Our Honest Shopify vs Amazon Review: Which Do We Recommend?

Each of these ecommerce providers has their own unique pros and cons. Whichever one is better for you depends on the particular needs of your store, but we can at least give you a balanced view of each.

Shopify Pros and Cons

Amazon Pros and Cons

If that wasn’t in-depth enough for you, try our quick comparison table for size:

Further Information

• Why not have a quick look at our Shopify review to get started?

You can make money by using Shopify or Amazon to sell your products online. You pay a monthly subscription to both and have access to all the tools and resources they have to offer.

But they are not the same!

Firstly, there’s the size difference. Shopify managed to rake in $1.7 billion for the first quarter of 2023, while Amazon pulled in a head-spinning $127 billion in the same period! Amazon and Shopify may seem similar, but they work in different ways.

The Major Difference Between Shopify and Amazon

The key thing to remember is Shopify is a specialized ecommerce platform and Amazon is an online marketplace. Shopify gives you the tools to build your very own online store, while Amazon lets you sell through its marketplace alongside other online sellers.

So selling through Amazon is like having a stall in a famous boot fair. Thousands of people swarm in to browse and buy – most of them aren’t looking for your business in particular, but you still make a lot of sales because of everyone walking past and seeing your stall.

Selling with Shopify is more like renting a building to set up your business in. You have your own space and customers actually come looking for your store once they know your brand. There’s more room to create a unique image, although it’s harder work building up that regular customer base. But it’s ‘your store, your way’, so you can really customize it! Expand it to a brick-and-mortar store, add pay by link, it’s all down to you!

Because of these differences, Shopify and Amazon cater to different types of online sellers. Amazon caters to individual sellers up to small and medium-sized businesses. Shopify is ideal for everything from small businesses to much larger brands.

Further Information

• If you would like to know more about ecommerce website builders and our own methodology, read our How We Conduct Our Ecommerce Website Builder Research page.

The Winner

It's A Draw! Shopify and Amazon are both easy to use

They’re both easy to use in their own ways. Amazon involves less work than Shopify because you just have to set up and get selling. But Shopify makes it really easy to build your own online store, especially with recently added updates like Shopify Magic, which we’ll go into more detail on later.

Whether you’re selling a pair of socks or setting up your ecommerce empire, you want your online selling experience to be as smooth as possible.

Setting up your own online store can seem overwhelming. But from our own experience with Shopify, it does a good job of making the process simplified. Unlike other website builders, Shopify opens up in the dashboard first, where you can start immediately adding products and sorting out payment details and other important details.

It can seem confusing at first to have to start with the “boring” stuff before getting to the editor and actually building your online store, but Shopify is just making sure you prioritize its sales features, which is what the platform’s known for. Shopify is built for online stores mainly, and our testers throughout the years have found the actual design and editing to be hard to use at first:

“Even the basics like adding and resizing text felt over-engineered and overcomplicated.”

Shopify did actually anticipate this impatience and implemented Shopify Magic as a way to help. An AI text generation tool, Shopify Magic can create product descriptions in multiple tones of voice from just a short description, saving you massive amounts of time when filling out your store’s inventory, such as writing descriptions based on prompts, creating FAQs, and even optimizing emails. AI website builders are becoming more popular, with more and more advancements and features each week, so if you think it saves time now, just check back in half a year!

Since our previous testing, Shopify improved its ease of use in our ranking with a 13% rise, going from 3.5 to a 4 out of 5. It still has a few issues, but in our experience, it is still one of the best platforms to build an online store.

On the flip side, with Amazon, all you need to do is create an account, complete each set-up stage, and then you’re ready to get selling!

Once you’re registered you just have to list your products, sell them, ship them, and then the best part – get paid!

This is all quite straightforward and Amazon has tools to make it as simple as possible. For example, you can sort out shipping yourself or use Fulfillment by Amazon (FBA).

