 months of sales.
Plan and fees for three example stores, checked 13 September 2026
Example store
BigCommerce plan
Extra fee with a non-embedded provider
WooCommerce platform fee
Sells $24,000 a year
Core: $39 a month, or $29 a month billed yearly
2.0%, about $40 a month
$0
Sells $60,000 a year
Growth: $105 a month, or $79 a month billed yearly
1.0%, about $50 a month
$0
Sells $150,000 a year
Scale: $399 a month, or $299 a month billed yearly
0.6%, about $75 a month
$0
Card processing is extra on both platforms. The extra fee applies only to sales through a provider outside BigCommerce’s embedded list.
Card fees land on both sides of a BigCommerce vs WooCommerce bill. Stripe, for example, charges 2.9% + $0.30 per US card sale on either platform.
WooCommerce has no plan fee, and it still costs money to run. You pay for hosting, a domain, any paid extensions and someone’s time for updates. Bluehost, a web host, puts a working WooCommerce store at $200 to $1,500 or more a year.
Under the Core cap, run a WooCommerce vs BigCommerce cost comparison with two totals side by side: the plan fee on one side, hosting and care on the other. Once sales push you onto Growth, the BigCommerce plan fee alone passes $100 a month.
Payments and transaction fees: BigCommerce vs WooCommerce
BigCommerce vs WooCommerce: the fee hiding inside each sale
Every sale pays a card fee to your payment provider. On BigCommerce, the provider you pick can add a second fee. BigCommerce builds in more than 20 providers it calls embedded, including Stripe, PayPal and Adyen, and adds nothing on sales through them.
Pick a provider outside that list, and BigCommerce adds its open payment provider fee on those sales on every self-serve plan. In a WooCommerce vs BigCommerce fee check, WooCommerce adds no platform fee with any provider, so you pay your provider’s own rate and nothing more.
Selling abroad? Stripe and WooPayments both add 1.5% for cards issued outside the US, so compare the same provider on both platforms.
Pro tip
Check your payment provider before you compare BigCommerce vs WooCommerce on price. On BigCommerce Core, a provider outside the embedded list adds a 2.0% fee on those sales, on top of card processing.
Features: WooCommerce vs BigCommerce side by side
Built in, or added when you need it
Across a WooCommerce vs BigCommerce feature list, BigCommerce keeps some selling tools for higher plans, such as abandoned cart emails on Growth. WooCommerce starts lean, and you pay only for the extensions you pick. Check what WooCommerce can do for free before you buy extras.
BigCommerce vs WooCommerce at a glance, checked 13 September 2026
BigCommerce
WooCommerce
Hosting
Included, on BigCommerce servers only
Any host you choose, and you can move later
Monthly cost
Core $39, Growth $105, Scale $399 billed monthly ($29, $79 or $299 a month billed yearly)
Plugin $0; hosting, domain and paid extensions extra
Fees on sales
None with embedded providers; 2.0% on Core, 1.0% on Growth, 0.6% on Scale with other providers
0% revenue share and no extra fee for any payment provider
Abandoned cart emails
Only on Growth and above
Through the official AutomateWoo extension
Extra storefronts
Paid add-on per storefront, from $30 a month on Core (up to 3)
A WordPress Multisite network, with extensions to manage the stores
Marketplaces
Amazon, eBay and Walmart channels on every plan
Through marketplace extensions sold on WooCommerce.com
Design freedom
Theme Store themes and a visual Page Builder
Any WordPress theme or page builder, with full code access
SEO control
Page titles, meta descriptions and URLs in the control panel
Titles, descriptions, URLs and rich-result markup through a plugin such as Rank Math
Store ownership
Your store runs on BigCommerce's platform
Files, database and store data on hosting you control
Blog and content
Built-in blog with a visual editor
Full WordPress publishing, categories and SEO plugins
Best for
Owners who want everything bundled and have nobody for updates
Most small stores: owners who want to own the store and choose every part
Want a WooCommerce store without the tech work?
Still torn: BigCommerce or WooCommerce? Talk it through with the team that builds WordPress stores.
SEO and blogging: BigCommerce vs WordPress
BigCommerce vs WordPress: let your articles bring buyers in
A buying guide or how-to post can reach shoppers before they pick a product. WordPress started as a publishing tool, so a WooCommerce store gets full blog pages, categories and an SEO plugin such as Rank Math on the same site as your products.
