Shopify vs Webflow: What’s the Best Builder in 2024?

Shopify vs Webflow: Final verdict

Shopify and Webflow both offer powerful website building solutions, but they cater to different user needs and preferences.

• 
  Shopify (Overall Grade: 8.1/10)
  
  is a leading ecommerce platform, ideal for businesses looking to create and manage online stores with ease. It excels in providing comprehensive ecommerce features, advanced marketing tools, and robust security measures. Shopify’s user-friendly interface and extensive app ecosystem make it a top choice for online retailers aiming for growth and scalability. When comparing Shopify vs Webflow, Shopify stands out for its specialized ecommerce capabilities and seamless integration of sales and marketing tools.
• 
  Webflow (Overall Grade: 7.9/10)
  
  is a versatile website builder designed for professional designers and developers. It offers powerful design tools, a flexible CMS, and top-tier hosting services, making it a comprehensive solution for creating custom, responsive websites. Webflow’s advanced design functionalities and extensive customization options make it ideal for users seeking creative control and precision. In the Shopify vs Webflow comparison, Webflow shines with its robust design capabilities and flexibility, though it may present a steeper learning curve for beginners.

Which one is the best for ecommerce: Shopify or Webflow?

Verdict

: Shopify is the superior choice for businesses focused on scaling and comprehensive ecommerce functionalities, while Webflow offers a robust platform for those seeking extensive customization and design flexibility.

• 
  Shopify
  
  : With a score of 9.2, Shopify excels in providing a comprehensive set of ecommerce tools, including advanced inventory management, multi-channel selling, and detailed analytics. It is ideal for businesses looking to scale and manage a large volume of products. Shopify’s extensive app library and unique features like Augmented Reality further enhance its ecommerce capabilities.
• 
  Webflow
  
  : Scoring 8.5, Webflow is a powerful platform for creating highly customized online stores without extensive coding knowledge. It offers flexible CMS, responsive templates, and robust design tools, making it suitable for professional designers and businesses that prioritize design and customization. However, it may not match Shopify’s depth in ecommerce-specific features.

Which one is the best for informational and business websites?

Verdict

: When it comes to creating informational and business websites, Webflow outshines Shopify. Webflow’s advanced design capabilities and flexibility make it a superior choice for those looking to build visually appealing and highly customizable websites.

• 
  Shopify
  
  : Shopify, with a score of 6.8, is primarily designed for ecommerce but can be adapted for informational websites. Its templates are sleek and professional, focusing on online stores. However, the platform’s ecommerce-centric features may feel excessive for simple informational sites, making it less ideal for this purpose.
• 
  Webflow
  
  : Scoring 8.6, Webflow is a robust platform for creating custom, responsive websites. It offers a wide array of design features and templates, making it perfect for informational and business websites. Webflow’s powerful design tools and flexible CMS allow for extensive customization, catering to professional designers and developers. When comparing Shopify vs Webflow, Webflow’s design flexibility and comprehensive features make it the preferred choice for informational sites.

Shopify vs Webflow: Detailed comparison

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Winner: Webflow.

If you’re looking for a platform that offers more creative control, a wide array of design features, and a diverse range of template and customization options, Webflow is the preferred choice.

Shopify’s templates are sleek and professional, ideal for ecommerce sites. They offer a sophisticated look with a focus on online stores. While the free template selection is not large, Shopify’s premium theme store provides a variety of industry-specific options, offering advanced features for a strong brand presence.

Shopify Themes

Compared to Shopify, Webflow delivers a robust design experience with a diverse range of template and customization options. Boasting over 1000 pre-built templates covering various industries and website types, including free and premium options, Webflow ensures a constantly evolving library for users. Templates are categorized for easy browsing, considering industry, website type, style, and features. The design customization features include a visual drag-and-drop editor for real-time adjustments, fine-grained control over every aspect of the design, and the ability to inject custom code for advanced users seeking additional personalization and unique functionalities.

Webflow Themes

🏆 Winner: Tie

. Both Shopify and Webflow scored 7.5 in ease of use. Shopify is praised for its user-friendly design and comprehensive support, making online store management accessible for all. On the other hand, Webflow is user-friendly for experienced designers and developers, offering a visually intuitive interface with drag-and-drop features. However, beginners may find it challenging due to a steeper learning curve.

