The battle for eCommerce – Magento 2 or Shopware 6?

Describing all functionalities of an online store on Magento resulting from the installation of basic or more advanced extensions would require writing separate articles on the subject. However, it is worth highlighting the most important ones.

For easy management of your product database

The eCommerce platform does not limit the number of products (single/group, virtual, digital), categories, subcategories you can add. What's more, it gives you the ability to add attributes, which allows you to match a product to a category faster. Effective inventory management, filtering, simple and advanced search, wishlist creation - these are only the basic functionalities of an online store.

To increase the conversion rate

Upselling products, offering promotional pricing, integrating with comparison sites, creating flexible coupons for different purposes (tailored to the product, customer, order), marketing automation, conducting surveys and newsletters, customer loyalty tools - all this to make sales revenue continually grow.

For those who need reports and analysis

Magento gives you access to diverse data at any location (most purchased products, most viewed products, products in the shopping cart, number of completed orders, searches, abandoned shopping carts, etc.). What's more, it allows you to perform advanced analyses using a report builder and perform integration with Google Analytics, Facebook Pixel or CrazyEgg.

For meeting the needs of B2B customers

It is noted that Magento is great at addressing the challenges of B2B sales. More attractive prices for business customers (individual prices depending on the type of customer), assigning a sales representative to an individual customer, giving account access to more employees (sub-accounts), credit limit payments, proforma invoicing are just some of the possibilities. You can use them both in an Open Source version, by purchasing the appropriate modules, as well as through a Commerce license.

Magento vs Shopware - what do we have in common?

If you're looking for information on the best platform for medium to large eCommerce, you've surely come across not only Magento, but also Shopware, a German platform designed for medium-sized online stores and distinguished by its use of storytelling to build a unique customer experience with the product.

These two eCommerce platforms show a lot of commonalities. Among the most important are:

• operation of the store in the open source model (possibility to adjust the appearance of the page to your own preferences),
• use of PHP language,
• offering a free, basic version,
• having both free and paid extensions,
• support of an extensive assortment,
• possibility to implement PWA,
• possibility to manage many stores from one administration panel (Multistore in Magento, Sales channel in Shopware),
• expanded possibilities of eCommerce optimization for SEO (integration with Google maps, friendly URL links, meta title and meta description customization, linking).

And what splits us?

Among the advantages of Shopware, differentiating this eCommerce platform from Magento is considered more accessible to people without advanced programming skills, especially due to the use of Drag&Drop ("Drag and Drop") functionality. Thus, it may seem that setting up a store on Shopware will require less time and money. However, it should be noted that DnD is a functionality that needs to be separately customized for each view. Thus, higher cost and extended development time - assured. Significant time and financial savings can only be seen in the long term.

Moreover, it should be emphasized at this point that Magento also has a plugin of this type (Page Builder) - so creating content without working in the code of the site is possible, although, we must admit, less intuitive than in Shopware.

Supporters of Shopware, while listing the advantages of this platform, also point out the implemented text editobr, which facilitates the creation of content. However, it should be noted that Adobe platform is not inferior in this respect. Changes in Magento can be made both in the source code of the site, as well as through a graphical editor in the administration panel - very similar in design to the Shopware editor.

Among the advantages of Shopware, the extensive features in the free version of the store are also listed. Without a doubt, one has to agree that the functionalities are numerous, but still - available in a smaller quantity than in the case of Magento. Cheaper packages in the paid licenses offering extended capabilities are also highlighted. For many, this issue will tip the scales in favor of the German eCommerce platform. However, it should be highlighted that although Shopware is relatively "cheaper", Magento offers more pre-built solutions that can be purchased and used right away. A competing solution often requires the creation of code from scratch for an individual eCommerce site.

Magento allows, for example, for smooth integration with payment or delivery modules (DPD, InPost, PayU and many others). Shopware does not offer ready-made solutions in this area at the moment - integrations with InPost, Allegro, PayU or Przelewy24 take place via API, which requires more work from the developer (including time and finances). In the case of ready-made solutions, only configuration is necessary.

