OpenCart or WooCommerce? Comprehensive comparison

Both Woocommerce and Opencart are two open source content management systems targeting e-commerce, or what are known as online store management systems. They are currently the two most used systems by companies that want to market their products and brands. Many users are confused between these two systems when creating their online stores, so in our article today we will help you choose the most appropriate system, provide you with a full explanation of the advantages and disadvantages of each system, and show you the full difference between them.

OpenCart is a free, customizable system for managing online stores. It is open source, based on the PHP language, and uses a MySQL database and HTML components. It offers support for many currencies and languages ​​and provides many templates.

Advantages of OpenCart: It includes the OpenCart platform:

It has a long list of features, most of which depend on the fact that this platform is open source, as the internal codes of the platform can be modified and any features required for the online store can be provided. Other features are available due to the feature of providing add-ons and templates, which helps in designing the store easily, and adding many features to it through add-ons, whether free or paid. Below we provide you with the most prominent features of OpenCart 1- A completely free store creation and management system. The most important feature of this system is that it is completely free since its launch to this day, and it is available for download without any restrictions. All you need is a domain and a host to upload the OpenCart system to it, and after installing the system you will own a complete store and you can adjust it. Professionally and easily, as OpenCart gives you the ability to adjust shipping, payment, and currency settings via the main control panel (admin interface) and create a multi-store store, thus your store is ready to operate with all standard features. 2- The ability to modify the store interface. With the presence of hundreds of different templates in OpenCart, you can create a website uniquely customized for you, as you can choose any template and modify it easily. You can also modify it on the platform itself because it is open source, which makes it easy for you to customize your site in the way that you deem appropriate for you.

For this reason, we find that the stores designed with the OpenCart platform are completely different from each other, and it is not even possible to see any sites that are close to each other in the same form and performance, and this is something truly special. 3- Multiple languages ​​and currencies in the store. Through OpenCart, you can make your store support multiple currencies. You can choose from hundreds of different currencies around the world and add them to your store. You can also create a store that supports working in more than one language, with the ability to customize the language you want in an easy and simple way without the need for any programming experience and publish products on it. 4- Payment gateways integrated with the platform. OpenCart supports more than 20 different payment gateways integrated within it in order to provide customers with the advantage of paying online with the appropriate gateway. It also supports the sale of digital products.

You can view all payment gateways supported by OpenCart at the following link. 5- There is an Arabic version of the Open Cart platform. Open Cart itself does not support the Arabic language, but a version of it was Arabized through a partnership between a Saudi software company and Open Cart to issue a version of Open Cart in the Arabic language through the opencartarab.com platform, which is based on completely Arabizing the Open Cart system, its add-ons, and templates. Any template can be purchased through the site simply.

Disadvantages of OpenCart despite the many advantages of the system

Content management is OpenCart, but it contains three drawbacks that may make merchants not prefer it and resort to another alternative to manage their online store, such as WooCommerce or other e-commerce platforms. 1- Difficulty in modifying the design. Although OpenCart is completely free and open source, it is difficult to modify the design without programming experience, like other content management systems or electronic store management systems. However, this defect can be avoided by choosing a suitable template for you that does not require modifications, whether a paid or free template, from the list of many templates available on the platform. 2- OpenCart is not friendly to search engines. By default, the OpenCart system faces problems with search engines, most notably obtaining data from OpenCart, which forces you to manually adjust it to make it compatible with the Google search engine and the rest of the engines. It is not like other store creation platforms that are automatically compatible with different search engines.

3- Slowness of OpenCart: The OpenCart system is noticeably slow in the case of publishing a large number of products. This problem appears clearly if you rely on shared hosting and not on your own server. Technical malfunctions can also occur in hosting as a result of the slow response of the site script. Second: The WooCommerce system is an add-on integrated within the content management system (WordPress). WooCommerce enables you to create an online store and modify it, and provides you with more than 50 other add-ons that are compatible with it, giving you a long list of features starting from automatic calculation of the shipping price, integration with various international shipping companies, determining the value of the tax on products, and other features.

WooCommerce features: 1- Compatible with all shipping companies

Perhaps the most important feature of WooCommerce is that most international shipping companies allow adding WordPress sites to integrate their shipping with WooCommerce, which allows the buyer to track his shipment directly. It also allows the shipping company to track the products that are ordered directly and the shipping address to which the products will be delivered automatically without the need for manual modification from the store owner. 2- Control the e-mail sent to the buyer. You can create custom designs for the e-mail of your website that the buyer receives immediately upon ordering any product from your store, and which follows up with the customer on the status of his product, whether the order is in progress, out for shipment, under delivery, or has been received. 3- Complete control over the shape and arrangement of the product page. You can add a photo or video gallery or specify the arrangement of the elements on the product page however you want.

