Wix and Shopify have both improved significantly in recent years. Wix now has ecommerce capabilities that would have seemed ambitious five years ago. Shopify now has a better native design editor than it used to. The gap has narrowed on the surface - but underneath, the platforms are solving different problems.
Where Wix genuinely works for ecommerce
Wix Ecommerce is a functional platform for simple online stores. If you need to sell a small number of products alongside a services or portfolio website - a photographer selling prints, a consultant selling a course, a local business selling merchandise - Wix handles it without you needing to manage two separate platforms.
The drag-and-drop editor is Wix's strongest advantage. Building and editing pages requires no technical knowledge and produces professional results quickly. For businesses where the website content is more important than the ecommerce capability, Wix's editor is genuinely better than Shopify's.
Wix also has a reasonable app market, built-in booking, and good integration with their other products (Wix Restaurants, Wix Bookings, etc.) for specific business types.
Where Wix runs into limits
Ecommerce feature depth. Wix's ecommerce features are functional but shallow compared to Shopify. Subscriptions require a specific Wix Payments setup and are limited. Multi-currency support is available but less mature. Inventory management for large catalogues is more limited. Complex variant structures (more than three options per product) aren't supported. As your ecommerce operation grows, you'll find edges.
App ecosystem. Wix's App Market has hundreds of apps, not thousands. Many Shopify-native tools (Klaviyo, ReConvert, Recharge, most subscription apps) either don't have a Wix integration or have significantly less capable Wix versions. Building a sophisticated ecommerce stack on Wix requires working around more limitations.
Developer ecosystem. Finding a Wix developer for custom work is significantly harder than finding a Shopify developer. The talent pool is smaller, the documentation is less comprehensive, and the community is less active. Custom functionality is genuinely more expensive and slower to deliver on Wix.
Migration path. If you start on Wix and outgrow it, migration is more painful than migration from many other platforms. Wix's data export options are limited, and themes don't port to any other platform. This isn't a reason to avoid Wix for the right use case, but it's worth knowing before you invest in building on it.
The key differences
Pricing. Both platforms have comparable entry-level pricing. Wix Business starts at around $17/month; Shopify Basic is $29/month. Wix doesn't charge transaction fees on any plan (with Wix Payments). Shopify charges 0% with Shopify Payments and 0.5–2% with third-party gateways. Shopify's pricing is higher but justified by deeper features at comparable tiers.
Ease of use. Wix is easier to learn for non-technical users. The drag-and-drop editor is more intuitive than Shopify's section editor. This advantage is real but narrows as Shopify's editor has improved significantly.
Ecommerce capability. Shopify is purpose-built for selling. Every feature - checkout, inventory, payments, shipping, analytics - is designed for ecommerce first. Wix is a website builder that added ecommerce. The distinction shows in feature depth, especially at scale.
Scalability. Shopify scales from $29/month to Shopify Plus for enterprise. Wix has no equivalent to Plus - there's no clear path to enterprise-grade ecommerce on the platform.
The decision
Use Wix if: ecommerce is a secondary function of your site, you have a small catalogue (under 50 products), you're already invested in the Wix ecosystem (Wix Restaurants, Wix Bookings), or you genuinely prefer the editor and your ecommerce needs are simple.
Use Shopify if: ecommerce is your primary business or a significant revenue channel, you need subscription selling, you expect to grow your catalogue, you want access to the full Shopify app ecosystem, or you'll need custom development at some point.
For most businesses where selling products online is the core activity - rather than a side function of a content or services site - Shopify is the right platform. The depth and scalability justify the slightly higher entry cost.
For more comparison context, see also Shopify vs Squarespace - a similar platform with similar trade-offs.
