Choosing Right E-Commerce Software For Your Online Store
Saad Bassi
There are numerous options available when it comes to choosing right e-commerce software for creating your online shop. From free shopping cart solutions to those who charge you a bill of thousands dollars for keeping your shop online, there are actually hundred of shopping solutions available out there. In this article we will dig deep in to the world of some most famous e-commerce solutions. Let’s get started.
E-commerce week is sponsored by SSLmatic which sells SSL certificates for much cheaper prices (RapidSSL, Geotrust, Verisign) and offers great support. Check their site to get the cheap SSL certificates.We can divide the whole section in three parts. First we will cover free and open source options and then we will cover pre hosted and paid options. We will also take a look on e-commerce modules available for extending your CMS to e-commerce website.
Open Source & Free E-Commerce Softwares
1. osCommerce
osCommerce is an award winning e-commerce shopping cart solution which has more than 200000 community members. osCommerce is released under GPL which means its open source and any one can modify its code adhering to the license under which it is released. You can download it for free and can create your shop online without paying a single penny to the developers of osCommerce.
The last update (3.0 Alpha 5) in osCommerce was in March 2009 so there are rumors that the project is dead. There are 5600 different modules available on their official repository which shows that community of osCommerce is really supportive.
2. Magento
Magento is the second big guy in the world of e-commerce solutions. Like osCommerce, Magento is also released under GPL and you can download it for free. With a very active development schedule, it got the latest update (1.4.1) on 19 February 2010. There is a big list of features which you can read there. But the biggest problem with Magento is that it’s heavy software and needs a huge amount of resources to work efficiently.
This is my personal choice and I use it for my client works. The community of Magento is still growing as it is new in the game. Recently the official extensions repository crossed the number of 2000 extensions. Varien, the company behind Magento also offers an enterprise version of Magento starting from only 8999$$$/year. The have previously worked with osCommerce and now they have developed their own solution.
3. Zen Cart
Zen Cart is a forked version of osCommerce, licensed under GPL and free for every one. The major difference between osCommerce and Zen Cart is the templating engine and some additional features which are not available in its superior. Templating engine of Zen cart makes it very easy to create custom themes for your online shop as compared to Magento and osCommerce. There are more than 1000 free addons available in their plugin repository.
4. PrestaShop
PrestaShop is also open source and free solution for creating your online store. It has a big community with more than 50000 community members. The best thing in PrestaShop is its light weight and fast speed. If you compare PrestaShop with Magento in terms of speed and size, it’s a lot better. One thing for sure, you will love its back end design. It’s really awesome, simple and easy to use. Even a beginner can set up an online store. We published a beginner’s guide for prestashop. You can check it out here.
Pre hosted and Paid Solutions
5. Shopify
Shopify is a pre hosted e-commerce solution which charges you for keeping your store online. You don’t need to set up anything technical. All you have to do is just adding your products. SSL, payment gateways and all the security measures are the responsibility of Shopify Team. You can setup your custom domain and you can also create custom themes.
Each shop owner can change the html/css of his store to customize the look of his store. All you have to do is just to pay their bills/month which depends upon your sales and the package plan you take. If you are totally scratch and want to make things easier for yourself then I will suggest you to go for it.
6. FoxyCart
FoxyCart is also a pre hosted version of e-commerce solutions but it’s a bit different from Shopify. Actually Foxy Cart is only a shopping cart (not a cms) which integrates in to your already existing website. You can customize the look of your shopping cart by changing the html and css of your shopping cart. Just take the code, put it into your website and you are done. At the end, you will have to pay them a monthly fee for all their efforts.
E-Commerce Modules for your CMS
7. Ubercart for Drupal
Ubercart is an e-commerce module for people who want to create an e-commerce store on the top of Drupal. It’s a fact that Ubercart is an almost complete solution for anyone who wants to create an e-commerce store but I will not recommend it those people who don’t have experience with Drupal.
8. WP e-Commerce for WordPress
WP e-Commerce is the most trusted and complete solution for people who want to include e-commerce functionality in their WordPress blog or website. We have already covered it out. You can check the detailed explanation here.
9. Virtue Mart for Joomla
Virtue Mart is an addon for creating online store using Joomla. There are 2 other plugins out there for same functionality but Virtue Mart is the oldest one and most comprehensive solution for creating e-commerce websites with Joomla. My personal opinion about Joomla is not good as I think a newbie will get puzzled with dozens of premium modules which have same functionally.
