WooCommerce or Prestashop – What’s the better solution?

Do you want to have a successful online store but you are not sure which e-commerce solution is the right one for you?

WooCommerce and PrestaShop are two of the most popular platforms for online stores. We have asked one of our developers a few questions to help you make your decision.

What is the main difference between WooCommerce and Prestashop?

WooCommerce is a WordPress Plugin while Prestashop is an e-commerce system. That means to use WooCommerce you need a WordPress Webpage first. You can then transform your site into an e-commerce platform by installing the WooCommercePlugin. At the same time you keep everything that makes the WordPress CMS so attractive: an easy-to-use content management, numerous free themes and plugins, etc.

Prestashop, on the other hand, is a shop system, meaning it’s limited to an online shop. If you want to have a news or blog section you need to buy and install additional plugins.

What are the advantages of WooCommerce over Prestashop and viceversa?

As just mentioned with WooCommerce, you’ll enjoy all of the WordPress CMS functionalities like a news page, numerous free plugins to customize the webpage style without using code or to optimize your SEO.

In Prestashop the style of the webshop is customized with code. However, Prestashop has other advantages: it provides more shop functions, different customer roles, more pricing options (e.g. discounts,wholesale and retail pricing), multistore function etc.

Which one would you recommend?

To choose between WooCommerce and Prestashop, it is important to consider the customer’s needs. Each platform has its advantages and disadvantages. If the customer wants a cool, content based Website with a simple online shop, WooCommerce is the obvious choice. If the focus is on the online shop or if it comes with a complex pricing system Prestashop might be the better option.

Which platform is easier to use and to be maintained?

WooCommerce is very user-friendly. A WordPress website can easily be customized without using code. The customization of a Prestashop website, however, requires knowledge of CSS.

Both platforms provide continuous updates. While in WordPress before updating to the newest version you have to manually backup the current version and individual plugins, Prestashop automatically creates a backup on system update and automatically updates all modules.

Are the platforms SEO friendly? Which one do you think will get the better ranking in Google?

Both WordPress and Prestashop equally offer the possibility to optimize the SEO friendlyness of your site, e.g. optimized metatags, friendly URL, responsive designs, etc.

Which platform has more out-of-the-box features?

Prestashop has more shop features, for instance, for complex pricing systems. WordPress, on the other hand has more CMS features.

Which platform is more secure?

Both platforms are secure. It’s important to update both platforms regularly and to use certain security standards like https, strong passwords, latest versions of plugins, shop system and OS.

Which platform has better templates?

Both platforms have high quality templates. WordPress, however, gives you a greater choice of templates.

So, how to choose the right platform for your project?

Both platforms are very recommendable. To choose the right one for a project, we’ll have to look at the customer’s requirements first. Depending on this, we can determine which platform adjusts better to the customer’s needs.