Shopify vs BigCommerce in 2026: Plans, Fees, Features and Which to Choose

Shopify and BigCommerce are the two best-known hosted ecommerce platforms, and in 2026 their entry prices look almost identical: $39, $105 and $399 a month on monthly billing for the three self-serve tiers. The differences are in how each charges as you grow, what's built in, how flexible the checkout and catalog are, and how big the surrounding ecosystem is.

The short version: Shopify suits most direct-to-consumer brands that want the largest app ecosystem, a highly optimized checkout and selling across many channels, and it doesn't cap your sales by plan. BigCommerce suits merchants who want more features built in, more choice of payment provider without extra fees, a more configurable catalog and checkout, and native multi-storefront, as long as its sales-based plan thresholds fit their numbers.

BigCommerce also changed a lot this year. On 1 June 2026 it renamed its plans (Standard, Plus, Pro and Enterprise became Core, Growth, Scale and Performance), lowered the sales thresholds on its lower plans and added a fee for orders through "Open" payment providers. Many comparisons online still use the old names and limits. Every BigCommerce fact below comes from bigcommerce.com and its documentation as of 1 October 2026. For other guides in this series, visit the Shopify hub.

Plans and pricing side by side

Sources: shopify.com/pricing and bigcommerce.com/pricing. BigCommerce calculates GMV as gross order value minus 10%, and counts taxes, shipping and some marketplace and social orders toward the threshold. Its 2026 plan update page explains the changes: the old Standard plan allowed $50K, Plus $180K and Pro $400K before the new structure.

What this means in practice: a BigCommerce store selling $150,000 a year can't stay on Growth; it moves to Scale at $399 a month (or $299 billed annually). On Shopify, plan choice is about features and card rates, not sales caps, so the same store could stay on Basic or Grow. On the other hand, Scale's included volume and modest overage can be competitive for stores between $400K and $2M a year, depending on payment setup.

Transaction and payment fees

This is where the platforms now look surprisingly similar on paper, and where details matter most.

The practical difference: on Shopify, avoiding the extra fee generally means using Shopify Payments, which is available in 40 countries. On BigCommerce, you can choose among many processors, including Stripe and Adyen, without the fee. If you have a negotiated rate with a processor on BigCommerce's Embedded list, BigCommerce may cost less to run. If Shopify Payments is available to you and its rates suit you, the fee difference largely disappears. Our guide to Shopify transaction fees covers the Shopify side in detail.

Products, variants and catalog

• Shopify: up to 2,048 variants per product since 15 October 2025, but still a maximum of three options (for example size, color and material). Metafields and metaobjects handle custom data. See our Shopify product variants guide.
• BigCommerce: its API documentation states a limit of "600 SKUs per product." BigCommerce also supports product modifiers, inputs such as text fields, checkboxes or radio buttons that can adjust price without creating SKUs, which can help with configurable products.

If your products need extra customer inputs that change the price (engraving, add-ons, custom sizes), BigCommerce's modifiers handle that natively, while Shopify usually needs a product options app beyond three options. If you sell products with many combinations of up to three options, Shopify's higher variant ceiling is an advantage.

Inventory locations differ too: Shopify includes 10 locations on Basic, Grow and Advanced (200 on Plus), while BigCommerce lists up to 4, 5 and 8 on Core, Growth and Scale.

Built-in features vs apps

BigCommerce's pricing page lists more features natively, including more than 70 discount options, a built-in blog, product reviews, real-time carrier shipping quotes and the ShipperHQ shipping rules engine. Some features depend on plan: customer groups, the abandoned cart saver and stored credit cards start on Growth; product filtering starts on Scale; price lists and advanced promotions management are on Performance. Multi-storefront is available as an add-on on the self-serve plans ($30, $50 and $100 a month per extra storefront, with maximums of 3, 5 and 8).

Shopify relies more on its app ecosystem but includes a lot on every plan: 200+ reports with custom analytics, Shopify Flow automation, Shopify Messaging with 10,000 free emails a month, in-person selling, and AI tools (Shopify Magic and Sidekick). The App Store is much larger: the homepage says it has over 16,000 apps, and Shopify's 10-K reported more than 21,000 as of 31 December 2025. BigCommerce says it has over 1,200 apps.