E-Commerce is an enormous subject to cover and each option has its own pros and cons. I have tried my best to write those options which are trusted ones and mostly people are happy with those options. There is always chance for improvement. Let me know if I have missed your favorite option and I will be happy to discuss it with you.:)
E-commerce week is sponsored by SSLmatic which sells SSL certificates for much cheaper prices (RapidSSL, Geotrust, Verisign) and offers great support. Besides standard SSL certificates, wildcard and EV certificates are offered with discounts too. Check their site to get the cheap SSL certificates.For Further Reading:
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linda
Posted 652 days ago 32Saad Bassi, thank you for your good sharing. Im using an open source which is ecshop but my website always hacked since June till now and havent solve it yet. As i know, all open source is easy to get hack. Am i right?? Im panic now and do not what should i do now. still continue to using this open source with same hosting company OR change a hosting company and change a new open source OR custom made?? In the market got a lot of company ecommerce package is modify open source then sell is as own develop ecommerce.it’s still is open source and easy to get hack??thank you for your info and sharing again.
Saad Bassi
Posted 591 days ago 36Get a good developer. Thats what you need.
Gloria
Posted 655 days ago 31I need some help, I want to create my website, I am using siteground, they offers some ecommerce like os commerce and other, could some one can help me to choose wich is one is better solution for an online store with more than 2500 items, how can I upload with pictures, I was using zen cart but siteground is not longer available, (is like a catalog)
Val
Posted 734 days ago 29Thanks a lot Saad Bassi, great list!
just tried Prestashop and its sleek and wonderful but an overkill for my task, does anyone have idea what is the best solution for Rental Website? Ive tried to search the web but failed to find any references. Iam renting stuff and my site is currently on css/html, im planning to move it to CMS but not sure what should i build it on. Have seen people doing this on Joomla/Virtuemart but it doesnt look nice to me. Any suggestions please? I dont really need shopping cart but a calendar would be great with indication when the item is due!
Thanks in advance to someone can help me out ;)
Saad Bassi
Posted 591 days ago 37Go with WordPress.
jsadmin
Posted 747 days ago 28Great compilation.
You may also want to take a look at JadaSite. It is an open source e-commerce software that you can download and use it for free. More importantly, it includes a lot of features right out of the box. Some important features include multi-site, multi-lingual and multi-currencies support.
One thing that makes JadaSite different than the list you have is JadaSite is written 100% in Java and it is able to leverage all the enterprise grade features in the Java environment.
G13 Media
Posted 757 days ago 27Out of Magneto and Presta which have the most options/add ons and customizable? Some clients want different features so trying to find out which would be the most flexible.
.-= G13 Media´s last blog ..Web Site Design San Diego Seo =-.
Joomla Web
Posted 762 days ago 26I tried following shopping cart:
Prestashop: easy to install and USE.
MAGNETO: Feature rich ecommerce software.
virtuemart for joomla: shopping cart for Joomla.
I like all three because they had their own advantages.
Ted Thompson
Posted 769 days ago 25Zen Cart and Prestashop are my favourites
Powen
Posted 784 days ago 23Saad,
Last month we at Jimdo added e-commerce/store functionality to our (hosted) website builder. Check it out if you have a chance, I’d very much like to hear what you think :) and if you would add us to your list
Saad Bassi
Posted 784 days ago 24Great Powen. Sure. Will let you know when I am done.:) And yeah Jimdo is a great tool. There is not doubt in it.:)
Alice Dagley
Posted 784 days ago 21Saad , thank you for your article.
However I find it very surface. I expected to learn more. Unfortunately your high-sounding title didn’t live up to my expectations.
You just enumerated the most popular e-commerce softwares, noticing few main features like “Ubercart for Drupal”, “WP e-Commerce for WordPress” (it’s not hard to guess), “Virtue Mart for Joomla”. Thank you very much. However this information can be found in any specifications for these software’s. There are more characteristics to choose E-Commerce Software: e.g. software’s architecture; its main functionality; customers’ and administrators’ possibilities; installation features and the like.
I think you will have to work at it.
Thank you.
Saad Bassi
Posted 784 days ago 22Well Alice, I am thinking of writing detailed tut on each software so It will be easy for every one to decide.
Ryan Cowles
Posted 786 days ago 20Great information! I don’t know how many hours I have spent researching different shopping cart software, trying to find the best suited for the job.
.-= Ryan Cowles´s last blog ..Taking a Train Across the Country – Part One =-.
Tom Girling
Posted 786 days ago 19After getting frustrated recently revamping a clients OsCommerce site – I think I might give Zencart a look.
I know Magento seems to be getting a good reputation – I had a look at it a while back & didn’t really get on with it…maybe I should do a text of them both & see which I prefer now.
Thanks for the article – it helps to get a different perspective.
