4 Best WooCommerce Alternatives for Specific Needs

Are you looking for the best WooCommerce alternatives?

While WooCommerce is the most popular eCommerce plugin for WordPress sites, it may not be the perfect option for everyone. Depending on your needs, there are better alternatives to WooCommerce that can get the job done faster and easier.

In this article, we will share the best WooCommerce alternatives you can use to sell online.

What are the best WooCommerce alternatives

Why Might You Need WooCommerce Alternatives?

WooCommerce is the most popular eCommerce platform because it allows anyone to launch an online store. And it’s an open-source solution, so you can download and use it for free.

Due to its ease of use and powerful customization options, it is hugely popular among online store owners. And WooCommerce powers over 20% of all eCommerce stores.

WooCommerce comes with hundreds of free and premium extensions to add powerful eCommerce features to your online store. It includes inventory management, point of sale (POS), and so on.

In our opinion, it is the overall best WordPress eCommerce plugin on the market.

Now you may wonder, is there a better option than WooCommerce?

Well, there are some scenarios where WooCommerce may not be the right tool for the job.

It might not have the specific key features you need for your eCommerce business or requires a learning curve. And this is where WooCommerce alternatives come in.

These user-friendly eCommerce platforms offer better solutions for specific needs and may be more suitable for your business plans.

Now, without delay, let’s look at the best WooCommerce alternatives and see when they are a better solution for your online business.

1. MemberPress

MemberPress is the best WordPress membership plugin on the market. It allows you to sell paid memberships with multi-level subscriptions, drip-content support, and eCommerce features.

It comes with support for multiple payment gateways, easy pricing tables, and other tools to help you sell and grow your membership community.

When Is MemberPress a Better Solution Than WooCommerce?

If you want to create a membership site that offers access to premium content with subscriptions, then MemberPress is made specifically for that. It offers a better experience for you as well as your users.

You can do the same thing with WooCommerce, but it would soon become overly complicated. You will have to use several add-ons to get the same functionality that you get built-in with MemberPress.

More importantly, MemberPress works well with WooCommerce, and you can combine them to sell subscription-based products and physical products on the same website.

Cons Compared to WooCommerce

MemberPress does not have any of the traditional shopping cart or advanced checkout features. To sell physical products, you will need to use them alongside WooCommerce.

For more details, see our article on how to build a WordPress membership website.

Why Do We Recommend MemberPress?

We recommend MemberPress as a WooCommerce alternative because it’s the best membership plugin for WordPress, and it’s PCI compliant by default, making it easy and secure to accept online recurring payments.

When it comes to top features, MemberPress lets you create multiple membership levels, so you can show different content to different members on your WordPress site.

While WooCommerce is an ultimate eCommerce solution, it has fewer membership options and is not PCI compliant. You can use third-party payment plugins to ensure your online store’s compliance with payment cards and processors.

Plus, MemberPress offers advanced community building, timed content release with Drip, a powerful LMS platform, a subscription plugin, integrations with third-party tools, and more.

2. Easy Digital Downloads

Easy Digital Downloads is the best WordPress digital downloads plugin made specifically for selling virtual goods. These include software, music, eBooks, movies, and more.

You can manage software licenses, accept payments, install addons to extend the platform further, and more.

When Is Easy Digital Downloads a Better Choice Than WooCommerce?

If you only want to sell digital downloads, then Easy Digital Downloads can replace WooCommerce easily. It simplifies the process and allows you to manage licenses, accept payments, manage users, and manage file downloads.

You can sell digital products with WooCommerce as well. However, it includes many key features to sell physical goods, cluttering the interface.

You’ll also need to use several addons to manage licenses, file permissions, and other virtual product features.

On the other hand, there’s a free version of the Easy Digital Downloads plugin. However, you need to use their professional business plan to get access to several features like shipping digital products.

Bonus Tip: You can use our Easy Digital Downloads discount code to get up to 50% off.

Cons Compared to WooCommerce

Just like you can sell digital goods with WooCommerce, you can also sell physical goods with Easy Digital Downloads by using addons.

However, if you plan on selling digital and physical goods, then WooCommerce will be a much better solution to manage your file downloads.

Why Do We Recommend Easy Digital Downloads?

We recommend Easy Digital Downloads because it is the best WordPress plugin to sell virtual products, digital goods, and software. We use it on several of our websites, including WPForms and MonsterInsights, and it works like a charm.

While WooCommerce lets you sell physical products and anything else you might want, it comes with a lot of features and options. This makes it confusing for business owners to set up their sites and sell digitally.

On the other hand, Easy Digital Downloads has a simple setup process. It comes with secure payment options, subscription plans for customers, hundreds of integrations, and more.

