Shopify vs Shopify Plus: 13 Key Differences Between the Two

Trying to choose between Shopify vs Shopify Plus?

The core Shopify service makes a great option for individuals and small businesses looking to sell online. But if you’re an enterprise doing multiple millions in sales, you might want a more customizable experience. That’s where Shopify Plus comes in – a more advanced Shopify, in short.

Shopify Plus offers the same core dashboard and features as Shopify, but with access to new features, integrations, your store’s underlying code, dedicated support options, and more.

In this post, we’ll compare Shopify vs Shopify Plus and share all the new features that Shopify Plus gets you access to.

Shopify vs Shopify Plus: What’s the difference?

Essentially, Shopify Plus has everything in the core Shopify plan plus more. So, rather than focusing on what’s the same, we’re going to help you understand the difference between Shopify vs Shopify Plus by focusing on the new key features/benefits that you get with Shopify Plus and show you the key differences between these two platforms.

Here are 13 new features/enhancements that you get with Shopify Plus…

1. A dedicated account manager (Launch Manager/Engineer)

Shopify offers support to its users via phone, email, and live chat. If things get difficult, you can hire Shopify Experts.

In contrast, the Shopify Plus offers personalized and dedicated support for your store. It assigns a Launch Engineer to your website to hold your hand throughout the entire store setup/migration process. And no matter if it’s third-party integrations or finding partners to work on projects specifically for your business, the Launch Engineer will be there to help.

2. More theme customization with access to Liquid

With standard Shopify plans, you can customize your Shopify theme templates using the editor, though it’ll be hard to switch to a completely new theme.

In contrast, Shopify Plus plan allows a high degree of customization, giving you access to Shopify’s theme language, Liquid. With Liquid in your bag of tools, you’ll be able to make changes in the backend at the code level for greater control.

3. Unlimited staff accounts

Another feature you’ll want to keep in mind while weighing Shopify vs Shopify Plus is staff accounts. The basic Shopify plan permits only a few limited staff accounts.

On the other hand, the Shopify Plus allows you to add unlimited staff accounts, and enables additional permission settings.

You’ll be able to grant access to any number of your team members to work on your online store. Besides, you’ll also have more control over staff actions in your store admin.

4. More control over the checkout

As a store owner, it’s only natural that you’ll want to give personalized attention to high-spending customers and what they’re doing on your checkout page.

Shopify Plus makes it possible to customize checkout experience based on shopping cart values or any other condition.

Moreover, users get to work with Shopify Scripts. The Script Editor gives you finer control, and you can customize shipping methods, customer fields, and payment options. That’s not the case with Shopify – you’ll need special apps to customize the checkout experience.

5. More API integrations

On any website, it’s the APIs that facilitate integrations with third-party apps.

To help users take full advantage of third-party apps, Shopify Plus includes enhanced API resources such as GiftCard, User and Multipass.

In case you want to know, GiftCard is an alternative payment method. Multipass login seamlessly redirects website visitors to the Shopify store (without separate login credentials and without the need to synchronize any customer database). User lets you add, remove, edit and retrieve information about staff accounts.

Not only that, Shopify Plus lets you integrate with custom apps or even build your own private apps.

6. Exclusive apps

Shopify Plus users also get access to some exclusive Shopify apps via their app store that aren’t available to regular Shopify users:

• Wholesale channel to help users with a high volume of B2B sales.
• Shopify Flow, an eCommerce automation platform. Working with a simple visual builder, it helps automate many customer-facing tasks and office processes within your store and across your apps. It stores and executes triggers, conditions, and actions that you specify to do many things – like tagging loyal customers, sending reorder requests, and more. All this without any coding on your part.
• Launchpad is useful to plan and automate flash sales, product launches, or sales campaigns. Once the event is over, you can roll back all the changes instantly.
• Script Editor is what allows you to create personalized experiences at the shopping cart/checkout stage. Small pieces of code help apply discounts or customize shipping and payment options for customers. This helps reduce the number of abandoned carts.
• Transporter app to import customer, product, and order records into your Shopify store. This makes it easy for you to send customer records across stores.
• Bulk Account Inviter to invite your customers imported from another platform or store to activate their accounts for your online business. This app is useful after you have imported customer accounts from another platform or from another store.