Learning Resources

🏆 Winner: Webflow

. Both platforms offer solid learning resources, but Webflow goes a step further with its comprehensive set of learning resources for individuals seeking proficiency in the platform. Webflow University serves as an excellent starting point, delivering diverse courses and tutorials covering fundamental to advanced aspects of Webflow.

Shopify and Webflow both offer robust ecommerce capabilities, but they cater to different needs. Shopify, with a score of 9.2, is a leading ecommerce platform that provides a comprehensive set of features for online businesses. It offers tools for creating and customizing online stores, managing products, processing payments, and handling order fulfillment. On the other hand, Webflow, scoring 8.5, is a robust platform for creating online stores, offering comprehensive ecommerce features such as easy store creation without coding, extensive customization options, product management with variations, inventory tracking, integration with major payment gateways, automated shipping calculations, tax configuration, and marketing tools like abandoned cart recovery and email marketing.

Shopify ecommerce features:

• Comprehensive store builder
• Shopify Payments and other gateways
• Advanced inventory management
• Multi-channel selling
• Abandoned cart recovery
• Detailed analytics and reporting

Webflow ecommerce features:

• Checkout and Payment Processing with Stripe, PayPal, etc.
• Marketing and Promotions
• Tax and Shipping calculations

Ecommerce themes & templates

Shopify offers about 150 modern responsive themes for creating a virtual storefront, ensuring a good look on both desktop and mobile devices. While some themes are free, others cost between $170 to $380. In contrast, Webflow offers a diverse range of ecommerce themes and templates designed to cater to various types of online stores, from fashion and technology to artisan crafts and children’s products. Each template comes equipped with built-in ecommerce functionality, allowing you to easily add products and manage your store without the need for coding.

Product page customization

Shopify has a limit of three options per product, totaling 100 unique variations. This limit may not pose a significant constraint, and it is suggested that for products with numerous options, creating separate listings on Shopify can be a more manageable approach. While Shopify offers titles, descriptions, and image galleries with zoom effects, customization options like adding ribbons, size charts, and wishlists are not as straightforward. However, Shopify distinguishes itself with additional features through its extensive library of extra apps, offering functionalities like reviews, Facebook stores, eBay item importers, and a unique Augmented Reality feature for an enhanced customer experience.

On the other hand, Webflow offers extensive customization options for eCommerce product pages, allowing users to design and personalize their pages without coding. It provides tutorials for creating product pages from scratch, offers responsive templates for various devices, and allows users to add custom code and dynamic content using Webflow’s CMS for maximum customization flexibility.

Payment processing

Shopify offers payments with typical charges of 2.9% + 30¢ per online transaction on basic plans, and lower fees for higher-tier plans. However, it adds extra fees for using other payment gateways. Shopify Payments is Shopify’s own payment processing gateway. It allows merchants to accept credit card payments directly on their store without having to integrate third-party payment providers. This simplifies the payment process, reduces transaction fees, and streamlines the handling of finances.

Webflow provides a flexible and secure platform for payment processing and ecommerce through integrations with leading payment gateways like Stripe and PayPal. This allows users to accept a wide range of payments, including credit card transactions directly from their websites. Given the versatility of Stripe and PayPal, businesses can manage online sales efficiently, and these integrations likely support various transaction types, potentially including POS transactions for physical sales environments.

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Winner: Webflow

. Webflow, with a score of 9.0, is a cloud-based platform that combines web design, CMS, and hosting, enabling users to visually design responsive websites without writing code. It offers a drag-and-drop interface, integrated SEO tools, ecommerce functionalities, and the ability to add animations and interactions, making web development accessible for designers and powerful for developers. Webflow streamlines the process of web creation, from design to launch, offering both high customization and ease of use.

Shopify’s editor, scoring 7.9, excels in providing a streamlined, ecommerce-focused editing experience. It’s particularly beneficial for users who prioritize efficient management of online stores. The editor is straightforward, making it easy to add products, manage inventory, and set up payment methods. While it may not offer the same level of design flexibility as Webflow, Shopify’s editor is optimized for sales and business growth, with built-in tools specifically designed for ecommerce businesses.

