Imagine – you want to start your own online business, and someone recommends you to go for Ecwid. But you don’t know whether it’d be a perfect fit for your business or not. Very confusing, right?
Well, deciding on a perfect platform to start an online business isn’t easy. You need a lot of research before opting for any plan. After all, you’ll have to pay for that! In such a situation, a detailed review of Ecwid can save you.
To ease your efforts, we have come up with an in-depth, research-baked Ecwid review. Here, we’ll cover every nitty-gritty information you need to know before purchasing any plan. So, stay tuned and keep on reading!
Ecwid Overview in Numbers (2024)
Overall Ratings | 4.6 |
Total Online stores | 0ver 928, 000 |
Category | E-commerce platform serving as a Saas tool for retailers |
Country | +175 |
Employees | 191 |
Total Networth | $11 million |
Ecwid Features Review: A Quick Recap
After interviewing several retailers and taking quotes from industry experts, we have concluded everything within the below-given rating chart (out of 5).
Have a quick look at it.
Ease of use | 4.2 |
Pricing | 4.5 |
Marketing Features | 4.5 |
Selling Features | 4.4 |
Themes and Designs | 4.4 |
Customer Support | 4.3 |
Ecwid Pricing, Fees, and Payment Gateways
You must have heard about other e-commerce platforms like Shopify, Woocommerce, and Bigcommerce offering a free trial to retailers. But Ecwid stands different here as it adds a free plan with the paid ones. Each plan comes up with its advantages and disadvantages. Also, these plans are available for the short term, and you can switch them whenever you want. So, here we’ll walk you through each plan to help you decide your best fit.
Free Plan
If you are just starting and have very minimal products to sell, Ecwid’s free plan has got your back. When you sign up to Ecwid, your free plan will automatically let you create a storefront, sell products (up to 10), and set up a shipping method. All the basic features, like setting up stores and selling, are available in Ecwid’s free plan.
This plan does not require a credit card since it’s free! After signing up for this free plan, you can decide whether you should upgrade to a paid plan or not. So, it’s an effective way to test Ecwid’s functionalities. We also have an exclusive Ecwid Coupon code here.
But, Ecwid’s free plan comes with a few drawbacks –
- No multichannel selling
- No multilingual selling
- SEO isn’t effective enough
- Limitations in selling products
- No customer support
- No gift and coupon cards
Paid Plans
Plans | Venture | Business | Unlimited |
Pricing | $25/month | $45/month | $105/month |
Suitable for | Medium-sized business with less than 100 products | Advance features for Growing business having less than 2500 products to sell | Giant and enterprise-level Business. |
Ecwid Venture Plan
Here are some advantages and disadvantages of the Ecwid venture plan:
Advantages
- Add your store to any website
- Customization functionalities
- Free SSL certificate
- Gift cards and coupons ( 2% commission on cards)
- Store management apps on both Android and iOS.
- Multichannel selling options
- Over 70 payment gateways
- Custom Domain
- Stats and reports
Disadvantages
- No multilingual catalog
- No scope for adding staff accounts
- No recurring subscription
- No inventory tracking functionality
Ecwid Business Plan
Here are some advantages and disadvantages of the Ecwid Business Plan:
Advantages
All venture features+
- Track abandoned carts
- Add two staff accounts in your store
- Marketplace selling option
- Abandoned cart recovery
- Product filtering options
- Customer support via calls
- Free customization option for 2 hours
Disadvantages
- No branded iOS or Android shopping apps
- No priority support
Ecwid Unlimited Plans
Here the advantages of the Ecwid Unlimited Plans
Advantages
All Business features+
- Branded iOS and Android support
- Priority support
- Customization support for 12 hrs
Our Recommendation: Which One Should You Choose?
As per our research, the Ecwid venture plan is the most popular among others. At only $15 annually, you’ll get all the advanced features you need to run an online business successfully. But if you raise your budget higher, you will benefit from more up-to-date features.
But we always recommend you to go for the free plan first to acquire all the functionalities of Ecwid, and if you want, you can change it anytime.
Also, Ecwid offers you around a 16.6% discount if you pay yearly for its paid plans. So, win-win.
(Additional Tip: If we compare the paid plans of Shopify and Ecwid, Shopify is a bit cheaper as its lite plan costs around $9/month. But on the other hand, Ecwid stands different from its competitors as it offers a completely free plan for the lifetime.)
Who Is Ecwid Best For?
Ecwid is a great platform for first-time sellers and small business owners who don’t have the budget to get started with an expensive eCommerce platform. You can start your online store on Ecwid for free. To start using Ecwid, you just need an existing website, copy its source code, and paste it on your WordPress website, and you will be able to turn your normal-looking website into a fully-fledged online store.
