Big Cartel vs Drupal: Comprehensive comparison guide for 2024

Final verdict

Big Cartel vs Drupal both offer unique advantages, but they cater to different audiences and needs.

• 
  Big Cartel (Overall Grade: 5.8/10)
  
  is designed for artists and small-scale sellers who prioritize simplicity and ease of use. It offers a straightforward setup process, customizable templates, and essential ecommerce features, making it ideal for independent creators and small businesses. However, its limited customization options and lack of advanced features may not meet the needs of larger or more complex online stores.
• 
  Drupal (Overall Grade: 6.4/10)
  
  is a powerful open-source CMS that excels in flexibility and extensibility. It is suitable for a wide range of websites, from personal blogs to complex corporate sites. Drupal offers a vast array of modules and themes, allowing for extensive customization and scalability. While it has a steeper learning curve and requires more technical knowledge, it provides robust security, comprehensive SEO features, and advanced content management capabilities, making it a versatile choice for developers and larger projects.

Best for ecommerce

Verdict

: Big Cartel is ideal for artists and small businesses, while Drupal offers extensive customization for larger, more complex ecommerce needs.

• 
  Big Cartel
  
  : Designed specifically for artists and makers, Big Cartel provides a straightforward setup process and essential ecommerce features like inventory management and sales tracking. It is perfect for small businesses and independent creators who need a simple, affordable platform to sell their creations online. However, when comparing Big Cartel vs Drupal, Big Cartel may lack the advanced features required for larger-scale operations.
• 
  Drupal
  
  : As an open-source CMS, Drupal offers a high degree of flexibility and extensibility, making it suitable for complex ecommerce websites. It supports a wide range of modules and themes, allowing for extensive customization of ecommerce functionalities. This makes Drupal a versatile choice for businesses that require more advanced features and scalability.

Best for informational & business websites

Verdict

: When it comes to creating informational and business websites, Drupal edges out Big Cartel due to its flexibility and extensive customization options. However, Big Cartel’s simplicity and ease of use make it a strong contender for small businesses and independent creators.

• 
  Big Cartel
  
  : Big Cartel is designed with simplicity in mind, making it particularly accessible for artists and small-scale sellers. Its straightforward setup process and customizable templates are ideal for users without extensive technical skills. However, its focus on ecommerce features may not fully cater to the needs of more complex informational websites. Best for Informational Business Websites score: 7.2.
• 
  Drupal
  
  : Drupal offers a robust and flexible platform suitable for a wide range of websites, from personal blogs to corporate sites. Its extensive library of modules and themes allows for significant customization, making it a versatile choice for complex informational websites. However, it comes with a steeper learning curve, which may be challenging for beginners. Best for Informational Business Websites score: 7.5.

Detailed comparison

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Winner: Drupal.

If you’re looking for a platform that offers more creative control, a wide array of design features, and a vast selection of free and premium templates, Drupal is the preferred choice.

Big Cartel provides a variety of free, customizable templates designed to ensure that online stores look appealing on all devices. These templates are geared towards artists, creators, and small business owners, offering features like high-quality product displays and adjustable product grids without the need for coding knowledge. With over 15 different styles to choose from, Big Cartel’s templates allow for easy customization to fit any brand’s aesthetic, making it simple for anyone to start an online store quickly.

Big Cartel Themes

Compared to Big Cartel, Drupal, as a highly flexible and powerful content management system, offers a vast array of templates and designs to cater to virtually any website need. With thousands of themes available, users can choose from minimalist designs, industry-specific layouts, and highly customizable multipurpose themes. These templates are designed to be responsive, ensuring that websites look great on any device. Moreover, the Drupal community continuously contributes new designs and templates, expanding the options for users to keep their websites modern and engaging.

Drupal Themes

🏆 Winner: Big Cartel

. Scoring a solid 8.0, Big Cartel is designed with simplicity in mind, making it particularly accessible for artists and small-scale sellers who may not have extensive technical skills. Drupal, with a score of 5.4, offers a robust platform but with a steeper learning curve, especially for those new to web development. If ease of use is a priority, Big Cartel is the clear winner in this category.

Learning Resources

🏆 Winner: Drupal

. While both platforms offer solid learning resources, Drupal goes a step further with its wide array of detailed tutorials and active community forums, making it easier for users to learn and adapt.

Big Cartel and Drupal both offer ecommerce capabilities, but they cater to different needs and audiences. Big Cartel is designed for artists and makers, offering a straightforward setup process and essential features like inventory management, sales tracking, and promotional tools. On the other hand, Drupal is a flexible open-source CMS that offers a wide range of modules and themes, making it a versatile choice for web development.