Mobile editor/app

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Winner: Shopify

. Both Shopify and Webflow offer mobile solutions for managing your website, but they cater to different needs and platforms. Shopify’s mobile app includes a user-friendly mobile theme editor that allows users to customize their online store website directly from their mobile device. This feature enables the addition, removal, editing, and rearrangement of content on the store’s website, offering convenient on-the-go adjustments to the store’s appearance and layout.

Webflow, on the other hand, does not have an official mobile editor app. There is a third-party app called EditFlow, created by a community member for Webflow users. However, this app is currently only available for iOS. Therefore, Shopify is the winner in this category due to its higher score and more comprehensive mobile editing capabilities.

Overall Result

:

Shopify wins

. Shopify scores 8.1, offering a 14-day free trial with access to all features, while Webflow scores 6.3, offering a free version with limited features and no trial or money-back guarantee.

Shopify and Webflow both offer a range of pricing options, with Shopify scoring slightly higher in terms of price.

Shopify offers a 20% discount on annual subscriptions, while Webflow offers discounts ranging from 9 to 31% depending on the plan. Both platforms also offer enterprise plans for larger businesses, with Shopify’s starting at $2,000 per month and Webflow’s pricing available upon request.

Winner: Shopify

. Shopify and Webflow both offer robust hosting services, but Shopify edges out with a slightly higher score. Shopify’s proprietary cloud-based hosting, global data centers, and guaranteed uptime for all plans make it a reliable choice for businesses of all sizes. Webflow, while offering managed hosting and a globally distributed network of data centers, only guarantees uptime for its Enterprise plan.

🏆 Winner: Webflow

Both Shopify and Webflow prioritize website performance and page speed, but Webflow edges out Shopify with a higher Website Speed Optimization score.

Webflow’s approach to website speed optimization includes custom cache settings, custom element lazy loading, automatic minification, responsive templates, and a content delivery network (CDN). This comprehensive strategy results in an average load time of below 2 seconds and a PageSpeed score of 77.2/100. Webflow also focuses on improving components’ usability and the Core Web Vitals (LCP, FID, and CLS).

On the other hand, Shopify’s strategy for speed optimization includes app efficiency and theme optimization. However, its load times and PageSpeed scores vary widely, depending on optimization. Shopify also emphasizes improvements in the Core Web Vitals (LCP, FID, and CLS).

🏆 Winner: Shopify.

With a score of 8.7, Shopify outperforms Webflow, which scores 5.5. Shopify offers over 8,000 apps in its App Store, covering a wide range of functionalities. These apps come with various pricing options, including free, paid, freemium, and one-time payment models. Shopify plugins and integrations enhance ecommerce by offering advanced sales, marketing, and payment options, streamlined shipping, sophisticated inventory management, improved customer service, in-depth analytics, seamless accounting integration, creative store design, mobile app support, enhanced security, multi-channel selling, product review tools, dropshipping and print-on-demand support, language localization, and accessibility improvements. Key Shopify integrations feature Oberlo for dropshipping, Klaviyo for email marketing, Yotpo for reviews, Printful for print-on-demand, Shopify POS for sales, Google Analytics for insights, Facebook Channel for social selling, ShipStation for shipping, QuickBooks for accounting, Privy for conversions, Smile.io for loyalty, SEO Manager, AfterShip for tracking, Spocket for products, and Gorgias for customer service, enhancing various ecommerce aspects.

On the other hand, Webflow doesn’t have plugins or extensions in the traditional sense. Instead, it offers a built-in library of website elements and functionalities that you can use to create your website. This library is constantly being expanded, so you’ll always have access to the latest features and tools. However, Webflow does integrate with a number of third-party services and tools that can add even more functionality to your website. These integrations are not managed by Webflow, so the number of available options and their pricing structures can vary depending on the specific tools you choose. Webflow’s extensibility through plugins allows for enhancements across ecommerce, SEO, analytics, form building, social media integration, and more. These tools can improve user engagement, site performance, security, and accessibility, along with providing advanced content management and marketing capabilities. Essentially, plugins can significantly expand the functionality of a Webflow site, making it more interactive, user-friendly, and tailored to specific business needs. Webflow offers a diverse range of integrations categorized by function, including Marketing & Analytics tools like Zapier, Google Analytics, and Hotjar; Forms & Lead Capture solutions such as Typeform, Wufoo, and Gravity Forms; Ecommerce platforms like Shopify, Stripe, and Gumroad; Live Chat & Support options such as Intercom, Drift, and Crisp; and a variety of Others like Airtable, Notion, and Forestry. These integrations cater to different needs and goals, providing flexibility and efficiency for Webflow users.

