Four platforms, four different cost structures. The right one depends on what you sell, your technical comfort level, and how the revenue math works at volume.
A physical goods store doing $20,000/month cares deeply about transaction fee percentages. A digital creator launching a first ebook cares about zero friction and zero upfront cost. A developer building a membership site for a client cares about plugin depth and data portability. These are different problems, and the platforms that solve them are different tools.
At a Glance
| Shopify Basic | BigCommerce Standard | WooCommerce | Gumroad | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Monthly cost | $39 | $39 | $0 + hosting | $0 (10% per sale) |
| Platform tx fee | 2% (third-party gateway) | $0 | $0 | 10% per sale |
| Card processing | 2.9% + $0.30 via Shopify Payments | Your processor's rates | Stripe/PayPal rates | Stripe (included) |
| Setup time | Hours | Hours | Days | Minutes |
| Hosting | Included | Included | Self-managed | Included |
| Physical goods | Yes | Yes | Yes | Limited |
| Digital goods | Yes | Yes | Yes | Primary use case |
Shopify: The Default for Good Reason
Shopify powers over 2 million stores. Basic is $39/month, the mid-tier plan is $105/month, and Advanced is $399/month.
The transaction fee is what most Shopify write-ups understate. Use any payment processor other than Shopify Payments and Shopify takes 2% on Basic, 1% on the middle plan, and 0.5% on Advanced — on top of your processor's fees. Switch to Shopify Payments and the platform fee disappears, but you are using Shopify's card rates: 2.9% + $0.30/transaction on Basic, improving with plan tier.
For stores doing under $15,000/month, Shopify Basic with Shopify Payments is practical. The card rates are competitive and the operational simplicity is real. For stores doing $50,000+/month using a third-party gateway, the 2% fee on Basic costs $1,000/month in platform overhead alone. At that volume, you are either switching to Shopify Payments or seriously evaluating alternatives.
Shopify's genuine strength is operational: no hosting to manage, built-in abandoned cart recovery, polished mobile management apps, and a 10,000+ app ecosystem. For a business owner who wants to focus entirely on selling rather than running software, Shopify's managed environment justifies the cost.
BigCommerce: Same Price, Zero Platform Fees
BigCommerce charges the same $39/month for Standard as Shopify Basic, the same $105 for Plus, and the same $399 for Pro. The key difference: zero platform transaction fees on every plan. You pay only your payment processor's fees, nothing to BigCommerce.
That structure matters immediately. A store on Shopify Basic using a third-party gateway and moving $20,000/month pays $400/month in Shopify platform fees on top of the $39 plan. On BigCommerce Standard at the same volume, there are no platform fees at all.
BigCommerce Standard also bundles more features at its base price than Shopify Basic: real-time shipping quotes, product filtering, abandoned cart recovery, and multi-channel selling to Amazon and eBay are all included without add-on apps. Shopify Basic requires paid apps for several of these.
The tradeoff: BigCommerce's app ecosystem (roughly 1,000 integrations) is smaller than Shopify's, and BigCommerce has a smaller support community and fewer publicly available tutorials. For merchants doing the fee comparison and finding BigCommerce's math compelling, those are real but manageable downsides.
BigCommerce is genuinely the most underrated platform in this comparison. Merchants who run the numbers often switch from Shopify once they see how quickly the 2% fee compounds at moderate volume.
WooCommerce: Free Software, Real Operational Cost
WooCommerce is a free WordPress plugin with over 5 million active installations. The core plugin handles products, cart, checkout, and payment processing at zero cost. Actual costs for a running store:
- ▸Hosting: $10-30/month for shared hosting (Cloudways, SiteGround), $25-75/month for managed WordPress hosting (Kinsta, WP Engine)
- ▸Extensions: Subscriptions cost $279/year, memberships $199/year, advanced shipping $99/year. Most stores spend $200-500/year beyond the free core.
- ▸Payment processing: Stripe or PayPal at standard rates. No platform fee.
The zero platform fee is real money at scale. A WooCommerce store doing $100,000/month pays nothing to WooCommerce. Shopify Basic at that volume would cost $2,000/month in transaction fees alone using a third-party gateway. That savings pays for years of managed hosting.
WordPress security requires active attention. Plugin updates occasionally break theme compatibility. Performance under real load needs caching configuration and a CDN. If you want to avoid thinking about server infrastructure, WooCommerce is not the right starting point.
WooCommerce fits: stores with meaningful volume where fee savings outweigh the complexity, businesses already running WordPress, developers building custom stores for clients, and any merchant needing WordPress's 60,000+ plugin ecosystem for features no hosted platform offers out of the box.
Gumroad: Digital Products, Minimum Friction
Gumroad is built for a specific use case: selling digital products to an existing audience with minimum setup. Ebooks, courses, templates, software, and music all work. Physical goods are possible but not the platform's purpose.
The fee structure is the most distinctive element. Gumroad charges 10% on every transaction with no monthly subscription on the free plan. A Pro plan runs $10/month for sellers with higher volume. No upfront cost, no monthly commitment.
The math on that 10% fee: a creator selling a $20 ebook at 100 sales/month pays $200 in Gumroad fees. That same transaction volume on Shopify Basic with Shopify Payments costs roughly $39 (plan) + $67 (card fees at 2.9% + $0.30) = $106 total. Gumroad costs nearly twice as much in fees at that volume.
The math flips at zero sales. Gumroad costs nothing until you sell something. For creators testing whether an audience will pay for something, that zero-cost entry point removes a real barrier that $39/month creates for new sellers.
Setup is genuinely five minutes. Gumroad handles payment processing via Stripe, file delivery, license keys for software, and basic email collection. The analytics and marketing tools are minimal, which is the tradeoff for the simplicity.
When Gumroad makes sense: You are selling digital goods to an existing audience. Volume is low enough that the 10% fee is acceptable (roughly under $2,000/month in sales before Shopify's math becomes better even accounting for the plan cost). You want to test whether something sells before investing in a full store.
Who Should Use Each
Shopify: First physical goods stores, moderate volume sellers, and businesses that want full-service managed e-commerce without thinking about infrastructure. Use Shopify Payments to eliminate the transaction fee and keep the math clean.
BigCommerce: Mid-volume merchants ($15,000-150,000/month) using a third-party payment gateway where Shopify's transaction fee creates significant overhead. Any store where the fee comparison shows meaningful savings. Sellers who need real-time shipping quotes and multi-channel selling included at the base plan price.
WooCommerce: WordPress-based sites adding a store, high-volume merchants where fee savings are substantial, developers building custom storefronts for clients, and businesses needing plugin depth for complex functionality. The Shopify vs WooCommerce breakdown covers that comparison in detail.
Gumroad: Digital product creators with existing audiences. Low-volume sellers testing whether a product concept has market demand. Anyone who wants something live in minutes without a monthly commitment.
The Recommendation
For a first physical goods store: Shopify Basic with Shopify Payments. Accept the plan cost, use Shopify's processing to eliminate the transaction fee, and focus on selling while the platform handles everything else.
For a store already doing $20,000+/month: compare BigCommerce before your next Shopify renewal. The zero-platform-fee structure is real money at that revenue level, and the feature gap at the base plan is smaller than most merchants expect.
For digital products with an existing audience: start with Gumroad. No monthly cost, no setup complexity. Move to a full platform when the 10% fee exceeds what a hosted store would cost.
How payment processing rates compare across Shopify, Stripe, and Square is covered in the payment processor comparison, which is worth reading before committing to any platform's built-in payment solution.