7. Integrations with existing platforms

While there’s no end to the number of apps you can connect to your Shopify store, it may sometimes make more sense for high growth and complex businesses to integrate with their existing platforms. This is possible using Shopify’s API. Examples include platforms for:

• Product information management (PIM)
• Enterprise resource planning (ERP)
• Inventory and order management (IMS and OMS)
• Customer relationship management (CRM)
• Third-party logistics (3PL)
• Warehouse management software (WMS)
• Global fulfilment partners

8. Wholesale channels

Another highlight in this Shopify vs Shopify Plus comparison is the wholesale channel.

As you grow, surely there’ll be customers who want to purchase from you in bulk. And it’s reasonable to expect that an enterprise-level platform should facilitate wholesale sales.

The wholesale channel helps you create a separate, password-protected storefront based on your online store. This means you can offer the same products at exclusive prices to wholesale buyers or exclusive wholesale-only products.

Or, you can even offer customized price lists or discount codes. In short, Shopify Plus merchants can send invoices, track orders, use existing product data and integrations, and manage both B2C and B2B businesses, all from one place.

9. Merchant Success Program

Shopify Plus has a Merchant Success Program that helps users get the most value out of the platform. They’re ready to help you with third-party integrations, products, and platforms, as well as training to help you tap your full potential. You’ll work with a Merchant Success Manager who’ll help you with everything you might need.

Besides 24/7 support, the team is ready to pitch in to assist you in finding approved Shopify Plus Partners to help keep you up to speed with industry trends and help with events such as flash sales.

10. Exclusive access to other resources

The Merchant Success Program is not the only resource available to Shopify Plus users. Other resources available to them include:

• A Facebook community where you can share experiences with other Shopify Plus users.
• Partners directory giving you access to technology, agency and solution partners.
• Access to exclusive beta programs.
• Access to the Shopify Plus Academy for guidance on using the Shopify Plus platform.

11. A unified dashboard to manage multiple stores

Shopify Plus now offers users a new dashboard to manage all your stores, analytics, staff accounts, user permissions, and automation tools (like Shopify Flow), in one place.

This dashboard allows you to have a complete overview of your business, promotes teamwork and improves automation. More so when you manage multiple stores or locations.

12. More in-depth analytics options

Shopify offers a detailed analytics dashboard where you can view stats like sales, top products, landing pages or referrers, returning customer rate, and more. You can produce professional reports via this tool and you’ll be able to catch up to the minute info about your store.

While this may be adequate for most businesses, Shopify Plus works with leading analytics companies to keep you abreast of the latest trends on your store.

13. Shopify Plus pricing – higher prices (that vary based on sales)

Ok, this one isn’t really a new feature, but it is an important difference between Shopify vs Shopify Plus.

The core Shopify service has flat pricing plans regardless of your sales numbers:

With Shopify Plus, you’ll need to talk to sales for a specific cost.

The prices are roughly $2,000 per month minimum or 0.25% of sales volume per month (capped at $40,000), whichever is greater.

For example, if your store does $2 million in sales per month, you’d pay $5,000 per month.

If you only do $100,000 per month, you’d instead pay the $2,000 minimum rather than 0.25% of sales.

Final thoughts on Shopify vs Shopify Plus

To recap, Shopify and Shopify Plus have the same core offering when it comes to the dashboard and basic eCommerce functionality. The main difference is that Shopify Plus gives you a lot more flexibility, more support options, and more access to your store’s underlying code.

While that’s great, it’s also pricey with a minimum monthly cost of $2,000. Unless your store is already doing millions in sales, you probably want to stick with the core Shopify platform, unless you absolutely need the functionality that comes with Shopify Plus and you think those new features are going to pay for themselves.

If you’re ready to get started with Shopify, you can follow our Shopify tutorial to launch your store.

Of course, Shopify and Shopify Plus are not the only ways to start selling online. So if you want the flexibility of Shopify Plus but are scared off by the price tag, here are some other good reads to help you find the best eCommerce platform for your store:

Do you have any additional questions about Shopify vs Shopify Plus? Leave a comment and we’ll try to help.

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