Matthias
Posted 787 days ago 18I have to mention oxidshop. It is a big player on the german market. just recently they changed their business modell and released it under a gpl license. it is a mighty fine product. well developed and easy to set up. the english community is growing stronger every month. check it out
http://www.oxid-esales.com/
Micheal
Posted 787 days ago 17Great Post Saad. We’re big fans of Magento ourseleves and have set up a whole free ecommerce course based on it at http://www.netsalestrainer.com. You can also get some nice themes for it now at last!
.-= Ecommerce Course´s last blog ..Another Way To Make Money Online With NetSalesTrainer =-.
djavupixel
Posted 787 days ago 16Did someone try http://www.shopperpress.com/ for wordpress? (It is not in the list)
Is it good? It is not free, but not expensive too and I never found lecture about it… which may not be good maybe?
.-= djavupixel´s last blog ..Chive a promising MySQL Manager or the next phpmyadmin! =-.
zubair sota
Posted 787 days ago 15GR8 POST :) THANKS A LOT
Justin Carroll
Posted 787 days ago 14Appreciate the Post. I’m glad to see that X-Cart did not make the list. Seriously, that system is hell. ;)
.-= Justin Carroll´s last blog ..Fearnet =-.
Clint
Posted 788 days ago 13What about OpenCart, how does that measure up with the others? From a designer/coder perspective, I’m looking for a shopping cart that’s simple to skin/theme and incorporate into any site. I like that Magento at least has some instructions on their site for designers.
Dani
Posted 788 days ago 11I have to say my personal favorite OS-Commerce & Zen cart, Both have their own Advantages and Drawbacks.
Of the two I prefer Zen Cart
Ant Hodges
Posted 788 days ago 10Great post thanks…
Has anyone had any experience with Adobe’s Business Catalyst?
Bryan Barker
Posted 788 days ago 12Business Catalyst is Great. I’ve been using it since before Adobe bought the company (used to be called Good Barry). The author may not have mentioned it because it is a paid solution. Though I believe that the advantages it offers far outweigh the small investment in the platform. I’m a developer and could use any of these, but Business Catalyst saves me time because the platform is integrated with all the features I’ve ever been asked to deliver. Also, because they are constantly improving the platform there is no need to worry about software updates or plugin conflicts. For me, it’s helped me streamline my technology offerings so I can focus on creating the best web marketing results and customer experience for my clients.
Beth McLain
Posted 788 days ago 9Useful Round up .
I have to say my personal favorite OS-Commerce & Zen cart, Both have their own Advantages and Drawbacks.
Ed
Posted 788 days ago 5nice article!
I’ve tried most of these and my personal favourites in order would be
1.) Prestashop – easy to work with – and fast
2.) Magento – full featured but you need lots and lots and lots of memory!
3.) Virtuemart for Joomla – great cart if your working with Joomla
I’m planning on using wp-ecommerce for an upcoming project.
I try to avoid Zen Cart and Os-Commerce as their code is in the dark ages now!
.-= Ed´s last blog ..2010 WordPress Theme Buyers Guide – Part 2 =-.
Saad Bassi
Posted 788 days ago 6Well. I am now quite sure that osCommerce and Zen Cart are dead. No updates from developers. Its sad to see osc going because they were the first one to take the initiative.:(
Wendy Wang
Posted 677 days ago 30Please try TomatoCart. It’s a fork of osCommerce 3. It adds new concept to shopping cart software, and it’s really a easy-to-use ecommerce software in the market.
Demir
Posted 788 days ago 4Great and very useful post. My favorite e-commerce software is Prestashop forever.
.-= Demir´s last blog ..Web Tasarım Kaynakları #5 =-.
Howard Stevens
Posted 788 days ago 3Another strong player in the open source space is Interspire. After thoroughly evaluating many of the platforms on your list, my team and I decided on Interspire due to its performance, open source code, out-of-the-box functionality. Contrasted with Magento, the code is infinitely more well structured, easier to comprehend and make customizations–one of the many reasons that performance is significantly better.
Pixel Air
Posted 788 days ago 2Great list of carts. I’ve used most of these solutions and am pleased to see them on there. Every solution is different and has it’s merits and downfalls. Getting the right balance of CMS and Shopping cart is vital for any project. Go one way too early and you may have a headache on your hands.
Saad Bassi
Posted 788 days ago 7Totally agreed. Nothing is Perfect. Every solution has its pro and cons.
Coder
Posted 788 days ago 1Great compilation! As far as I know, Magento is really robust but in the same time you will need at least a vps hosting account to run it…Prestashop is light but you will have problems if you want to sell digitalproducts (especially for big files).
.-= PSD Coder´s last blog ..Create a business web layout in Photoshop =-.
Saad Bassi
Posted 788 days ago 8Well, 100% Agreed regarding Magento. About Prestashop, I’ve heard a lot of praise and I am going to test it out. Will surely share my experiences with you.:)