Shopware was developed mainly for mid-sized eCommerce, while Magento is used by companies with larger assortment - it is thus characterized by easy scalability. In case of Shopware, it is necessary to move the online store to a better version of the platform (from the free Community Edition or Starter Edition to the Professional Edition or Enterprise Edition).

A bit of numbers - for credibility

Almost 200,000 Magento-based online stores operating today - of which almost 50% in the USA. Just under 50,000 online stores on Shopware and over 70% of them in Germany.

Now, you may think that the number of stores on Adobe Commerce is no indication of anything. In fact - the numbers by themselves will not tell us which eCommerce platform has better functionalities, and is better suited to the needs of our business, providing us with a greater opportunity for growth. But these numbers translate into the possibility of obtaining support in solving a specific problem on their own, or finding an agency, which will create or take care of the site.

Official technical support for Magento is only available for the paid versions. In the case of Shopware, the scope of support depends on the version you choose. Nevertheless, Magento definitely has an advantage in this regard - its online community is simply bigger and consists not only of developers, but also partners, implementation companies or additional solutions providers. So you can always visit various discussion forums, read tutorials or check out guides,/b>, and use the extensive official documentation provided by the producer to find the right solution.

Language is also important. Magento community communicates mainly in ,b>English, which every developer is required to know. In the case of Shopware, on the other hand, it is primarily a German-speaking community. If you don't know the language, you may have more trouble finding the answer you need. It should also be pointed out that quite a few Shopware plugins are still available in German (although English versions are slowly being developed as well), which can delay the work on your online store.

Magento reigns over the foreign markets, Shopware is only gradually entering them. For this reason, you should expect more problems with finding specialists for the German eCommerce platform.

The most important concern of a businessman - finance

Since we mentioned earlier the critics' voices regarding how much it costs to set up a store on Magento, we can't help but expand on this topic more. Thus, we return to the topic of licenses - Open Source, Commerce and Commerce Cloud. The first provides free access to a number of functionalities. The second one gives more possibilities in this respect, and its cost starts from about 22 000 dollars per year. The third one differs from the Commerce version only in the use of cloud, which increases its cost to about $40,000 per year. It is important to emphasize the fact that the cost of the license increases with the gross sales value achieved by the online store.

To the costs described above one has to add of course hosting, domain, SSL certificate, extensions and add-ons or even transaction fees, as well as hours worked by a developer.

Magento certainly needs a more powerful server than Shopware, which should come as no surprise given the features and capabilities described. Your own, more powerful hosting than in the case of WooCommerce or Prestashop, which meets the requirements of the script, is simply a must-be. Thus, higher prices or design and implementation time should not be a surprise to anyone. Thus, it should be pointed out that Magento is a platform for eCommerces that have the inancial resources necessary to maintain an online store.

What if I have a smaller store?

Keep in mind that Magento is designed to support medium to large eCommerces which intend to have a diverse offer having hundreds of products in it. Of course, this does not mean that smaller eCommerce stores cannot function using this option. However, it is certainly necessary to emphasize that they will not have the opportunity to get the best out of the platform - thus, it may simply be unprofitable for them. The situation is different when a smaller company plans to grow and wants to immediately enter the platform, which will be the target one. Due to its flexibility and scalability, Magento is perfect for this task.

Sales platform - it all starts here

Without the choice of an eCommerce platform and an online store properly based on it, there is no differentiated offers. There is no marketing, personalization, automation of the shopping process and promotion. There are no sales, no group of loyal customers, no prospects for development. No one hides that the decision "Magento or Shopware" - for both B2B and B2C business - is extremely difficult. After all, which sales platform you choose will translate into results not only for the online store owner, but also for the customer. It is therefore worth choosing a solution that will satisfy both parties to the maximum extent.

Finally, answer one more question - do you want to be one of the 78 online stores on Shopware or the 2068 eCommerce stores on Magento in Poland? The ball is in your court.