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When adding a shopping cart to your WordPress site, WooCommerce is the best solution.
But WooCommerce is not the only solution. There are also a handful of WordPress shopping cart plugins available. You should choose one based on your needs.
For instance, WooCommerce is not the best choice if you sell digital products. Easy Digital Downloads is considered the best solution.
We have compiled a list of the 6 best shopping WordPress plugins to help you choose the right one.
Plugins | Active Installations | Ratings | Download |
WooCommerce | 5+ million | ||
Easy Digital Downloads | 50,000+ | ||
ShopEngine | 40,000+ | ||
Ecwid | 20,000+ | ||
WordPress Simple Shopping Cart | 20,000+ | ||
WP EasyCart | 5,000+ |
Let’s dive into the details of these plugins.
WooCommerce
WooCommerce is the most popular WordPress shopping cart plugin.
From adding a cart to delivering products, it has everything that an online store needs.
The plugin lets you sell both physical and digital products. You can also set up a payment gateway using this plugin.
You can collect your payments through credit cards and other payment systems like PayPal, Stripe, Amazon Pay, Authorize.net, etc.
You can even collect your payments offline, like cash on delivery or bank checks.
WooCommerce is best for its extensibility and customization options. You can find great add-ons to add more features to your WooCommerce store.
Pros
- Most Stable eCommerce Plugin
- Available Themes, Plugins, & Extensions
- Advanced Features
- Built-in Payment Gateways
- User-Friendly
- Sell both Physical and Digital Products
- Global Shipping Options
- Well Documented
- Supports Dropshipping
Cons
- An Overwhelming Number of Options
- Works on WordPress Only
- Premium Extensions are expensive.
Price
This awesome plugin is downloadable for free. Grab a copy today and start your online store.
Easy Digital Downloads
As the name suggests, the Easy Digital Downloads plugin lets you sell digital products like eBooks, plugins, PDF files, and more.
It makes selling digital products extremely easy. You can sell products directly by using the ‘Buy Now’ button or by adding the’ Add to Cart’ button. You can also customize the button text as you wish.
It has a Customer Management Option that facilitates editing, viewing, and deleting any customer on your WordPress site.
You can even manage an individual record for every customer, link customer records to user profiles, create a customer account page, and many more.
This plugin easily integrates with payment gateways like PayPal, Bitpay, Stripe, Amazon Pay, etc.
Like WooCommerce, the features of this plugin are easily extendable.
You can extend its functionality further by adding premium extensions to make your selling process more dynamic.
This shopping cart plugin for WordPress lets you sell only digital products that do not need any shipping address but an email address.
Therefore, shipping features are not included with this plugin, unlike WooCommerce.
Pros
- Specially Designed for Selling Digital Goods
- Add-ons for Expanding Functionalities
- Supports Almost Every Theme
- Free Core Plugin
- Customer Management
- Data Reporting
- Refund Tracking Tools
- Mail Lists
- Front-End Shopping Cart
Cons
- Not Support Physical Products
- Require Third-Party Addons for Selling External or Affiliate Products
Price
This plugin is free but offers a premium version. The premium version starts at $199/year for a single site.
ShopEngine
ShopEngine is a comprehensive freemium plugin boasting shopping cart widgets.
In the recent Monster Awards competition, the WooCommerce plugin stood 1st, toppling its counterparts. Thanks to its stunning modules, widgets, templates, and other features.
ShopEngine’s shopping cart widgets include empty cart message, cart table, cart total, return to shop button, etc.
You can incorporate these widgets in your WooCommerce pages, maximizing customer satisfaction.
Along with these widgets, ShopEngine comes with many other widgets connected to a single page, archive page, checkout page, order page, and so on. These drag-and-drop widgets allow you to customize your pages limitlessly.
ShopEngine has plenty of modules, including preorder, backorder, sales notification, partial payment, product comparison, variation swatches, flash sales, etc.
Best of all, ShopEngine offers ready-made templates for all your WooCommerce pages that you can alter and customize to ensure the optimal user experience.
Pros
- Compatible with popular WordPress themes like Astra, Hello Elementor, Divi, Ultra, and others.
- The addon comes with 13+ modules, 65+ widgets, and many other stunning features.
- Provides limitless customization options.
- Functions perfectly with Elementor.
- Integration with Gutenberg is available.
- showcases related products based on the preferences of buyers.
- Comes with multi-language support.
Cons
- Cart page, Order page, and Thank you page come with only 2 premade designs.
Pricing:
ShopEngine offers both free and pro versions. The pro version costs $59/year for a single site.