Big Cartel ecommerce features:

• Inventory tracking
• Sales analytics
• Social Media integrations
• Marketing tools

Drupal ecommerce features:

• Shopping Cart and Checkout Process
• Payment Gateway Integration
• Order Management and Invoicing
• Tax Calculation and VAT Support
• Shipping and Fulfillment
• Promotions and Discounts
• Reporting and Analytics
• Security and Compliance

Ecommerce themes & templates

Big Cartel offers around 20 templates, each specifically designed to cater to the needs of ecommerce stores, providing a variety of options for creating an online store. Drupal, on the other hand, offers a wide array of eCommerce themes designed to cater to different types of online stores, from clean and simple designs to more sophisticated and feature-rich options. These themes are built with responsiveness in mind, ensuring that stores function seamlessly across various devices.

Product page customization

Big Cartel enables merchants to customize their product offerings with the Product Variants feature, supporting up to 150 variants per item, such as sizes, colors, and more. Drupal offers extensive customization possibilities for product pages through its modular architecture, allowing for detailed content types, flexible displays with Views, and theme customizations.

Payment processing

Big Cartel supports payment processing through PayPal and Stripe, allowing a variety of payment methods including credit/debit cards and mobile payments like Apple Pay and Google Pay. Drupal supports a wide range of payment gateways through third-party modules, including popular ones like PayPal, Stripe, and Authorize.Net. These modules enable seamless integration for e-commerce functionalities on Drupal sites.

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Winner: Drupal

. Drupal, with a score of 7.5, offers a wide range of features tailored for content creation and management. It supports rich text editing, enabling users to format text, insert links, images, and media, as well as create tables and lists with ease. The editor is highly customizable, allowing administrators to configure toolbars and options according to the needs of their site. Furthermore, it integrates seamlessly with Drupal’s content management system, supporting features like automatic content saving, version control, and access control, making it a powerful tool for building and managing diverse web content.

Big Cartel’s website builder editor, scoring 6.8, is designed with simplicity in mind, catering primarily to artists and small-scale sellers. Users can easily customize their online store’s look and feel without needing advanced technical skills, thanks to its user-friendly interface. The editor allows for the customization of themes, addition of products, and setup of different pages like home, about, and contact pages. Additionally, it offers basic SEO settings and integration options with social media and other tools, making it a straightforward solution for those looking to sell their work online with minimal fuss.

Mobile editor/app

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Winner: Big Cartel

. Big Cartel offers a mobile app that allows users to manage their online store directly from their mobile device. Key features include the ability to add and edit products, process orders, check inventory, and view store statistics. It provides a convenient way for store owners to keep their business running smoothly on-the-go, without the need for a computer. The interface is user-friendly, ensuring that even those with minimal technical skills can easily navigate and make use of its functionalities. However, website design changes can be applied only on the desktop version.

On the other hand, Drupal does not have a dedicated mobile editor app.

In summary, Big Cartel receives a higher rating due to its mobile app that allows users to manage their online store, while Drupal lacks a dedicated mobile editor app.

Overall Result

:

Drupal Wins

. Drupal scores 7.1 in product testing options, while Big Cartel scores 5.9. Both platforms offer a free version, but Drupal’s open-source nature allows for more flexibility and customization. However, neither platform offers a trial version or a money-back guarantee. Big Cartel allows for some premium features to be tested with the free plan, while Drupal does not offer this possibility.

Big Cartel offers straightforward pricing plans, while Drupal is free but requires separate purchases for domain, hosting, and website builder subscriptions.

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Winner: Big Cartel

Big Cartel offers hosting included in all their plans, making it easier for users to set up their websites. However, it does not provide specific information about the hosting type, bandwidth, storage limitations, uptime, or data centers. On the other hand, Drupal does not directly provide hosting services, and the hosting type, uptime, and data centers depend on the hosting provider chosen by the user. Therefore, Big Cartel has a higher hosting quality score because it provides hosting services, unlike Drupal.

🏆 Winner: Drupal

Both Big Cartel and Drupal prioritize website performance and page speed, but Drupal has a slight edge due to its more comprehensive approach to speed optimization.

Drupal, an open-source content management system, offers a comprehensive approach to speed optimization. It provides numerous guides and tutorials, allowing users to optimize almost all aspects of their website. The load times and PageSpeed scores vary depending on the optimization and website complexity. The improvement in Core Web Vitals depends on the users.

On the other hand, Big Cartel, a web-based website builder, does not specify any information on speed optimization strategies, performance tools, or Core Web Vitals improvements. The load times and PageSpeed scores vary depending on the optimization and website complexity.

🏆 Winner: Drupal.