FBA takes one of the headaches of the ecommerce world – shipping – and takes it out of your hands. So you don’t have to worry about shipping at all if you don’t want to. Instead, you sell your products and Amazon sorts the rest out for you. You do get some choice, however. For instance, you can choose which products you want to give exclusive Prime free shipping. We recommend this option for your best sellers, as free shipping has been shown to influence 73% of online shoppers into making a purchase.

Both Shopify and Amazon are designed to make your life as easy as possible. You’ll find useful tools and streamlined setups with both.

The Winner

Shopify has the better design flexibility

Shopify wins! It gives you more freedom over your design than Amazon, letting you use themes and alter color and font sizes. Shopify’s customization is great for creating a unique brand image for your business, which can be a major deciding factor for a customer to buy your product. Amazon controls your design, which is less work but much more limiting when it comes to marketing.

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There’s nothing more frustrating than trying to browse online when bad design is getting in the way at every click. Shopify gives you control over the layout and design of your online store. But you don’t have to design it from scratch – instead, you choose from over 140 themes and then customize it to match your brand.

Shopify has 12 free themes and over 120 premium ones which cost between $170 to $380. You can edit, personalize, and even switch your theme, so you create a unique brand image for your business. Shopify’s themes are all designed for online stores, meaning they are already optimized for getting your customer’s attention. That’s why in our research, we gave Shopify a 4.4 out of 5 for design flexibility, beating out usual design heavy-hitters like Squarespace.

Amazon is more limiting in its designs. All Amazon pages are laid out in a similar way. You can upload your own images and descriptions, but the overall layout and design of your store page are recognizably Amazon’s rather than your own.

On the homepage, for example, products are listed in Amazon’s branding, alongside your competitors’ products. This is ideal for the customer but can make it more challenging to direct visitors to your own pages.

You are in fact able to make a brand storefront on Amazon. You can select from a range of templates, put in your own images and video and create a space where customers can view your brand and your brand alone. There are however three requirements to building a storefront in Amazon. You must be either:

• An Amazon seller enrolled in Brand Registry.
• A brand selling directly to Amazon via Vendor Central.
• An agency representing one of the above.

Brand Registry is available to any business that has a valid registered trademark in the same country as the Amazon marketplace they are selling on.

The Winner

Shopify has the better ecommerce features

Shopify wins! It puts the tools in your hands to manage your online store and help you succeed. You can pick and choose which tools you need based on your product, and while Amazon has a wide range of features and makes it easy to sell online, it has the same features for all the products it sells, making it harder for yours to get seen.

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Bust the myth that looks and savviness don’t go hand in hand. Create a store that has ecommerce power tools in its pocket as well as great design.

Many people don’t actually know how to sell on Amazon. You get a vast range of products to sell in its marketplace, from electronics to toys and books. You can even sell services rather than physical goods. You can access all your selling options through Amazon’s Seller Central App. Here, you can create coupons,  get reviews for your products and even sign up to have Enhanced Brand Content, replacing your usual product images with professionally-shot video that better reflects your brand, increasing conversions.

It welcomes individual sellers as well as businesses and has the tools in place to support your online selling. This includes unique stores such as Amazon Handmade, global selling, and the creation of targeted adverts.

One example is the Fulfillment by Amazon (FBA) program, which allows you to access Amazon Prime customers, and lets Amazon handle the storage, packing, and shipping of your products.

You send your products to Amazon, which then packages and ships them to customers once the products get sold. There are fees for this, but if you don’t want the hassle of dealing with shipping it’s a useful solution!

In our research, Shopify comes first in our ranking of sales features with a 4.7 out of 5. This speaks to the depth and range of its ecommerce abilities, beating out many other providers like Wix, Square Online, and BigCommerce.

