Like many people during the pandemic, I found myself spiraling into a chasm of increasingly niche hobbies: sewing, metalsmithing, designing a clothing line inspired by my dog. It wasn’t long before I had an entire collection of questionably marketable merchandise and the delusional confidence to try selling it online.
Armed with nothing but determination and a WordPress installation that’s probably older than some readers, I dove headfirst into the dizzying array of eCommerce plugins. Between the endless options and my stubborn refusal to read documentation, I became intimately familiar with the unique joy of breaking my site in exciting new ways.
After testing what felt like every plugin in existence, I finally figured out how to turn my lockdown fever dream into a legitimate online store. Now, I’m here to share what I consider the best WordPress eCommerce plugins.
The 5 best WordPress eCommerce plugins
What makes the best eCommerce plugin for WordPress?
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There are dozens of eCommerce plugins for WordPress, and I’ve tested more than my fair share of them. While they might all promise to turn your website into an online store, not all of them will give you the seamless experience you’re looking for. I spent weeks testing plugins, building stores, and probably aging several years in the process.
Here’s what I looked for while evaluating these plugins:
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Features and functionality: Your chosen eCommerce plugin should offer essential features out of the box and can scale with your business through extensions or add-ons. The best ones include things like multiple payment gateway options, product management tools, and detailed reporting capabilities.
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Ease of use and customization: Nobody wants to spend weeks figuring out how to add a simple product variation. The top plugins offer intuitive interfaces and visual builders that make sense even if you’re not tech-savvy. You’ll want the ability to customize your store’s look without touching code—though having the option to add custom code is a plus for advanced users.
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Support and costs: Hidden fees and shoddy customer support. Name a worse duo. I evaluated the initial costs and long-term value of each plugin, including what you get in free versus premium versions. Quality support is non-negotiable, so I checked response times, documentation quality, and community resources.
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Performance and security: The best eCommerce plugins are optimized for speed and should include robust security features like SSL support, secure checkout processes, and regular security updates. I paid special attention to how each plugin handles sensitive customer data and payment information.
After putting these plugins through their paces, I pared down the options to the five best WordPress eCommerce plugins.
The best eCommerce plugins at a glance
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Best for |
Standout feature |
Pricing |
|
|---|---|---|---|
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Best overall eCommerce plugin |
Feature-rich and completely customizable |
Free |
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|
A free option for small businesses |
Easy-to-use solution without the need for additional plugins |
Free with limited features; paid plugin from $89/year |
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A lightweight and secure solution |
Headless setup unloads data processing to the cloud |
Free with limited features; paid plugin from $39/month |
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|
Selling digital products |
Simplifies selling digital products without the bloat of physical product management |
Free with limited features; paid plugin from $199/year |
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|
Creating membership sites |
Rule-based content access |
From $359/year |
Best all-around WordPress eCommerce plugin
WooCommerce
WooCommerce pros:
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Free and open source
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Extensive customization and scalability
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Fantastic community support
WooCommerce cons:
WooCommerce is the Cate Blanchett of WordPress eCommerce plugins—versatile, ubiquitous, and always stealing the show.
Since WooCommerce is built by Automattic, the same folks behind WordPress, it handles like a natural extension of the CMS instead of feeling like a bolted-on addition. The plugin inherits WordPress’s familiar interface, making it super intuitive for anyone already comfortable with the platform.
WooCommerce is free to install, which sounds amazing, but (and it’s a big but) running a store isn’t exactly a zero-cost adventure. While the plugin itself won’t cost you a dime, plan to budget for things like hosting, premium themes, or some fancy add-ons.
Speaking of, WooCommerce’s galaxy of extensions—nearly a thousand at last count—can help make your shop as unique as that artisanal, gluten-free, vegan soap you’re trying to sell. During my testing, I experimented with several extensions to add features like multiple currencies, complex coupon codes, and dropshipping services. While these premium add-ons can eat into costs, I appreciate the flexibility to only pay for the features you actually need.
