Adobe Commerce Cloud Vs. Shopify Plus – Which Is Better?

When it comes to finding the most powerful eCommerce platforms, businesses often interest Magento Commerce Cloud and Shopify Plus, seeing their capabilities and impressive feature sets.

However, choosing between these platforms will depend on your unique business needs and goals.

Adobe Commerce Cloud is an advanced eCommerce platform known for its detailed personalization and scalability, which is ideal for large businesses. On the other hand, Shopify Plus is an enterprise-level user-friendly, scalable, and supportive platform that is ideal for growing businesses.

If you find yourself stuck at choosing between Adobe Commerce Cloud and Shopify Plus, this article is here to help you with a detailed comparison. The areas we’ll discuss:

• Key Differences
• Pros & Cons
• FAQs

… And more that helps you decide between Adobe Commerce Cloud and Shopify Plus.

Let’s start with a basic understanding of both platforms.

Adobe Commerce Cloud Vs. Shopify Plus – Platforms at a Glance

Let’s dive into understanding these platforms separately in this section.

Understanding Adobe Commerce Cloud

In 2018, Adobe acquired Magento to extend its eCommerce capabilities and formed Adobe Commerce (Also known as Magento Commerce), which comes with an option for both on-premise and cloud-based infrastructure.

Adobe Commerce Cloud (also known as Adobe Enterprise Cloud) is a cloud-based version of Adobe Commerce. With Adobe Commerce Cloud, Adobe handles the infrastructure rather than hosting the website on external servers, allowing businesses to concentrate on their core operations.

In easy words, Adobe Commerce Cloud = Adobe Commerce + Cloud Infrastructure from Adobe

The Adobe-managed cloud infrastructure offers enhanced scalability, performance, and security compared to traditional on-premise deployments. Some of the key functionalities of Adobe Enterprise Cloud are multi-store management, AI-powered search, product recommendations, PWA studio, cloud infrastructure, inventory management, marketing tools, and much more.

This platform is an ideal choice for retailers and large businesses that need B2B or B2C functionalities with extensive capabilities to handle high traffic, huge inventory, complex operations, excellent support, and substantial growth.

Regardless of the industry and business size, it is specially designed to scale with the business and deliver optimal solutions.

Understanding Shopify Plus

Shopify Plus, an enterprise-level upgraded version of Shopify,  is a scalable SaaS eCommerce platform for large businesses and enterprises to operate their online store efficiently.

It’s an end-to-end eCommerce solution for large businesses (with around $1 million revenue) looking for a highly customizable eCommerce platform without coding efforts to manage everyday operations. The platform comes with the dashboard and interface of standard Shopify, however, Shopify Plus have stepped up by offering advanced customizations, functionalities, automation, scheduling, integration, better support options, customisable checkout, advanced apps, and more.

Along with additional integrations and permissions, Shopify Plus merchants get access to the Merchant Success Program, the Shopify Plus Partner Program, Shopify POS Pro, and a Shopify Plus Community on Facebook.

Now, you get the basic understanding of both platforms. It’s time to deep dive into a detailed comparison between them and identify the key differences.

Adobe Commerce Cloud Vs. Shopify Plus – The Main Difference

The main differences between Adobe Commerce Cloud vs Shopify Plus lie in several key areas, including:

1. Pricing
2. Feature Set & Customization Capabilities
3. B2B / Wholesale Capabilities
4. Multi-store Management
5. Headless and Composable Possibilities
6. Extensions, Integrations, & Apps
7. Platform Support

Here, we begin a detailed discussion comparing both platforms to help you understand what your journey will look like if you choose to grow with either option!

1. Pricing

Adobe Commerce and Shopify Plus, both of these platforms charge license fees based on your business’s Gross Merchandise Value (GMV).

In Adobe Commerce, there are two main editions i.e., Commerce Pro (On-premise) and Managed Services (Cloud). Both editions have varied pricing structures depending on various factors such as annual licensing fees, hostings, and development and maintenance fees. 

Here are the estimated Adobe Commerce annual license fees:

Gross Merchandise Value	Commerce Pro (On-premise)	Managed Services (Cloud)
$0 – $1M	$22,000 per annum	$40,000 per annum
$1M – $5M	$32,000 per annum	$55,000 per annum
$5M – $10M	$49,000 per annum	$80,000 per annum
$10M – $25M	$75,000 per annum	$120,000 per annum
$25M+	$125,000 per annum	$190,000 per annum

On the other hand, Shopify Plus uses a custom quote model, which is surely higher than standard Shopify plans because the pricing varies as per business GMV (Gross Merchandise Value). However, it starts from $2,500 per month (1-year plan) that covers license fees along with the hosting, scaling, support, and upgrades. 