BigCommerce stores include a built-in blog too, with a visual editor and SEO fields for each post. Neither platform ranks a store by itself: Google ranks pages that answer the search well. If content is how you plan to win customers, WooCommerce wins this part of the WooCommerce vs BigCommerce match-up. WordPress gives your writers more room, and our WordPress SEO team can set it up with you.
Design and customization: WooCommerce vs BigCommerce
Make the shop look like you
Your store should feel like your brand from the first click. BigCommerce vs WordPress comes down to a store builder with its own themes, or a full website system where the shop is one part. With WooCommerce, your product pages, blog and service pages share one design, and our team can build a WooCommerce store around your brand.
BigCommerce does offer a plugin that brings its store into WordPress. Its WordPress.org page warns it has not been tested with the last three major WordPress releases, so check its update history before you rely on it.
With WooCommerce, you own the store. With BigCommerce, you rent it, and the rent rises with your sales.
Scalability and uptime: WooCommerce vs BigCommerce
Room to grow without starting over
Growth feels different on each side of the WooCommerce vs BigCommerce choice. On BigCommerce, the servers are its job, and your bill steps up plan by plan as sales rise. Past Scale, the Performance plan has custom pricing from $1,499 a month, billed yearly.
On WooCommerce, you grow by giving the store stronger hosting, caching and a lean set of plugins. Big catalogs and busy sale days need planning, and that planning is your team’s job or ours.
BigCommerce promises 99.99% uptime on its own comparison page. With WooCommerce, you pick a host whose uptime terms you like, in writing, and you can move hosts if it falls short.
B2B and multi-channel selling: BigCommerce or WooCommerce
Selling to businesses, marketplaces and more than one store
This is where BigCommerce earns its fee. Every plan connects to Amazon, eBay and Walmart, Growth adds customer groups and segmentation, and you can add extra storefronts to one account.
WooCommerce reaches the same places through extensions for wholesale pricing and marketplace feeds. You pick only the ones you need, and none of them adds a WooCommerce platform fee to your sales. If most of your buyers are trade buyers across several brands, BigCommerce is a fair pick for this part of BigCommerce vs WooCommerce.
Security and maintenance: WooCommerce vs BigCommerce
Who keeps your store safe after launch?
A store that goes down or gets hacked stops taking orders. Before you settle WooCommerce vs BigCommerce, decide who watches for that.
BigCommerce
- Free SSL on every plan.
- BigCommerce runs the platform updates.
- You cannot choose your own servers.
- Staff logins and the apps you add are still your risk.
- You cannot take the platform to another host.
WooCommerce
- You choose the host, backups and security tools.
- Providers such as Stripe can take card details without them passing through your server.
- You have full access when something breaks.
- A care plan can hand the updates to a team you pick.
- Updates to WordPress, WooCommerce and plugins need someone to run them.
Our WordPress security best practices guide covers the basics you can do yourself. If you would rather hand off the updates and backups, a care plan puts them with our team.
Apps and extensions: BigCommerce vs WooCommerce
The bigger toolbox belongs to WordPress
WordPress.org calls its plugin directory the largest directory of free and open-source WordPress plugins, and WooCommerce sells official extensions on top. If you need a feature, expect to find a plugin for it.
BigCommerce runs its own App Marketplace, built for its platform, with fewer options to choose from. Whichever way your WooCommerce vs BigCommerce decision goes, every app or plugin is one more bill and one more thing to check, so add only the ones you use.
Changing platforms later
Switch later without losing your customers
Your WooCommerce vs BigCommerce choice can change later, and a clean move takes planning. A BigCommerce to WooCommerce move runs in five steps.
1
Export your products
In BigCommerce, go to Products, then Export, and save the file as CSV.
2
Import them into WooCommerce
The built-in CSV importer adds products and variations in bulk.
3
Move customers and orders
The built-in importer handles products only, so use a store-moving tool or a web team for customers and past orders.
4
Set 301 redirects
Point each old page address to its new one. Google advises keeping these redirects for at least a year.
5
Test before you switch the domain
Place test orders, check tax and shipping, and read every order email.