With a score of 8.6, Drupal outperforms Big Cartel, which scores 5.8. Drupal’s extensive library of over 51,000 modules, compared to Big Cartel’s 27 apps and integrations, offers a much wider range of functionalities. Drupal’s modules extend the platform’s capabilities beyond its core features, enabling functionalities like advanced SEO tools, e-commerce solutions, and custom content types and fields. On the other hand, Big Cartel’s integrations offer capabilities beyond its base features, including advanced email marketing, enhanced shipping and fulfillment options, the addition of customer reviews and social feeds, and detailed customer insights and analytics. However, the sheer number and versatility of Drupal’s modules give it a clear edge over Big Cartel in this category.

Drupal Applications

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Overall Winner: Drupal

. Drupal stands out for its comprehensive SEO features, robust analytics and reporting, and flexible ads and promotions. Big Cartel, while offering basic marketing features, lacks in blogging and its SEO features are not as extensive as Drupal’s.

🏆 Winner: Drupal

. In the comparison of Big Cartel vs Drupal, Drupal takes the lead with a higher customer support score of 6.7 compared to Big Cartel’s 5.4. Drupal offers a comprehensive range of support options, including community support through forums and documentation on Drupal.org, as well as professional 24/7 support services via providers like Drupal Connect. This ensures that users have access to help whenever they need it, covering everything from basic inquiries to professional maintenance and hosting needs.

Big Cartel, on the other hand, provides customer support from Monday to Friday, 8am to 6pm EST, with a team of twelve members available to assist. While it offers essential resources and email support, it lacks the round-the-clock availability and extensive professional support options that Drupal provides. This makes Drupal a more robust choice for users seeking comprehensive and flexible support solutions.

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Winner: Drupal

. Drupal’s security score of 8.3 outperforms Big Cartel’s 7.3, indicating a more robust security framework. Drupal’s open-source nature allows for extensive customization and configuration to enhance security, including role-based access control, field permissions, and encryption for data at rest. Regular updates and security audits, along with the use of security-focused modules, further bolster Drupal’s security.

Big Cartel, while offering SSL encryption and strict data processing protocols, does not achieve PCI compliance on its own, relying on third-party gateways for secure payment processing. This could potentially be a drawback for users seeking an all-in-one solution for ecommerce security.

🏆 Winner: Drupal

. Drupal, with a score of 7.5, integrates AI across various functionalities, enhancing e-commerce through chatbots, content creation, marketing automation, and cognitive services for improved user interactions. Features include natural language processing for interactive chatbots, automated content generation and SEO optimization, and cognitive services like emotion and facial recognition to enhance user experiences. These AI capabilities streamline operations and significantly enhance user engagement and satisfaction on Drupal-based platforms.

Big Cartel, on the other hand, does not have any AI capabilities, which is a significant disadvantage in today’s digital landscape where AI plays a crucial role in enhancing user experience and operational efficiency.

🏆 Winner: Drupal

. The user management capabilities of Big Cartel and Drupal are significantly different.

• Big Cartel allows only one user to build and edit a website. This could be a limitation for larger teams or projects that require multiple collaborators.
• Drupal’s flexible permission and role system allows for an unlimited number of users to manage and edit a website, only constrained by server capacity and practical management considerations. Administrators can create various roles, such as “Editor” or “Administrator”, each with customized permissions. There’s no inherent limit in Drupal on the number of users with administrative or editing capabilities, enabling extensive collaboration and content management possibilities.

Big Cartel User Roles and Access Levels:

Big Cartel does not provide specific user roles and access levels due to its single-user management system.

Drupal User Roles and Access Levels:

Additional Features

User Feedback

User feedback on Big Cartel highlights its simplicity and affordability as key advantages, making it a popular choice for small businesses and startups looking to establish an online presence quickly. Users appreciate the ease of setting up and customizing their online stores, the flat monthly fees without per-item charges, and the platform’s intuitive design and mobile management capabilities. However, limitations in features compared to more comprehensive platforms, restricted customization options, and lack of advanced integrations or inventory management for specific items are noted drawbacks. Despite these concerns, Big Cartel is praised for its cost-effectiveness and user-friendly approach, particularly for those new to e-commerce or with smaller inventories.

Users appreciate Drupal for its ease of use, security, and flexibility as an open-source CMS, highlighting its ability to scale and support a variety of websites and applications with modern technology tools. The community and documentation are frequently mentioned positives, providing ample support and resources. However, criticisms include a relative lack of plugins and themes compared to competitors like WordPress, the learning curve for customization without coding, and some challenges with installation and updates. The platform is praised for its robust content management capabilities, enabling users to manage content and user access efficiently. Overall, feedback underscores Drupal’s strength in creating secure, customizable, and scalable web solutions, despite some desires for more intuitive UI and easier setup.

FAQ