Here’s the estimation of Shopify Plus license fee cost based on GMV of business.

Gross Merchandise Value	Shopify Plus License Cost
$1M	$4,000
$2M	$8,000
$5M	$20,000
$10M	$40,000
$20M	$80,000
$50M	$200,000

So, on average, most businesses are spending between $60,000 – $200,000 per annum to run their Shopify Plus stores.

Overall, Adobe Commerce Cloud may have higher upfront costs, but its functionalities, excellent support, and flexibility can help businesses with long-term savings. And Shopify Plus offers cost-effective options.

The cost given estimatimating are variable based on several factors, including specific features, customizations, and additional requirements. Besides the license fees for, you’ll likely incur costs for hosting (if you choose Commerce Pro), development, integrations, and ongoing maintenance.

To obtain a precise license cost based on your specific needs, it’s highly recommended to contact Adobe and Shopify Plus directly for a customized quote.

2. Feature Set & Customization Capabilities

Adobe Commerce is widely known for its extensive customization capabilities due to its open-source roots. The customization flexibility has been a key factor in its popularity. However, the platform comes with a greater pre-built feature set, themes, extensions, and more that allows businesses to set up stores easily, without requiring extensive coding for customizations.

It is an ideal platform for businesses seeking unparalleled control and customization over their online store. While this level of customization demands technical expertise, the platform’s built-in functionalities provide a solid base for developers to easily work with it. Below, I’ve listed some of the pre-built features of Adobe Commerce.

Key Features of Adobe Commerce:

• B2B Functionality
• PWA Studio
• AI-Powered Product Search
• Personalized Recommendations
• Multi-source Inventory (MSI)
• Drag and Drop Builder
• Scalable Cloud Infrastructure
• Customer Segmentation
• Order Management System (OMS)
• Fraud Prevention
• Marketing Automation
• Advanced Reporting and Analytics

On the other hand, Shopify Plus has a user-friendly approach to offer customization. Shopify has an extensive library with themes and apps (free & paid) to use as starting points that can be customized. With ease of words, I can state that Shopify Plus relies on theme editors and third-party apps (free & paid) to make required changes in layout, design, and user experience, reducing the need for custom coding.

While Shopify Plus does rely on a robust app ecosystem, it also offers a comprehensive suite of built-in features to support high-growth businesses.

Key Features of Shopify Plus:

• B2B functionality
• Multi-currency and multi-language
• Advanced inventory management
• Flexible checkout customization
• Enhanced security features
• Dedicated support
• Unlimited products and staff accounts
• Advanced reporting and analytics
• Shopify Flow to automate tasks and workflows
• Launchpad to plan, execute, and automate marketing campaigns
• Script Editor to customize code
• Shopify Plus Academy

Both Adobe Commerce Cloud and Shopify Plus offer robust feature sets and are capable of helping businesses grow significantly.

3. B2B / Wholesale Capabilities

When it comes to wholesale capabilities, Adobe Commerce Cloud has established itself as a leader in B2B.

Adobe Enterprise Cloud is B2B-friendly and offers a B2B suite pack that includes advanced features such as customer-specific catalogs, custom pricing, quote management, role and budget assignment for users, credit limit setting, and more.

These features cater to advanced B2B needs and highly complex workflows, making Adobe Commerce a highly demanded B2B solution for large enterprises. However, its dedicated B2B module requires high-end technical expertise and incurs additional costs for setup and maintenance.

On the other hand, Shopify Plus has built-in B2B functionalities that allow businesses to easily set up stores for wholesale operations.

However, Shopify Plus lacks many advanced functionalities needed for B2B, such as advanced pricing rules and separate shipping rules for customers. It is a more user-friendly platform with fewer customization options, though it is easy to integrate with B2B apps for additional functionalities.

If we compare it to Adobe Commerce’s B2B capabilities it’s quite limiting.

4. Multi-store Management

Adobe Commerce Cloud is the winner for multi-store management.

It’s one of the best-selling features of Adobe Commerce Cloud to allow B2B and B2C brands to set up and manage their multiple websites (over 100 websites) from one account. Some real-world brands that utilize Adobe Commerce’s multi-store features include Warner Music, Nestle, Helly Hansen, and many others.

Additionally, its centralized approach and full customization capabilities allow businesses to easily manage their multi-stores according to regional preferences, languages, and storefronts. This gives large businesses more control to manage each brand (at the local or global level) separately and provides complete flexibility to make any necessary customizations.

Shopify Plus also offers multi-store management capabilities that are easy to access. It provides centralized management tools, allowing businesses to manage their multiple stores from a user-friendly, unified dashboard. Whether you want to manage inventory, orders, customers, or content, there’s a single dashboard for all customizations across all stores.