Shopify Applications

Webflow Applications

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Overall Winner: Shopify

. Shopify stands out for its more advanced ecommerce-focused marketing tools, especially in analytics and ad campaign management. Webflow, while offering a robust set of marketing tools, is more suited for content-driven strategies and simpler social media engagement.

🏆 Winner: Shopify

. When comparing Shopify vs Webflow, Shopify takes the lead in customer support with a score of 8.6. Shopify offers 24/7 support through chat, email, and phone, ensuring that users can get help whenever they need it. The platform also provides clear tutorials, an extensive community forum, and a valuable marketing blog, making it easier for users to find solutions and grow their businesses.

Webflow, with a customer support score of 8.3, also offers robust support options, including 24/7 live chat, email, and a community forum. Webflow’s extensive documentation and video tutorials are particularly helpful for users navigating the platform. For enterprise customers, Webflow provides a dedicated Customer Success Manager and priority support, ensuring that large organizations receive the assistance they need.

Overall, while both platforms offer excellent support, Shopify’s round-the-clock availability and comprehensive resources give it a slight edge over Webflow.

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Winner: Shopify

. Shopify’s security measures are more comprehensive, with a focus on data privacy, secure infrastructure, encryption, and limited access. They also comply with data privacy regulations, practice data minimization, and ensure user control and transparency. Additional security measures include two-factor authentication, regular audits, and a dedicated incident response team.

Webflow also prioritizes security, implementing robust encryption techniques and strict access controls. They regularly update their systems and conduct audits to identify and address any potential vulnerabilities. However, Shopify’s higher security score and more extensive security measures give it the edge in this category.

🏆 Winner: Shopify

. Shopify, with a score of 7.9, utilizes AI mainly to enhance the ecommerce experience. Its AI features focus on customer behavior analysis, personalized shopping experiences, inventory management, and sales predictions. While Shopify’s AI is powerful, it is more business and data-centric.

Webflow, with a score of 8.3, does not currently have AI capabilities. However, they have announced plans to introduce AI features in the future, including AI-customized templates and AI-powered content personalization. These features, once implemented, could significantly enhance the user experience on Webflow.

🏆 Winner: Webflow

. Managing your online team with Shopify and Webflow involves different approaches to website editing access.

• Shopify enforces staff account limits based on plans, ranging from 2 to 15, with Shopify Plus offering unlimited
  accounts. Collaborators with limited access are also an option.
• In Webflow, the number of users who can edit a website and their access levels vary by plan. Core, Growth, and Enterprise plans offer unlimited editors, while others limit content editors to 3 or 10 per site. Access levels include Designer for full access and Editor for content editing. Workspace roles like Admin, Designer, and Editor ensure collaboration and security through features like the Site Activity Log and role-based permissions.

Shopify User Roles and Access Levels:

Webflow User Roles and Access Levels:

Additional Features

Shopify vs Webflow: User Feedback

Shopify’s slightly higher rating on G2 Crowd can be largely attributed to its specialization in ecommerce. Its comprehensive features, ease of use, and robust customer support cater specifically to online businesses, leading to high user satisfaction among those seeking a dedicated ecommerce solution.

Webflow receives high praise for its user-friendly interface, eliminating the need for coding while offering extensive design flexibility. Users appreciate its scalability, cost-effectiveness, and seamless integration of essential features like forms and CMS. However, some users note a slight learning curve and occasional limitations, particularly in ecommerce functionalities and content management. Overall, Webflow proves to be a powerful tool for building and managing websites, offering robust features for both beginners and experienced developers, albeit with some room for improvement in certain areas like collaborative editing and content management.

Shopify vs Webflow: FAQ