Easy Digital Downloads also offers addons to sell physical products. So if you are using this plugin, then you can sell anything and everything with a few extra steps.

3. Shopify

Shopify Ecommerce Website Builder Software

Unlike other WooCommerce alternatives on this list, Shopify is a fully hosted eCommerce platform that does not require using WordPress. You don’t have to manage software, install updates, or manage backups.

It allows anyone to start an online store and sell without technical skills easily.

When Is Shopify a Better Solution Than WooCommerce?

Normally, you need to manage your shopping cart software using a platform like WooCommerce.

You will need to register a domain name and buy a WooCommerce web hosting account to install software, manage updates, backups, and so on.

Shopify takes care of all that and offers you a fully hosted platform. You can use their drag-and-drop tools to build your online store within minutes.

Shopify offers a better user-friendly solution if you are looking for a completely hands-off platform. It also provides a mobile app to manage your products, process orders, and design campaigns using built-in marketing tools.

Cons Compared to WooCommerce

Shopify is a hosted platform, meaning you get less control over your website than with a hosted WooCommerce store. It also charges you transaction fees, which means your costs will increase as you start selling more.

For a side-by-side comparison, you can see our article on Shopify vs. WooCommerce with the pros and cons of both platforms.

Why Do We Recommend Shopify?

We recommend Shopify because it’s a popular hosted eCommerce solution. And when we say hosted, this means that you don’t need to worry about a lot of things, including web hosting, security, and more.

Unlike WooCommerce, Shopify is a ready-made eCommerce platform for business owners to get started quickly. There’s no need to install or manage software, and you can use their drag-and-drop builder to set up your online store.

While WooCommerce gives you full control over customization and installing third-party tools to make a powerful eCommerce store, Shopify has limited options. You have to work around their provided tools and addons.

Shopify has more than enough addons, extensions, and themes to get you started with your online store. And if you outgrow Shopify, you can always move your online store from Shopify to WooCommerce.

4. WPForms

WPForms is the best WordPress form builder plugin in the market. Although it’s not a full-featured eCommerce plugin, it comes with payment options for Stripe, PayPal, Square, and Authorize.net, so you can easily create online payment forms in WordPress.

It also has a free plan, but you’ll need the WPForms Pro version to access payment options and other eCommerce functionality.

When Is WPForms a Better Solution Than WooCommerce?

If you are looking to create an order form to accept credit card payments on your WordPress website, then WPForms is the simplest option on the list.

You can use it for one-time or recurring services like consulting, lawn mowing, and more. It also offers hundreds of ready-made form templates for your ease.

WPForms is also a better solution for NGOs to create an online donation or fundraising form and automatically send email notifications to donors.

Moreover, WPForms has an excellent customer support team that can help with setting up your credit card and other payment options easily.

Bonus Tip: You can use our WPForms discount code to get up to 50% off.

Cons Compared to WooCommerce

This is not an apples-to-apples comparison. WPForms is not an eCommerce plugin. So you will need to install addons to handle advanced features like taxes, shipping, and more.

It’s a simple payment solution for people who want to sell online without setting up a complete online store.

WooCommerce, on the other hand, is a powerful, full-featured eCommerce plugin.

Why Do We Recommend WPForms?

We recommend WPForms because it’s the best WordPress form builder and a simple and secure payment solution. For people who don’t want to set up a complete eCommerce store and still sell from their site, WPForms is the ideal choice.

It supports all major payment options, including Stripe, PayPal, Google Pay, and more. And WPForms is the most beginner-friendly WordPress plugin that lets you add a payment form with just a few clicks.

While WooCommerce is a complete WordPress eCommerce plugin to start an online store, sometimes it’s too much for small businesses with a few products. WPForms provides a way out and let you install specific addons that get the work done without cluttering your WordPress website.

With WPForms, you can give choice to users to select one or multiple products within the online form and use their favorite payment method. Additionally, WPForms has conditional logic to accept one-time and recurring payments.

What Are the Best WooCommerce Alternatives?

Finding a better eCommerce solution than WooCommerce is not difficult if you know exactly what you need as an online business owner.

We recommend MemberPress for creating a fully functional membership site. It’s user-friendly and works with WordPress out of the box.

And if you want to sell digital products with better features and flexibility, then Easy Digital Downloads is the right provider.

There are many other WooCommerce alternatives that we didn’t mention in this list to avoid confusion. For example, you could use BigCommerce, Magento, Ecwid, Opencart, or Square.

These can be good eCommerce solutions, but we wanted to share only the best WooCommerce alternatives for beginners and small business owners.

We hope this article helped you learn about the best WooCommerce alternatives and when they can be a better solution. You may also want to see our other guides about WooCommerce, online businesses, and eCommerce sites.

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