The trade-off: BigCommerce may need fewer paid apps; Shopify gives you more choice for almost any need, plus a bigger pool of developers and agencies.

B2B and wholesale

Both platforms have moved B2B down-market.

• Shopify: since 2 April 2026, Basic, Grow and Advanced include native B2B with up to three active catalogs, company profiles, payment terms, volume pricing, ACH payments (US only) and vaulted cards. Unlimited catalogs, direct catalog assignment to companies and locations, partial payments and deposits remain Plus-only. Our Shopify B2B guide covers the details.
• BigCommerce: customer groups (from Growth) and price lists (Performance) are part of the core plans. Its B2B Edition adds features such as purchase orders, quote-to-cart and net terms, which BigCommerce says are native to B2B Edition, plus buyer portals, company hierarchies and approval workflows. B2B Edition isn't priced on the public pricing page; BigCommerce directs B2B buyers to request a demo.

For wholesale with simple catalogs, Shopify's non-Plus B2B is now a strong, low-cost option. For complex B2B with quotes, approvals and buyer hierarchies, compare Shopify Plus with BigCommerce B2B Edition on real requirements and quoted prices.

Checkout

Shopify's checkout is managed by Shopify and is one of its strongest assets: Shop Pay, accelerated wallets and a checkout Shopify tests for WCAG 2.2 AA. But customization is tightly controlled. Checkout UI extensions for the Information, Shipping and Payment steps are Plus-only, checkout.liquid is gone, and Shopify Scripts stopped working on 30 June 2026. See our guide to Shopify checkout extensibility.

BigCommerce markets its checkout as highly customizable. Its checkout page describes no-code controls for branding and guest checkout behavior, and a full-code option where developers fork the open-source checkout on GitHub and connect it in the control panel, along with one-click checkout for returning shoppers and Apple Pay and Google Pay support.

If your business needs a checkout that works differently (complex delivery scheduling, custom fields, unusual B2B flows) and you're not ready for Shopify Plus, BigCommerce has the edge. If you want a proven, fast checkout with minimal work, Shopify's is hard to beat.

SEO

Both platforms cover the SEO basics, such as editable titles and meta descriptions, SSL on your domain and URL redirects. The notable difference is URL control. Shopify uses fixed paths such as /products/ and /collections/; you can edit the handle but not the path, and Shopify's documentation notes you can't create redirects from those fixed paths. BigCommerce's help center describes URL structure settings that let you choose short or long formats, or a custom pattern with placeholders, for product and category URLs.

In practice, rankings depend far more on content, site speed, internal linking and links than on URL prefixes. Choose the platform on business fit, then invest in those fundamentals.

Channels, POS and AI

• Shopify includes in-person selling on every paid plan, with POS Pro at $89 a month per location (billed yearly) and its own hardware. Agentic Storefronts lists products in AI channels such as ChatGPT, Microsoft Copilot and Meta, with Google AI Mode and Gemini rolling out to eligible US stores, and no channel fees. Marketplace Connect covers Amazon, Walmart, eBay and Target Plus.
• BigCommerce connects to POS systems through integrations (it names Square, Clover and others), connects to Amazon, eBay and Walmart, and includes Feedonomics Surface for Google, Meta, TikTok, Microsoft and Pinterest, free for up to 100,000 SKUs on its basic plan. It also markets agentic commerce features and an MCP toolkit for developers.

When to choose each

Switching between them

Both directions are common. Moving from BigCommerce to Shopify usually means mapping options beyond three into Shopify's model, rebuilding the theme and redirecting URLs to Shopify's fixed paths. Moving from Shopify to BigCommerce usually means re-creating apps' functionality with native features and choosing a payment provider. Either way, plan redirects and an SEO audit before launch. See our guides to migrating from BigCommerce to Shopify and migrating from Shopify to BigCommerce.

Conclusion

In 2026, Shopify and BigCommerce charge the same headline prices for their first three tiers, and both add a fee for some payment providers. Shopify wins on ecosystem, checkout polish, POS and the absence of sales caps. BigCommerce wins on built-in features, catalog flexibility, checkout control and payment provider choice, but its new GMV thresholds can push growing stores up a tier sooner than expected. Model your own sales, payment setup and must-have features on both before you decide. If you choose Shopify, eSEOspace offers Shopify development services to build or migrate your store.

Frequently asked questions