Here are just some of the ecommerce tools Shopify offers:

• Abandoned cart recovery
• Powerful inventory system
• Automatic tax calculation
• Logo maker
• Multichannel selling
• App integration

Shopify provides all the necessary tools to make your online store succeed,  while also making your life as a business owner as easy as possible. What’s more, Shopify has recently teamed up with dropshipping suppliers like DSers to support extensive app store that you can use to expand and advance your ecommerce website. With over 6,000 apps, Shopify has an app for everything…sometimes to the platform’s detriment. If we’re being honest, Shopify can be quite third-party app reliant. As one of our testers said:

“A lot of the time it was unclear whether or not a feature was built in or if I had to download a third-party app.”

The app store is certainly useful for adding functions like email marketing or member areas, but it would also be simpler for the user if Shopify had more in-built functionality.

Further Information

• Shopify’s app store gives it tons of extra features. But if you’d rather have all your tools built into your builder, check out our BigCommerce review. It has the most amount of inhouse features of any ecommerce platform.
• If you want to see how Shopify’s features compare to its competitors, take a look at our Shopify vs BigCommerce Comparison.
• Wondering what the difference between Dropshipping vs Ecommerce Fulfillment is? Our helpful breakdown explains the difference!

The Winner

Shopify has the better payment options and fees

Shopify wins! It has more payment options than Amazon. You don’t have to pay transaction fees if you’re using Shopify Pay. Amazon’s fees are super dependent on the individual seller but overall are much less transparent, and harder to budget for.

Try Shopify Today

Sometimes you have to look deeper than the upfront costs. Transaction fees and credit card rates can increase your monthly outgoings, so it’s always best to check before you commit.

It’s no surprise Amazon supports Amazon Pay as its main payment gateway. You can accept credit and debit cards through this, but not PayPal.

For ‘Professional Sellers’, Amazon has selling fees plus its monthly subscription. These fees vary by category but are made up of referral fees and shipping fees. These referral fees have a minimum cost of $0.30, and can usually sit between 8% to 15% of the total sale. However, some categories like Device Accessories have a referral fee of 45%, meaning you would lose nearly half of your sale to Amazon based on what you sold.

If you use FBA there is a range of fees varying from $2.41 up to $137.32 for fulfillment fees (per unit). Then there are monthly inventory storage fees ranging from $0.69 to $2.40 per cubic foot. These prices are totally dependent on the size, volume, type of product, and even the time of year. You can check the various prices here.

Individual sellers don’t pay a monthly subscription like Professional Sellers do. Instead, you would pay a $0.99 fee for every product you sell.

Shopify has its own payment gateway, Shopify Payments. Most ecommerce website builders will make you sign up for their own in-built payment gateway, since it lets it keep track of your transactions. And Shopify is no different! There are benefits, however, such as being able to sync your transactions to other functions such as tax invoice makers. But the main benefit when you’re using this is you don’t have to pay any transaction fees!

That’s not all Shopify has to offer – it also provides over 100 different payment gateways, including Amazon Pay and PayPal. These all have transaction fees ranging from 0.5% to 2% depending on which one you’re using and which plan you’re on.

Credit card fees apply to all payment gateways, including Shopify Payments. The regular credit card rate on Shopify is 2.9% + 30¢. As you upgrade through Shopify’s price plans your online credit card rates decrease from 2.9% + 30¢ to 2.4% + 30¢.

The Winner

Amazon is the best at attracting customers

Amazon wins! Even though you can’t just sit back and relax, your customers come to you and your store will benefit from Amazon’s massive search volume. Shopify gives you all the tools you need to succeed, such as SEO options and marketing plugins like omnichannel selling and automated emails. But in general, it’s just a more hands-on approach.

Try Amazon Today

From our experience, attracting your customers’ attention online can be a challenge. With competitors targeting your customers with ads in their social feeds and with distractions at every click, it’s a race to get noticed first.

This is where Amazon really shines. It gets an average of 2.2 billion visits a month in just the US alone, so the odds are stacked temptingly in your favor. You don’t have to worry so much about Google rankings or run email campaigns – people come to Amazon with their eyes peeled and wallets primed.

