· Giraffe
Shopify vs Squarespace for new sellers
You're picking a place to sell online, and the shortlist keeps coming back to Shopify and Squarespace. Both are hosted, both take cards, both get you a store without renting a server. The useful question isn't which one is "better" — it's which one matches how you plan to sell.
Who this is for
This is for someone deciding between platforms before the first product goes live: a small catalogue, maybe a service or membership mixed in, and no full-time developer on staff. If you already know you need deep custom code and own the server, skip ahead to the WooCommerce note below.
How they differ in practice
Squarespace is a website builder with ecommerce built in. Templates and the Fluid Engine editor are the star: you can shape a portfolio, blog or services site and hang a shop on it. Memberships, courses, invoicing and email tools sit next to products without bolting on a second stack.
Shopify is an ecommerce platform with a themeable storefront. Hosting, SSL, PCI compliance and checkout come with the plan. The editor works in sections inside a theme — which feels stricter at first and steadier when you're iterating on products, discounts and orders every day.
Both handle hosting for you. Neither asks you to patch servers. Check current plan prices on Shopify's pricing page and Squarespace's pricing page; figures move often enough that quoting them here would age badly.
Storefront and apps
Squarespace leans design-first. If your brand needs a site that looks like a magazine, a studio portfolio or a services homepage with a few products in the corner, that template library is hard to beat. Shopify cites 70+ no-code themes aimed at product pages, collections and cart — fewer freeform layouts, more commerce-shaped ones.
When you need a feature the platform doesn't ship, you reach for add-ons. Shopify cites 8,000+ apps built around ecommerce — shipping, subscriptions, reviews, wholesale, marketplaces. Squarespace Extensions are a smaller set of third-party tools (tax, dropshipping, marketing and similar). Squarespace also ships more site and content pieces natively — email, memberships, courses — so you may install fewer add-ons early on if selling stays secondary.
Payments and selling
Both offer their own payment processor (Shopify Payments and Squarespace Payments) plus third-party options. Card processing fees always apply. On Shopify, using a gateway other than Shopify Payments can add a platform transaction fee that varies by plan — check the pricing page for your country rather than trusting an old comparison chart. Some Squarespace plans add an online-store transaction fee on top of card processing (higher tiers drop that fee to 0%); digital content and memberships can carry their own fees. Availability of each native processor still depends on where you sell.
Shopify leans harder into multi-channel and international selling: markets, multi-currency, sales channels (social, marketplaces and more) and a full POS stack are first-class. Squarespace can sell physical and digital products, services, gift cards and subscriptions, and it has a neat edge if one site needs to mix a small shop with memberships, courses or client invoicing — something Shopify doesn't do out of the box the same way. At small scale both handle inventory and orders; Shopify's admin tends to feel more like a warehouse once volume grows.
SEO and ownership
Both give you the basics: editable titles and meta descriptions, custom URLs, SSL and mobile-friendly pages. Shopify handles a lot of technical ecommerce SEO for you (canonicals, product-friendly URL patterns). Squarespace adds guided SEO steps and content tools that help if search and blogging are part of the brand. For a brochure site with a small shop, either is fine. For a catalogue you expect to rank on product queries, Shopify's ecommerce-first structure is usually the safer default.
You're renting either platform. Export products and customers before you need to leave. Shopify documents migration from Squarespace via CSV, migration apps or a Partner. Migration is doable both ways — just never fun — so pick for the next few years of selling, not the next afternoon of design.
Not ready to leave Squarespace entirely? Shopify's Buy Button sales channel can embed products and Shopify Checkout on an external site — including a Squarespace site — if you want design on one side and order tooling on the other.
When WooCommerce still fits
If you want full ownership of the stack, custom checkout code and plugins that run on your own server, WooCommerce on WordPress is still the usual answer — with the hosting and maintenance trade-offs that come with it. We've covered that trade-off in a short series: cost, maintenance, checkout and apps vs plugins. For a website-builder comparison closer to this one, see Shopify vs Wix.
Who each one suits
Choose Squarespace if the website is the product — design-led brand, portfolio or services site with a small catalogue, memberships or courses mixed in, and you want polished templates without learning a commerce-shaped admin.
Choose Shopify if selling is the product — growing SKU count, discounts and apps you'll swap as you scale, multi-channel or multi-currency plans, and an admin built around orders rather than pages.
Neither "wins" in the abstract. Try the free trial on both with the same three products and one real payment method. The platform that feels boring after an hour of admin work is usually the one you'll still like in a year.
FAQ
Is Shopify better than Squarespace for ecommerce?
For a product-first store — growing catalogue, discounts, apps and multi-channel selling — Shopify is usually the safer default. Squarespace is a website builder with strong commerce tools; Shopify is an ecommerce platform with a themeable storefront.
Can I switch from Squarespace to Shopify later?
Yes. Export products and customers before you leave. Shopify documents migration from Squarespace (CSV, migration apps, or a Partner). Migration is doable both ways — just never fun — so pick for the next few years of selling, not the next afternoon of design.
Which is cheaper, Shopify or Squarespace?
It depends on how you sell. Both are hosted plans with card processing on top. Some Squarespace plans add an online-store transaction fee; Shopify can add a platform fee when you use a gateway other than Shopify Payments. Check current prices on each vendor's pricing page — figures move often enough that quoting them here would age badly.
When is Squarespace enough?
When the website is the product: a design-led brand, portfolio or services site with a small catalogue, memberships or courses mixed in, and you want polished templates without learning a commerce-shaped admin.
Can I keep Squarespace and use Shopify for checkout?
Yes. Shopify's Buy Button sales channel can embed products and Shopify Checkout on an external site — including Squarespace — if you want the design on one platform and order tooling on the other.
If Shopify fits how you plan to sell, try it with the same three products you'd put on Squarespace.