BigCommerce or WooCommerce: our verdict
So which store should you build?
Pick the platform that fits how you want to work in two years, as well as today. After this WooCommerce vs BigCommerce check, we pick WooCommerce for most small stores, because you own the store and pay no platform fee on sales. BigCommerce fits a smaller group: owners who want everything bundled and have nobody to handle updates.
Three example stores (made up, to show the thinking)
A candle maker selling about $2,000 a month who already blogs on WordPress. WooCommerce. The shop joins the site she already has, and her posts keep bringing readers to her products.
A parts supplier with no web person, also selling on Amazon and eBay. BigCommerce. Marketplace channels come with every plan, and nobody has to run updates.
A clothing brand heading past $100,000 a year. WooCommerce. On BigCommerce this store moves up to the Scale plan. On WooCommerce there is no plan jump, so the budget goes to strong hosting and a care plan.
Go with BigCommerce if…
- You want hosting and updates bundled, and nobody on your team will run updates.
- Most of your sales go to trade buyers or to Amazon, eBay and Walmart.
Our pick for most small stores
Go with WooCommerce if…
- You want to own the store, its data and its design.
- You already run a WordPress site, or want your blog and shop in one place.
- You expect sales to pass $30K a year and want no plan jumps tied to sales.
- You want 0% revenue share and a free choice of payment provider.
Shopify on your list too? Read our WordPress vs Shopify comparison.
Picked WooCommerce?
What happens after you say yes
If WooCommerce comes out ahead in your WooCommerce vs BigCommerce comparison, our team can handle the build and the upkeep for you. WP BigBang is a WordPress-only team with 500+ websites built.
1
We look at your products, payment provider, shipping and sales goals.
2
The right setup
We choose hosting and a payment provider with you and compare their fees.
3
Design and build
We design the store around your brand and build it on WordPress and WooCommerce.
4
Test the checkout
We place test orders and check taxes, shipping and every order email.
5
Hand over
The files, the database and the domain are yours the day the store is finished. A care plan stays your choice.
Frequently asked questions
WooCommerce vs BigCommerce questions, answered
Is WooCommerce free?
Yes, the WooCommerce plugin is free and open source. A working store still pays for hosting, a domain, any paid extensions and card processing, such as WooPayments at 2.9% + $0.30 per US card sale.
Is BigCommerce cheaper than WooCommerce?
Not always. BigCommerce Core costs $39 a month billed monthly, and abandoned cart emails need the pricier Growth plan. A WooCommerce store has no plan fee and no revenue share, so a small shop with few paid extensions can cost less each month.
Does BigCommerce charge transaction fees?
BigCommerce adds no fee on sales paid through its embedded providers, such as Stripe and PayPal. With other providers it adds a fee, from 2.0% of sales on Core down to less on the bigger plans. WooCommerce adds no platform fee and no extra fee for any provider, so this is the first BigCommerce vs WooCommerce cost to check.
BigCommerce or WooCommerce: which is better for a small business?
For a small business weighing WooCommerce vs BigCommerce, WooCommerce suits most owners who want to own their store, keep a blog and avoid platform fees on sales. BigCommerce suits a smaller group: owners who want one monthly bill and have nobody to handle updates.
Is WooCommerce or BigCommerce better for SEO?
Neither platform ranks a store by itself, and both let you edit page titles, descriptions and URLs. In a BigCommerce vs WordPress match-up, WordPress adds the stronger blog and SEO plugins such as Rank Math, so WooCommerce suits stores that plan to win customers with content.
BigCommerce vs WordPress: what is the difference?
The main BigCommerce vs WordPress difference: WordPress runs your whole website, and the WooCommerce plugin adds the store to it. BigCommerce is a hosted store platform on its own. You can connect BigCommerce to WordPress with a plugin, but check its update history first.
How do I close a BigCommerce store?
On a paid plan, you contact BigCommerce to cancel the store. Export your products and orders from the control panel first, so you keep a copy. A WooCommerce store stays on your own hosting for as long as you pay your host.
Can I move from BigCommerce to WooCommerce?
Yes. Export your products from BigCommerce, import them with WooCommerce’s CSV importer, and use a store-moving tool for customers and orders. Then set 301 redirects, permanent forwards from each old link to its new page, so bookmarks and Google still find you.