You have more time to manage your inventory and deal with orders – instead of you going to them, your customers are coming to you.

Or so you hope!

The drawback of Amazon is, once billions of visitors are on the site, they need to get to your products instead of your neighbor’s. And when Amazon itself is also selling on the same platform, competition is pretty fierce.

You may not need to worry about Google’s SEO, but you will need to comply with Amazon’s SEO in order to rank as high in its search results as you can. Thankfully, Amazon SEO works near-enough the same as Google, so a lot of the same advice applies.

In order to improve your Amazon SEO, don’t overstuff your product titles with keywords, optimize the product title and description with brand names and sizes, use clear and concise bullet points of key product info, and try to showcase positive reviews. This will give you the best chance of being chosen over your competitors.

Shopify doesn’t have the same search volume as Amazon. That’s because you create your very own brand – people actually need to search for your business to find you. This means marketing is essential to widen your customer base.

Email campaigns, multichannel selling, a strong social media presence, Shopify App Market.

From our perspective, having followed Shopify for years, its marketing tools are good, earning a 5 out of 5 in our research, but having Amazon’s audience size from the get-go is a huge advantage when it comes to online selling.

Further Information

• Social media is an essential part of attracting customers. Read our guide on How to Set Up a Facebook Store for helpful tips.
• Instagram isn’t just for cute pictures of cats. Check out our guide on How to Make Money on Instagram and learn how to start earning sales and growing your customer following through Instagram.

The Winner

Shopify has the best help and support

Shopify wins! Its support is much easier to access than Amazon’s and there are a lot more help options for you to choose from, such as having a 24/7 phone and live chat support and a comprehensive Help Center of articles for nearly every query you may have. Amazon does offer support, but it’s less in-depth than Shopify’s.

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Amazon doesn’t have the clearest support system – there is phone support where you request a call and Amazon gets in contact with you. There are forms you can submit for support and community forums where you can discuss issues. However, it’s not the most streamlined or easy-to-use support system out there.

Shopify has a comprehensive set of help options, because, unlike Amazon, there’s a lot more that you could struggle with. Having so many different functions and tools means needing more support options. Shopify comes equipped with

• 24/7 phone
• Social media
• 24/7 live chat
• Forum
• Email
• Video tutorials
• Advanced specialist support

Shopify also has a Help Center with articles and guides. It’s easy to navigate and has tons of resources to browse. It also includes video tutorials and forums to help you learn new skills. Shopify’s 24/7 phone support is unique for an ecommerce website builder. Other competitors, like Squarespace, only offer 24/7 email support.

Shopify knows it can be challenging running your own store, and released Shopify Sidekick in order to offer a higher level of support. An AI chatbot that can answer questions and even automate certain tasks for you, allowing you to focus on other tasks. When we were doing our latest research, Shopify actually shot up 2.6% since last year from 3.8 to 3.9 out of 5 for overall help and support, now coming in second in our overall rankings of the best builders on the market.

Further Information

• The Best Ways to Reach Shopify Customer Service: Read our guide to learn how you can contact Shopify if you need a helping hand

Pricing

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The Winner

Shopify has the best value for money

Shopify wins! Although Amazon’s Individual plan is more suitable for small-scale sellers, overall Shopify offers better value for money. It’s cheaper than Amazon’s Professional plan, and is more scalable and transparent with its pricing than Amazon, making it easier to budget for.

Try Shopify Today

At the end of the day you want to be making more money than you’re spending. There’s no point choosing a platform that’ll cost you hundreds of dollars if you’re only selling a few handmade items a month.

Neither Amazon nor Shopify is as pricey as that, so you should find something here to fit your budget.

Amazon has two selling plans:

• The Professional Selling plan costs $39.99 per month, plus extra selling fees (which vary depending on your products).
• The Individual Selling plan doesn’t have a monthly fee – instead, you pay $0.99 per item sold. This is in addition to extra selling fees, which again vary by category.