The learning curve can be steep if you’re new to WordPress—I won’t sugarcoat that. During my first WooCommerce build, I spent a ton of time wrapping my head around the relationship between products, attributes, and variations. But between the comprehensive documentation and massive community support, I never hit a roadblock I couldn’t crack.
Performance-wise, WooCommerce can quickly turn into a resource hog. It’s a good rule of thumb to invest time in caching solutions and image optimization to maintain decent loading speeds. Despite this, I found WooCommerce to be remarkably stable and reliable.
WooCommerce also connects with Zapier, making it easy to automate tasks like backing up customer info in a spreadsheet, alerting your team when a new order comes through, or generating an invoice or sales receipt whenever a new order is processed. Learn more about how to automate WooCommerce, or get started with one of these pre-made workflows.
WooCommerce pricing: Free; additional costs can arise depending on extensions and theme used
Best free WordPress eCommerce plugin for small businesses
WP EasyCart
WP EasyCart pros:
WP EasyCart cons:
As great as WooCommerce is, I’ve seen firsthand how overwhelming it can be. That’s why I’m particularly fond of WP EasyCart. Compared to other plugins, WP EasyCart’s interface is refreshingly uncomplicated. You won’t need to waste an entire weekend watching YouTube tutorials to figure out basic customizations.
The free version is actually quite generous, and I’m not just saying that because I’m cheap (though I absolutely am). You get essentials like unlimited products, email newsletter integration, and live shipping rates. I particularly love that you can sell pretty much anything—physical products, digital downloads, subscriptions, and even invoice payments. And if you decide you need more muscle, WP EasyCart’s premium plans are very affordable.
WP EasyCart isn’t perfect. Don’t expect the extensive customization or scalability you’d get with WooCommerce, and you’ll need to pony up for the premium plan if you want to add extensions. But for small business owners who’d rather focus on running their actual business instead of becoming WordPress developers by default, WP EasyCart is a solid choice.
WP EasyCart pricing: Free plugin with limited features; paid version starts at $89/year
Best lightweight and secure eCommerce plugin for WordPress
SureCart
SureCart pros:
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Compatible with every WordPress theme and page builder
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Modern, user-friendly interface
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Email support included in free plan
SureCart cons:
I’ve been around the WordPress block enough times to know that most eCommerce plugins are about as lightweight as a celebratory meal at Old Country Buffet. So, when I learned about SureCart, which promises to be both lightweight and feature-rich, I was very skeptical. Well, I’m here to eat my words (and they taste delicious).
Instead of dumping a ton of code onto your site, SureCart uses a headless setup. This means your shop doesn’t wheeze under the weight of back-end processes because they’re offloaded to SureCart’s secure servers. I noticed the difference immediately when my site’s loading time improved significantly compared to my previous WooCommerce setup.
While other plugins nickel-and-dime you for basic features, SureCart includes subscription capabilities, installment payments, and cart abandonment features right out of the gate. The only real catch is a modest 1.9% transaction fee, which honestly feels fair, considering you’re getting features that you don’t have to pay extra for or install additional plugins to make happen.
Plus, you get email support even on the free tier—a refreshing change from being left to fend for yourself in community forums. If you upgrade to a premium plan, you’ll get priority support, but the basic email support is already more than most free plugins offer.
SureCart doesn’t have the massive ecosystem of extensions that WooCommerce boasts. But as someone who once crashed an entire website by installing too many plugins (a story for another day), that’s not necessarily a bad thing.
By connecting SureCart to Zapier, you can automatically update your CRM with new customers, send yourself a text whenever someone places an order, and further automate your eCommerce workflows. Here are some examples to get you started.