However, Shopify Plus is limited to managing up to 10 online stores, which is a significant reason why big businesses often do not consider this platform. Nevertheless, small and midsize businesses can effectively manage multiple stores using Shopify Plus.

5. Headless and Composable Possibilities

Adobe Commerce introduced a new trend of headless with its PWA Studio around 5-6 years ago.

While initially facing challenges due to its requirement of high-degree maintenance expertise, the platform has made significant improvements over years. But yes, they still face some issues with maintenance aid. Additionally, the Hyva theme, a new launch in the Magento market, has become a popular and easier way to go headless with Adobe Commerce while maintaining excellent performance.

Although the Hyva theme is not strictly headless, it’s great for businesses that seek modern Magento storefronts without the complexity of headless approach.

Some of the recent store examples of headless Adobe commerce are:

• Rubik’s
• Galerie de Beaute
• Zadig & Voltaire
• G-SP
• Lovecraft

On the other hand, Shopify Plus introduced Hydrogen, their own framework for building headless sites and custom storefronts.

Shopify’s introduction of Hydrogen and Oxygen has indeed strengthened its headless commerce offering. Its benefits include the ability to achieve greater control over the frontend, improve page load speeds, freedom around URL structure, and integrate complex third-party systems is a significant advantage for businesses seeking a headless solution.

Some of the massive brands have tried headless route with Shopify Plus, and it includes:

• Kotn
• Peloton
• Seedlip
• Chilly’s
• Allbirds

Headless commerce promises benefits but demands technical expertise and can increase costs. Mainly, smaller businesses should evaluate carefully as changes often require more time and resources.

Lastly, Shopify has more established headless brands due to its later entry and focused solutions like Hydrogen. While Magento offers flexibility, maintenance challenges persist. Ultimately, the best approach depends on specific business needs and capabilities.

6. Extensions, Integrations, & Apps

Adobe Commerce Cloud is great at customizations due to its wide range of extensions and integration capabilities with third-party apps.

Also, due to its open-source roots, Adobe Commerce offers an easy integration process with other apps and allows businesses to increase functionalities as per their needs without any limitations. This control over customization, flexibility, and integration makes it an ideal choice for large enterprises.

Some common extensions for Adobe Commerce Cloud include:

• Stripe Payments
• Dotdigital — Marketing Automation
• Paytrail
• Easyship — Shipping & Fulfillment
• Facebook Business Extension

Shopify Plus, on the other hand, has limited customization because it heavily relies on pre-built apps available in the Shopify app store due to its inability to access source code. However, businesses can develop custom apps via API and integrate them with their Shopify store.

So we can say that, Shopify Plus comes with a user-friendly approach for businesses to easily integrate with pre-built Shopify apps without relying heavily on developers.

Some common pre-built Shopify apps for integration include:

• Qikify Cart — Upsell & Free Gift
• Klaviyo — Email Marketing & SMS
• DSers — AliExpress Dropshipping
• PageFly — Landing Page Builder
• SEO Optimizer

In the end, the choice of platform for integration depends on business needs. If your business requires expert help for integration and limitless customization, Adobe Commerce is worth considering. However, Shopify offers a user-friendly integration with pre-built apps, making it a better option for those looking for easier and quicker setups.

7. Platform Support

Adobe Commerce Cloud primarily offers application-level support, meaning a technical expert will be available via live chat to help you with technical complexities such as security patches, version upgrades, server maintenance, and more.

Given the large community of developers, Adobe Commerce also has multiple useful resources available to help store owners.

Shopify Plus, on the other hand, provides 24/7 dedicated account management support, which is a key reason businesses consider Shopify Plus. Merchants receive immediate solutions for any platform-related queries via phone, email, or live chat. Additionally, the Shopify developers’ community is rapidly growing and continually developing new APIs to improve it as a platform.

Okay, so these were the key differences between Adobe Commerce Cloud vs Shopify Plus that you need to know.  But wait, would you like to know some more about both platforms’s pros and cons? If yes, keep reading. 😀

Adobe Commerce Cloud Vs. Shopify Plus — The Pros & Cons

Here are some differences of using both platforms that businesses often experience when working with them. 