Ecwid
Ecwid is another best plugin that covers everything you need to build a WordPress online store, just like WooCommerce.
This shopping cart plugin for WordPress is a robust yet easy-to-use plugin. It supports up to 45 languages.
Like WooCommerce, this plugin has built-in payment gateways, including PayPal and Stripe, and 40 more payment options.
It even integrates with major shipping carriers, such as USPS, UPS, FedEx, and others, to automatically calculate shipping rates.
Even this fantastic plugin calculates tax rates automatically for the USA, Canada, and EU VAT.
The significant distinction between WooCommerce and Ecwid is that WooCommerce can only be used on WordPress-based websites.
In contrast, Ecwid is usable on every website, including Wix, Joomla, Drupal, Weebly, Facebook, Instagram, etc. It also offers unlimited backup, security patches, and server maintenance.
Unlike WooCommerce and Easy Digital Downloads, this WordPress shopping cart plugin lets you add up to 10 products on their free version, which is suitable for a small shop.
You must buy their premium version if you want to add more products. However, this plugin also offers free iOS and Android apps.
Pros
- Sell Both Digital & Physical Products
- Multiple Shipping Options
- Reporting
- 40+ Payment Gateways
- Marketing Tools
- Secure HTTP Checkouts
- Unlimited Storage Space
- POS System
- Automatic Tax & Shipping Rate Calculation
- Product Management
Cons
- Limited Use Free Version
- Cannot Change Product URLs
Price
Like Easy Digital Downloads, the Ecwid Ecommerce Shopping Cart is free and allows you to add 10 products only. But if you want to add more than that, you should buy the pro version. The price of the pro version starts at $19/month.
WordPress Simple PayPal Shopping Cart
If you want to build an online shop for free without using WooCommerce, the WordPress Simple PayPal Shopping Cart plugin is an excellent choice.
It not only lets you sell but also allows you to have options to glue multiple offers on your site. It is a lightweight plugin, so you never have to worry about your site load speed.
It’s a simple solution for building a store to sell digital and physical products like WooCommerce.
This shopping cart plugin enriches your shop’s functions to deliver a better experience for your shoppers. It includes an add-to-cart button and PayPal checkout. You can also add a dynamic cart directly to your active theme.
This plugin easily integrates with any post, page, or sidebar on your WordPress site.
You can create and use the control panel provided with this plugin to add new products. You will receive a shortcode for every product you add.
You can add those products to your pages, widgets, and posts directly with the shortcodes.
It gives your users or shoppers the freedom to buy the products directly or add them to their carts.
They can even view the items in their cart on an individual page and proceed to the checkout via PayPal. It is fully compatible with mobile devices.
Pros
- Simple Solution
- Sell Both Physical & Digital Products
- Smart Payment Buttons
- Specify the SKU for Each Product
- PayPal Sandbox for Testing
- Automated Email Sent After Purchasing
Cons
- Not as Advanced as WooCommerce
- No Add-ons Support
Price
This is open-source software, just like WooCommerce. Therefore, download the plugin for free.
WP EasyCart
WP EasyCart is another shopping cart WordPress plugin that allows you to sell any product and accepts unlimited orders on their free version.
Though it is not as advanced as WooCommerce, the WP EasyCart plugin can be the right choice if you need a simple shopping cart.
This plugin supports almost 30+ payment gateways, multiple languages, and currencies.
Like the WP eCommerce plugin, you can manage coupon and promotions systems.
This plugin is integrated with Google Analytics and lets you create a share button to share your products on social media to get accurate reports.
With its rich Order Management System, you can manage your order, print sales receipts and delivery notes, shipping notes, order information, and more, all in one place.
This feature can inform your customer about their purchase details through an email. Unlike Ecwid, this plugin does not limit you to adding 10 products.
Pros
- Unlimited Products
- Sell Both Physical & Digital Products
- Simple Interface
- Business-oriented Extensions
- Robust Marketing Tools
- Order Management
- 30+ Payment Gateways
- Shipping & Taxes
- Multi-currency and Multi-Language Support
Cons
- Not best for a more significant business
- Limited extensions
Price
Download the free version from the WordPress repository or grab the premium version for $69/year, which unlocks all the features except their premium add-ons.
Conclusion
I hope this post helped you to choose the right plugin for your online store.
If you’re still confused, here’s my advice –
- Choose WooCommerce if you are going to sell physical products.
- Choose Easy Digital Downloads if you are going to sell digital products.
Please don’t hesitate to let me know your thoughts in the comment section. If you liked the post, consider sharing it with your friends.
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