SureCart pricing: Free plugin with limited features; paid version starts at $39/month
Best WordPress eCommerce plugin for selling digital products
Easy Digital Downloads
Easy Digital Downloads pros:
Easy Digital Downloads cons:
Easy Digital Downloads (EDD) is easily the best WordPress eCommerce plugin for businesses selling digital goods, and the more I learn about it, the more annoyed I get. That’s because, 10 years ago, I was selling invitation templates online, and I can’t tell you how much time I wasted trying—and failing—to cobble together a makeshift solution to peddle my little invites. EDD is made for this kind of setup, and every time I discover another one of its features, I feel a pang of retroactive frustration.
Unlike WooCommerce, which feels like it’s constantly reminding you about shipping zones and nonexistent inventory levels, EDD doesn’t burden you with unnecessary options you’ll never use. Instead, you get purpose-built features like download limits, expiring links, and software licensing tools. During my test run, I tried breaking the download delivery system by purchasing my test products from different devices and browsers, and the download links worked flawlessly every time.
The core plugin is free, and you can extend its functionality with premium add-ons. While testing, I found the basic version perfectly adequate for simple digital stores. But if you’re planning to build the next Gumroad, you might want to look into EDD’s premium features for things like recurring payments, software licensing, or multi-vendor marketplaces.
The only real drawback I’ve found is that if you later decide to add physical products to your store, you’re somewhat stuck. While EDD can technically handle physical products with an extension, it’s not its strong suit. But for anyone selling digital products—whether it’s eBooks, software, or printable coloring pages of Moo Deng fan art—EDD makes so much more sense than trying to bend WooCommerce to your will.
Easy Digital Downloads pricing: Free plugin with limited features; paid version starts at $199/year ($99.50 for the first year)
Best WordPress eCommerce plugin for creating membership sites
MemberPress
MemberPress pros:
MemberPress cons:
MemberPress is a powerful WordPress plugin that allows you to easily launch and manage membership sites. It helps creators keep the riff-raff out with comprehensive features like paywalled articles, content subscriptions, and community forums.
The flexible access rules let you control who sees what on your site. More than just simple member levels, you can put content behind a paywall based on posts, pages, tags, or custom rules. Plus, you can set up drip schedules to release content gradually, which helps keep members engaged without overwhelming them with too much content at one time.
The ReadyLaunch feature sets up a basic membership site structure, sparing you the horror of creating login, registration, pricing, and account pages. Just add your brand colors and logo, and ReadyLaunch generates those critical but boring pages on your behalf.
For the social architects among us, MemberPress even allows users to set up members-only communities, complete with profiles, private messages, and forum posts, all nicely wrapped in your own brand. And if that isn’t enough, you can milk a few extra bucks by selling access to exclusive groups on places like Facebook, Slack, and Discord.
Plus, MemberPress integrates with Zapier, so you can automatically create subscriptions, members, or coupons in MemberPress based on trigger events in other apps in your stack. Try one of these pre-built workflows to get started.
MemberPress pricing: No free version; paid plugin starts at $359/year ($179.50 for the first year)
Other helpful plugins for WordPress shops
Just like a Build-A-Bear isn’t complete without accessories, your WordPress shop can benefit from a few extra plugins to make it truly irresistible. Whether you’re looking to supercharge your WooCommerce setup or add some general enhancements to your WordPress site, there’s an array of tools to help you out.
Supplementary WooCommerce plugins
General WordPress plugins that work well for eCommerce
Now that you’re thoroughly overwhelmed with a truckload of options, I’d be remiss if I didn’t tell you to avoid going plugin-happy. It might seem like more features are better, but cramming too many plugins into your setup slows everything down and leads to plugin conflicts. Focus on the tools you really need and make sure they work well together.
Increase efficiency by automating your eCommerce shop
Running an online store involves juggling multiple tasks, and automation can save time and reduce the risk of human error. Zapier lets you connect WordPress with thousands of other apps, automating tasks that would otherwise eat up your time. Whether updating your inventory, syncing customer data, or sending out those all-important email confirmations, Zapier handles eCommerce automation while you focus on growing your business.
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