Magento vs WooCommerce vs Shopify: Which Ecommerce Platform for UK Small Business in 2026?

For most UK small businesses in 2026, Shopify (£19 to £289 a month) is the quickest to launch and the easiest to run. WooCommerce (hosting from about £10 to £60 a month, plus the build) gives you the most SEO control and the lowest long-term cost if you, or someone you work with, knows WordPress. Magento (Adobe Commerce), with builds from around £15,000, only really makes sense for retailers turning over £1 million or more with complex B2B, multi-store or very large catalogue needs. Rough first-year totals: Shopify £500 to £3,000, WooCommerce £1,000 to £5,000, Magento £20,000 to £100,000 or more.

The three platforms at a glance

Shopify: simple, managed and quick to launch

Shopify's UK plans in 2026 are Basic at £19 a month, Shopify at £49, Advanced at £289, and Plus from around £2,000. Card fees with Shopify Payments start at 2% plus 25p on Basic and fall as you move up the plans.

It handles UK VAT for you, works with the main UK payment providers (Stripe, PayPal, Klarna), and has a huge app store. You can be selling within days.

The catches are worth knowing before you start. Deep changes to the theme or checkout mean working in Shopify's Liquid templates. Apps add up fast, often £50 to £300 a month. You can't change the /products/ and /collections/ parts of your web addresses. You don't own the platform; you rent it. And if you use a payment provider other than Shopify Payments, Shopify adds its own transaction fee of up to 2% on top.

It suits UK brands that want to spend their time on marketing rather than servers. Just keep an eye on app subscriptions and payment fees.

WooCommerce: full control, built on WordPress

WooCommerce is a free WordPress plugin. You pay for hosting (about £10 to £60 a month for good UK managed hosting), a theme (£0 to £100), plugins (£200 to £1,000 a year) and the build (£900 to £5,000 or more).

Good UK-friendly hosts include Krystal (£7 to £30 a month), Cloudways (£20 to £80), WP Engine (from £40) and Kinsta (from £35), all with UK data centres and set-ups tuned for WordPress.

Its big advantage is search. You control every web address and every piece of structured data, and your shop and your content live in the same system, with WordPress's blogging tools built in. If articles and guides bring in your customers, WooCommerce is hard to beat.

Trade selling needs plugins such as B2BKing (about £249 a year) or Wholesale Suite (about £299). They work, but every extra plugin is one more thing to update.

The trade-off is responsibility. You own everything, including the security updates and the performance tuning.

Magento (Adobe Commerce): built for scale

Magento Open Source is free to download, but it needs serious hosting: typically £100 to £500 a month for a set-up with Varnish, Redis, OpenSearch and at least 8GB of memory. UK Magento developers charge around £60 to £120 an hour. Adobe Commerce, the licensed version, adds licence fees that commonly run to tens of thousands of pounds a year.

Builds usually cost £15,000 to £30,000 for a mid-sized shop and £50,000 to £100,000 or more at enterprise level, and you'll need a development team or agency on a retainer (often £500 to £1,500 a month).

Where it earns that money is B2B. Company accounts with several buyers, negotiated quotes, requisition lists, purchase orders, credit limits and shared catalogues are all built in. It also runs several websites, shops and currencies from one admin panel, which matters if you sell under three or more brands or in several countries.

In practice it makes sense for UK retailers turning over £1 million or more with large catalogues (10,000+ products), real B2B needs, or several brands or territories.

What it really costs in the UK

Shopify is the cheapest to start but has the highest running costs that grow with sales, because of apps and transaction fees. WooCommerce costs a little more to build but its hosting is predictable, and it tends to be the best value over several years. Magento is a business investment that only pays off when you genuinely need its B2B, multi-store or very-large-catalogue features.

UK specifics: VAT, payments, GDPR and SEO

VAT. The UK registration threshold is £90,000. Shopify works out UK VAT for you. WooCommerce needs a plugin for full automation (around £79 a year). Magento has its own tax engine.

Payments. Stripe's standard UK card rate is 1.5% plus 20p, which applies on WooCommerce and Magento. On Shopify, using any provider other than Shopify Payments adds Shopify's own fee of up to 2%, which is easy to overlook.

Data protection. All three can be run in line with UK GDPR. Self-hosting WooCommerce or Magento gives you complete control of the data. Shopify keeps data on its own servers in North America and Europe, so your privacy documentation needs to cover that.