It also has amazing scaling features, meaning you can start by selling fewer products and then move on to more expensive plans and sell more products from your online store. Even if you don’t have a website to create an online store using Ecwid, then don’t worry because Ecwid has an “Instant Site” where you can create a website within a few minutes by adding your requirements.
Ecwid Payment Gateways
While dealing with online payments, people always look for the safest payment gateways. And, Ecwid has met this expectation by offering 100+ integrated gateways globally. Also, your transactions on Ecwid will be 3D secured as Ecwid is PCI DSS Level No One service provider.
Moreover, if you connect POS to your online store, you’ll be able to accept payment from anywhere in the world.
Also, Ecwid doesn’t charge one single penny for transactions making the shopping experience more seamless for both the retailers and customers.
Three popular payment gateways offered by Ecwid are Stripe, PayPal, and Authorize.Net. Apart from them, Ecwid also supports a range of other payment gateways. These include-
- RazorPay
- PayU
- Paytm
- Paystack
- 2Checkout
- Zapper
- E-path
Even; Ecwid also accepts cryptocurrency via CoinPayments and CointoPay.com. One thing to remember is that although Ecwid doesn’t charge extra transaction fees, other payment processors connected with Ecwid cost very little while receiving payment. So, choose your payment processor accordingly.
Ecwid Marketing Features
Marketing Features | Ratings |
Built-in SEO tools | 3.9 |
Analytics tools | 4.3 |
Social commerce option | 4.1 |
Blogging option | 3.8 |
Bigcommerce App Store | 4.2 |
Promotions and discount coupons | 4.0 |
Ecwid SEO features
Great marketing always depends on great SEO features. Fortunately, Ecwid has covered this technical side of marketing. Every store connected with Ecwid is SEO-optimized by default. Ecwid offers a range of SEO features to rank your site on search engines. These are-
- Ecwid offers an SSL certificate and HTTPS protocol to improve rankings on search engines. This feature also helps you keep your store safe from hackers and build credibility with your audience.
- Ecwid initiates a sitemap.xml file that helps your store appear on the search engine. Remember, you have to submit a sitemap to Google manually.
- One of the most effective features offered by Ecwid is special tags. They will accumulate important data from your site and index them better.
- Ecwid creates page titles and meta description by default, depending on your product name. You will have full control over how you want to show your products on the search engines.
- To improve the SEO technique, Ecwid offers automatically generated URLs that are simple, descriptive, and SEO friendly.
- Ecwid produced automated ALT tags for images.
- Ecwid offers built-in mobile optimization features to boost SEO features.
- Also, Ecwid offers rich social snippets for product pages.
Ecwid Analytics and Reporting Feature
You can’t improve your marketing if you don’t have any information about your present situation. To make this process easier, Ecwid has its built-in reporting tool. They will help you track your progress every month. These include-
Vital Metrics
- Automated reports and sales Analytics
- Real-time Sales Tracking
Deep Analytics
- Sales Funnel
- Visitors Engagement
- Historical Benchmarking
Extended Options
- Visitors recordings
- Heat Maps
- Inbox Report
- Sales tracking via social channels
Apart from that, you can also integrate google analytics to boost your conversion rate.
Ecwid Social Commerce Feature
40% of the total population uses social media. I hope you can imagine the hype of social media in this stat. So, it’s very much important for owners to grow their business through omnichannel selling.
Ecwid E-commerce lets you connect your store with famous social media platforms like Facebook, Instagram, and Pinterest and sell products to your potential customers.
Ecwid Blogging Feature
You can find thousands of benefits to inserting a blog feature on any website. Though Ecwid doesn’t have any built-in blogging option, you can still create one for yourself.
With the help of category descriptions, you can create a customized blogging feature with images. Isn’t it a cool idea? Use this trick and skyrocket your sales.
Ecwid App Market
Here comes one of the most effective advantages of Ecwid. Ecwid will let you choose your needed apps/tools among 2000+ integrated apps (both paid and free) from the App Market if you want to grow your business to the next level.
Choose any of them to compensate for any built-in functionality of Ecwid. These App marketplaces include- Social Media Marketing apps, sales managing apps, Affiliate tracking apps, and so on. Remember, if you are on Ecwid’s free plan, you won’t have access to its app marketplace. But surely, it’s available for all premium plans of Ecwid.
Ecwid Selling Features
Selling Features | Ratings |
Multi-currency selling | 4.2 |
Point of Sale feature | 4.4 |
Dropshipping | 4.2 |
Multiple Language Selling | 4.0 |
Shipping options | 4.3 |
Importing and Exporting | 4.2 |
Ecwid Multi-Currency Selling Features
Ecwid doesn’t have its built-in multi-currency feature, but if you want to sell your products worldwide, connect with the Currency Converter app. This app will change the price in your customer’s native language.