Parameters	Adobe Commerce	Shopify Plus
Customization	It’s open-source architecture enables limitless customization	Limited customization based on third-party apps
Ease of Use	May require more technical expertise compared to Shopify Plus	Beginner-friendly and easy-to-setup platform without any technical expertise
Pre-built Templates & App Integrations	Offers a wide range of pre-built templates and apps for integration	Offers a wide range of pre-built templates and apps for integration
Workflow Automation	Allows for easy setup of automated processes to streamline operations.	Offers built-in workflow automation tools for streamlining processes.
Hosting	Allows on-premise or cloud-based hosting to ensure flexibility	Comes with its own hosting server
Customer Support	Provides enterprise-level support and consists of large community of merchants	Offers excellent 24/7 customer support
Multi-store	Perfectly works with large B2B businesses handling multiple online stores	Allows businesses to create multi-stores
Transaction Fees	There’s no transaction fee charged by the platform when using its own payment processor.	There’s no transaction fee charged by the platform when using its own payment processor.
Speed & Performance	Faster performance and high uptime due to its cloud-based infrastructure	Shopify’s optimized infrastructure results in fast page load times and high uptime.
Chatbots	It does not provide a built-in chatbot option, however, the platform supports its integration	Built-in chatbot functionality for enhanced customer interactions.

The pros and cons table shares better ideas on the strengths and weaknesses of both platforms.

It is necessary for you to carefully evaluate the pros and cons of each platform to determine the best fit for your organization.

Finalizing eCommerce Platform For Your Business!

Finally, we’ve explored the details of both Adobe Commerce Cloud and Shopify Plus.

And we saw that both platforms offer significant advantages. If you want to finalize on any of these platforms, ultimately, the best choice will depend on your specific business requirements. Consider the following factors to choose between these platforms.

Choose Adobe Commerce Cloud If:

• You’re a large enterprise and B2B business with high traffic and sales.
• You want limitless customization and a wide range of themes, extensions, and code modifications.
• You want to manage multiple stores (up to 100 websites) from a single account.
• B2B functionalities are essential for your business.
• You want headless commerce and composable architecture.
• You’re planning for extensive international expansion with multi-language and multi-currency.
• You want to handle large-scale operations.

Choose Shopify Plus if:

• You’re a high-growing business with moderate complexity.
• You want a user-friendly platform with scalable functionalities.
• You want to manage multi-stores (up to 10) within a single account.
• You want dedicated account management support 24/7.
• You require modern customization with minimal technical expertise required.
• You want to set workflow automation.
• You need robust security and reliable performance.

These are the main factors that you can consider and you might have many more questions.

Our experts at Aureate Labs can help you find the right platform based on your specific needs. Here’s your chance to avail a free consultation with our eCommerce experts.

FAQS – Adobe Commerce Cloud Vs. Shopify Plus

You may still have multiple doubts about choosing between these platforms, and we’ve tried to clear them all in the table that is placed right below. Let’s dive in!

Aspect / Feature	Adobe Commerce Cloud	Shopify Plus
Web Hosting	Included ✅	Included ✅
Product Limit	Unlimited ♾️	Unlimited ♾️
Built-in POS System	No❌, requires 3rd party integration	Yes ✅
Multiple Payment Gateways	Yes ✅	Yes ✅
Bandwidth	No❌	Unlimited ♾️
Customer Support 24/7	No❌	Yes ✅
Blogs	No❌	Yes ✅
Staff Accounts	Over 6,000	Yes ✅
Sales Report	No❌	Yes ✅
Open source	Yes ✅	No❌
Drop-shipping	No❌, requires 3rd party integration	Included ✅
Currencies	200 currencies	133 currencies
Integrations	3,600+ apps	3,200+ apps
Fraud Protection	Included ✅	Included ✅
Free Sub-domain	No❌	Included ✅

Q.1 Is it easy to migrate to Shopify Plus or Adobe Commerce?

Migration on shopify plus or adobe commerce can be complex or simple depending on the chosen method and complexity of the data volume.

Q.2 Is Shopify or Adobe Commerce better for SEO?

Both platforms have great SEO capabilities. However, Adobe Commerce Cloud has high potential because it has more control over SEO elements with technical expertise.

Q.3 What is the difference between Adobe Commerce and Shopify Plus?

Adobe commerce cloud offers limitless customization and scalability which help large B2B enterprises to grow and handle their business efficiently. On the other hand, Shopify plus is an easy to use, fast setup and moderate customizable platform which is best-fit for growing-businesses.

Q.4 Is Shopify Plus or Adobe Commerce easy to use?

While Adobe Commerce Cloud has a steeper learning because of its extensive customization options, Shopify plus is a user-friendly platform with drag-and-drop functionality.

Q.5 Why should I choose Shopify Plus over Adobe Commerce?

For fast-growing businesses, Shopify Plus is the best option due to its user-friendly experience, scalability, and app marketplace.

Q.6 Why should I choose Adobe Commerce over Shopify Plus?

For large enterprises with complex needs, Adobe Commerce Cloud is a better option due to its limitless customization, B2B functionalities, and high-volume handling.