The Individual plan is suitable for anyone planning to sell less than 40 items per month. Because of this, it has fewer features available. For example, you can’t customize shipping rates on the Individual plan.

There are extra costs when you use FBA, but this is extremely variable and dependent on your products and business. Don’t forget about referral rates as well. These can be up to 45% of a sale, so keep that in mind if you decide to go with Amazon.

Shopify has three price plans:

• The Basic Shopify plan costs $29 per month
• The Shopify plan costs $79 per month
• The Advanced Shopify plan costs $299 per month

Shopify has earnt a bit of a reputation as being expensive, but from our experience, you get what you pay for – good sales features. In our research, its value for money got a 3.6 out of 5, which was a 20% rise from our previous testing. For those worried about the cost, Shopify offers a 3-day free trial (then the first month at $1). This offer allows you to test the platform and maybe even get a head start on selling before you have to start paying for the main plans, a great option for start-ups or new businesses with not a lot of capital (just yet).

You unlock more features as you upgrade through the pricing plans. Below you can see which features are available on each plan.

The Basic Shopify plan gives you the basics to set up your ecommerce website. You can then add apps to expand your store’s functions and upgrade whenever you’re ready. The prices Shopify displays for all its plans are yearly prices, which can lead to up to 25% cheaper than paying month-by-month. The Basic plan becomes $39 per month if this method is chosen.

If even the basic plan is outside of your budget, Shopify does have a fourth plan, but it’s restricted to selling on social media only. The Shopify Starter Plan only costs $5 per month, and with it, you get a reduced version of a typical Shopify store. You won’t have a website, instead, you’ll have a small store that you can link to a social media page.

Extra costs can occur if you’re adding third-party apps to your store. However, these help scale your business so should reflect a rise in customers and profits.

Further Information

• Did Shopify’s prices catch your eye? Read our Shopify Pricing Review to find out which Shopify plan is best for you.
• Trying to budget for your business? Read our article on how much does a web site cost for some helpful tips.
• Compare prices in our Online Store Builder Comparison Chart to find the perfect platform for your wallet as well as your business.

Using Amazon with Shopify

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Amazon and Shopify are pretty well-matched. They both offer certain things which the other does not. Just like peanut butter and jelly, why not put them together to make something great?

You can integrate Amazon into your Shopify store. Yes, that means exactly what you think it does: you can build your own ecommerce business while promoting your products on the world’s largest marketplace… at the same time… and with just a few clicks.

This will let you create Amazon listings and offers straight from Shopify, sync inventory and product details, link products, and more!

All you have to do is add the Amazon Sales Channel to your Shopify Store.

The main thing to be aware of is you still have to pay for the Amazon Professional Seller account. You will already be paying your monthly subscription to Shopify, and then you will pay for the Amazon Professional plan on top of that. The minimum you will need to pay is nearly $80 per month, plus all the potential plugin costs you may be paying with your Shopify store. We don’t mean to be a buzzkill, but we just want to be clear that running a store on both is a more expensive option.

But if your business is ready for more exposure and expansion, combining these two powerhouses is a worthwhile investment.

Shopify vs Amazon: Conclusion

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Shopify and Amazon are two impressive sales platforms. In this article, we have explored why they’re different and dived deep into their features, pricing, design, and more.

Most importantly, we’ve looked at how these things can help you.

Overall, we recommend Shopify for anyone setting up their ecommerce business or those looking to grow their business and scale up. It gives you greater control, a stronger brand identity, and more scalable pricing.

Amazon is good for small sellers who don’t want to pay an upfront cost, but its variable extra fees make it difficult to judge how quickly those costs could rack up.

Shopify provides a better solution in the long term, and with the option to integrate Amazon into your Shopify store, you don’t have to miss out: it’s a win-win!

Further Information

• Comparison of Online Store Builders
• Shopify Alternatives
• The Best Ecommerce Website Builders
• The Best Small Business Website Builders