The Currency Converter app has a total of 130 currencies to choose from. So, it’ll be easier for merchants and customers to have a seamless shopping experience.
Remember, If you go for the Currency Converter app, you have to pay extra($4.49) on your premium plans.
Ecwid Point Of Sale Features
On Ecwid, you can connect your online store with Brick and mortar shops and track your product inventory. There are thousands of comprehensive POS systems available on Ecwid. Moreover, a range of third-party integrations, including Clover, Square, Alice POS, etc, are available here.
The main drawback of these tools is they are only available in the most expensive plan of Ecwid (Except for Square).
If you are an iOS user and have opted for paid plans on Ecwid, you’ll get access to Ecwid’s “Sell On the Go” app.
Dropshipping
You all know the facilities of dropshipping. One way, it keeps away the headache of product stock; on the other hand, it saves your product inventory cost.
When you opt for the paid plans of Ecwid, you’ll get hundreds of options on Ecwid dropshipping, including Wholesale2B, Spocket, Syncee, Alibaba, and Printful. You can install these apps from App Marketplace and connect your store with them. These apps have different specialties. For ex-
- Printful offers branded products to designers, artists, and sport-teams.
- Spocket is a dropshipping service that connects with US and EU-based suppliers.
- Syncee offers ready-to-sell products to small and medium-sized businesses.
- Alibaba is one of the largest marketplaces in the world that integrates millions of products in over 40+major categories.
Ecwid Multi-lingual Selling Feature
If you wish to globalize your business, then Ecwid has your back. You can translate your store, product description, product names, and category description into 53 languages. Amazing, right?
And one of the best parts is that Ecwid translates your store automatically to your targetted audience by observing their actions on your website.
Here Ecwid stands different from its rivals as they provide limited options for multi-lingual selling. Not only that, but you can also send multilingual email notifications to your customers.
Ecwid Shipping Options
Choosing the right shipping options is the most important task for merchants. If you are just starting, you can offer free shipping to increase conversions.
Otherwise, if you integrate popular shipping services like USPS, FedEx, UPS, etc., you can charge your customers the same amount you paid for each order.
Moreover, you can also go for flat-rate shipping for delivering products. If you want to optimize your shipping costs, you can change the packaging as per your choice.
Ecwid Importing and Exporting Options
As we are talking about eCommerce platforms, importing and exporting features are considered one of the most effective functionalities. You should note that while importing, Ecwid converts data into products on your online store.
You can make this process simpler via a CSV file. You can make different columns, and these columns are separated by different characters like commas, semicolons, tabs, etc.
You can also import products to your sites via the Litecommerce import format.
Tax Calculation With Ecwid
Ecwid always stays updated with the Tax rates of states/countries. If tax laws are changed, it’ll automatically get up-to-date with the new norms and change the checkout accordingly.
Ecwid Themes and Designs
Though Ecwid mainly connects your online store with your website, it has now taken a step further by launching Ecwid’s instant store. This store doesn’t represent your traditional online store with multiple features, but it’s a good option for newbies.
You’ll get surprised by knowing that Ecwid offers more than 70 design themes. No matter your business type, you’ll get fully customizable, rich-quality themes as per your choice.
Storefront Design with Ecwid
If you connect your store with Ecwid or create your standalone store on Ecwid, you will have full control over designing your storefront. Select the image size, product card layout, category name position, and so on as per your choice to make your store more engaging to your customers. Apart from that, you are allowed to make any kind of changes to your storefront. For Ex-
- Product card designing
- Product page layout setting up
- Product highlighting
- Banners adding
- Navigation Adjusting.
- Featured Products adding
Ease of Use
Unlike its rivals, Ecwid is easier to navigate. If you have used WordPress or any other sites, you won’t face many problems navigating Ecwid.
After setting up your store, you’ll get a vertical menu with all the functionalities(My sales, Dashboard, designs) available.
You can choose any option from that menu bar and customize your store accordingly. You won’t face any technical issues while doing that.
In a nutshell, you don’t need to be tech-savvy to use this platform as it’s very easy to use as far as its competitors ( Shopify, Bigcommerce, Wix) are concerned.
Customer Support
Ecwid offers different types of support systems to its users. It all depends upon the plan you have purchased. If you opt for the free plan, you’ll get access to live chat with the customer support team for the first 30 days.
But if you purchase the venture plan, you’ll receive email and live chat for the timespan.
On the other hand, you’ll get call support on Business Plan. But if you opt for the most expensive plan of Ecwid, you’ll get “priority support” with email, live and call support.