Search. For SEO control, the order is WooCommerce, then Shopify, then Magento, because of web address control, freedom to tune speed, and how well shop and content sit together. On Core Web Vitals, Shopify usually passes without effort, WooCommerce needs good hosting and some tuning, and Magento needs a specialist set-up.

Selling to trade customers

If trade sales are more than about 30% of your revenue, or you need trade accounts with their own prices, the choice narrows.

Shopify: the old basic wholesale channel has been retired. Shopify Plus (from around £2,000 a month) has proper B2B features, including company accounts, price lists and payment terms, but that's expensive if B2B is your main business.

WooCommerce: handled with plugins such as B2BKing (about £249 a year), Wholesale Suite (about £299) or YITH B2B (about £199). Flexible, though the more plugins you add, the more there is to maintain.

Magento: B2B is built in, from company hierarchies and negotiated quotes to purchase orders, credit limits and shared catalogues. This is where Magento stands apart.

The cost of choosing wrong

Moving platforms later is the cost most comparisons leave out. Shopify to WooCommerce typically costs £3,000 to £8,000. WooCommerce to Shopify, £3,000 to £10,000. Magento to either, £10,000 to £30,000 or more. Without careful planning, any move can also cost you three to twelve months of search traffic.

So choose for where the business will be in three years, not just where it is now. A £200,000 retailer that outgrows Shopify after 18 months faces a migration bill and a dip in traffic. Starting on the right platform usually saves more than the difference in price.

Which platform for your business?

Up to £100,000 turnover, small team, speed matters: Shopify Basic or Shopify. Get selling, learn what works, upgrade later.

£50,000 to £2 million, content-led, SEO matters, WordPress skills available: WooCommerce. Best long-term value, full control and the strongest content tools.

£1 million or more, complex catalogue, B2B or several stores, development team in place: Magento or Adobe Commerce.

Not sure yet: start on Shopify, which asks the least commitment, but plan how you'd move if you outgrow it.

Above all, match the platform to the people and budget you have to run it. A £200,000 retailer on WooCommerce with no technical help will struggle, and a £5 million brand on Shopify Plus with fifty apps will leak money.

How we can help

We build on WooCommerce and Magento, and we'll tell you honestly if Shopify suits you better. We recommend based on how your business runs, not on partner commissions.

Every ecommerce build starts with an audit covering SEO, visibility in AI search, accessibility (WCAG 2.2 and the European Accessibility Act) and how easily visitors can buy. We look before we build.

Our WordPress and WooCommerce packages start from £449 and our Magento stores from £2,249. Both include managed UK hosting and a free .co.uk or .com domain for the first year.

Frequently Asked Questions

Is Shopify or WooCommerce better for SEO in the UK?

WooCommerce gives you more control over the technical side: web addresses, structured data and how content is organised. Shopify is good enough for most retailers and quicker to launch. If articles and guides bring in your customers, WooCommerce usually wins. For product-led brands, a well-run Shopify store often beats a badly tuned WooCommerce one.

How much does a Magento website cost in the UK?

A Magento Open Source build typically costs £15,000 to £30,000 for a mid-sized shop and £50,000 to £100,000 or more at enterprise level. Hosting runs to £100 to £500 a month and a development retainer £500 to £1,500 a month. Adobe Commerce adds licence fees on top. A typical first year is £25,000 to £60,000 or more.

Can I start on Shopify and move to WooCommerce later?

Yes, but budget £3,000 to £8,000 for the move and expect three to six months for search traffic to recover. It's cheaper to choose well at the start, and we're happy to give you a recommendation for free.

What is the cheapest way to run a UK online store?

WooCommerce on UK hosting such as Krystal or Cloudways (£10 to £20 a month), with a free theme and only the plugins you need. The first year comes to roughly £1,000 to £2,000 including a basic build. The cheapest option usually takes the most of your own time, though, so count that too.

Does Shopify handle UK VAT correctly?

Yes. Shopify's tax engine handles UK VAT, including the £90,000 registration threshold, VAT on digital services and the Northern Ireland arrangements. WooCommerce needs a plugin, at around £79 a year, to do the same automatically.

Can Daedalus Design build on any of these platforms?

We build WooCommerce stores through our WordPress packages (from £449) and Magento stores from £2,249, both with managed UK hosting and a free domain for the first year. If Shopify is the better fit for you, we'll say so.