Moreover, a range of blogs and video tutorials are available on Ecwid’s official site. They’ll come in handy if you face any problems while navigating this platform.
But, Ecwid somewhere ranks lower than its rival Bigcommerce as it provides complete personalized care on its unlimited plan.
Ecwid Review: Pros & Cons
Here are the pros & cons of Ecwid.
Pros
- Ecwid offers a completely free plan which offers plenty of features for you to use.
- With Ecwid, you can easily add eCommerce features to any existing website.
- POS (Point Of Sale) feature is also available, and there are many ways that you can use it.
- If you want to create a multi-lingual store, then Ecwid’s features can help you with that.
- It is easy to sell in multiple currencies with Ecwid; however, you will need to buy an app for it.
Cons
- If you want phone support, then you will need to purchase one of the expensive plans.
- Ecwid’s SEO features aren’t as good as they claim them to be.
Why Should You go For Ecwid?
We have mentioned several advantages of Ecwid in this article. Now, we will wrap it up with a few points showing how Ecwid stands out among the crowd –
- Ecwid stands out by offering a free plan instead of a free trial. If you are a newbie and have a very limited budget to purchase any paid plan, Ecwid has your back.
- It has 2000+ apps in the App Marketplace to boost your marketing campaigns.
- Globalize your business with multi-currency and multi-lingual selling.
- Real-time shipping functionalities are available for all plans.
- Themes and designing templates are pretty engaging and updated.
- Ecwid doesn’t charge any transaction fees. But if you integrate third-party apps, you have to pay extra on your plans.
- Reporting and analytics tools are pretty effective in measuring your business growth.
Drawbacks of Ecwid
Nothing is perfect. The same is true with Ecwid. With all these premium features and advantages( mentioned above), Ecwid has a few drawbacks that keep this platform behind its competitors.
- No SEO feature is available with the free plan.
- Ecwid instant site is not that responsive like other standalone stores.
- Calling support is only available in its most expensive plans whereas its competitors avail this feature in their basic plans.
- SEO features aren’t effective enough.
- No built-in blogging options.
- Ecwid pricing depends on the country you live in. For Ex- In Europe, the Ecwid plan is more expensive than in the US and cheaper than that of the UK.
- No mobile POS integrations are available for Android. It’s available only for iOS users.
- You can’t change Product URLs as per your choice, which hampers the SEO factors.
- No product variants are available for free and entry-level plans.
Ecwid and Its Rivals
Features | Ecwid | Shopify | BigCommerce | Squarespace |
Ratings | 4.6 | 4.5 | 4.2 | 4.3 |
Pricing Plans (per month) | $25-$105 | $39-$399 | $39-$399 | $16-$46 |
Number of Templates | 70+ | 70+ | 120+ | 110+ |
SEO features | Could have been better | Effective | Highly Effective | Good but needs improvement in site SEO |
Built-in Email Marketing functionality | no( via third-party tool) | Yes | No | Yes |
Ease of Use | Very easy to use | Very smooth and seamless | A bit difficult | Minimalist but could be improved |
Selling Features | Premium | Effective | Highly effective | Premium and advanced level selling features |
Business Globalization | Recommended for business globalization | Not ideal for globalization | Perfect for international-level marketing | Ideal for big brands |
Final Words: Ecwid is the Best Option for Budget Sellers
It’s up to you! Nothing comes with absolute perfection. So does Ecwid. One of the best parts of this Platform is that it offers a free plan instead of offering a free trial for a limited period.
Again, to some people, Ecwid is a saver for them as it offers multiple features on a limited budget. On the other hand, to some enterprise-level business owners, Ecwid is not that effective.
But here, we have mentioned every pros and cons of Ecwid you should know before purchasing any plan. Hope it helps! If you have any further queries, do let us know in the comment section below.
FAQs On Ecwid Review
Yes, Ecwid is a Russian social commerce site.
Yes, Ecwid offers a free plan for its users. However, its features are less effective and not appropriate for mid-level business.
Yes, Ecwid is absolutely secured, and also it’s PCI DSS certified.
Yes, with Ecwid API you can access e-store data from outside of Ecwid.
No, Ecwid does not offer a money-back guarantee, but they do offer a free plan. If you’re not sure about Ecwid’s subscription, then you should use the free plan until you’re sure it is the right platform for your online store.
All the eCommerce platforms require you to create an online store from scratch, whereas you can Ecwid to any existing website and create it into an online eCommerce store.
Shopify and Ecwid are both competitors. Shopify gives you all the features you need to create an online store from very scratch, whereas Ecwid gives you eCommerce features to add to any existing website.