WooCommerce developers provide you with a Documentation page that explains all the details of the add-on and shows you how to modify it. It also explains how to control and modify the product page and control the rest of the add-on features. 4- An open source and responsive system. WooCommerce is also an open source system like OpenCart, and it is adjustable and expandable based on its basic code. It is also faster than OpenCart in terms of response, as it does not cause any speed problems no matter how many products are on the store. 5- Friendly to search engines and fast archiving. The WooCommerce system is widespread in most online stores, as about a third of online stores around the world use it.

It provides automatic compatibility with all search engines, especially the Google search engine, so the product name, price, and all data about it appear in the first search results. It can also appear in the Shopping from Google box due to its compatibility with all Google policies. Disadvantages of WooCommerce: Although WooCommerce is the best way to create a professional online store for those who are not proficient in programming, it is actually not the cheapest. In order to create a store with all the features, you need to pay for each add-on you want from the list of WooCommerce add-ons available on the official store. Some of the add-ons are not cheap and prices for some reach close to $100.

As for the admin interface, it is a little more difficult than other available content management systems, as you will need some time to train your employees and product publishers on how to use the platform and publish products on it, but this problem can be solved through the many explanation videos available on YouTube for how to publish products on WooCommerce. Comparison between WooCommerce and OpenCart systems 1- Ease of use and installation WooCommerce: Very easy to use, and does not require any programming experience to install it on your hosting. All you have to do is install WordPress and then access plugins< والبحث عن إضافة WooCommerce وتنصيبها.

OpenCart: It cannot be installed with the click of a button on all hosts (this can only be done on hosts that support CPanel), and it requires programming experience in the PHP language in order to be able to add and control it on your hosting. It is also more difficult to use and customize than WooCommerce for the average user. 2- Prices WooCommerce: It is a free add-on that can be added to the free WordPress system, and you can create your store with a large group of free templates and add-ons. There are also paid add-ons whose price starts from $16 to $100 per add-on, and templates whose price starts from $30 to $100 per template. OpenCart: It is a content management system in itself that is completely free, but it contains a group of paid add-ons and templates, but most of them are available in English. The price of Arabizing any template from the official website is $150 per template, and the prices of Arabic templates start from $54. As for add-ons, their prices start from $10 up to $80.

3- WooCommerce control panel and inventory management: Its control panel is a little more difficult and contains many options that you must learn how to use, but it does not require any programming experience. It allows you to manage the inventory of each product individually and notify you if any product you have runs out of stock, while supporting the feature of sending an email to the customer immediately after ordering the product, and following up on the product’s status through it. It also gives you the advantage of paying via PayPal and cash on delivery for free.

OpenCart: The basic interface of the OpenCart content management system shows you quick insights into your sales, today’s purchases, and profits, with the ability to add multiple merchants within the system and specify more than one currency for your store. It also supports more than one language without any additions, and supports more than 20 different payment gateways that you can include in your store. 4- Compatibility with search engines If you want your store to be at the top of search engines, in this case WooCommerce will be the best choice for you. This is because it supports many add-ons that you can benefit from to improve your site’s rank in search engines, such as the Yoast SEO add-on, which is considered the most popular add-on for search engine optimization.

As for OpenCart, although it is an SEO-friendly platform, as stated on its official page, it has some restrictions regarding SEO, such as restricting users’ ability to make certain modifications that are important for improving search engines. In order to be able to modify the meta titles and keywords, you will need to modify the system code. Also, 301 redirects are very complex and require programming knowledge in PHP.

Below is a table summarizing the most important basic differences between the WooCommerce and OpenCart systems. Comparison between WooCommerce and OpenCart In conclusion, we can consider that WooCommerce is better than OpenCart in terms of SEO, and in terms of its support for many templates, add-ons, and tools that make many things easier for us. It also provides multiple free templates, in addition to its official support for the Arabic language. On the other hand, OpenCart is better than WooCommerce in terms of the professional control panel it provides, its support for setting several different currencies for products, and it also has the ability to make the store in more than one language easily.

For this reason, the use of WooCommerce predominates over any other competitor, with up to 26% of online store users relying primarily on WooCommerce, while only 4% of them, in contrast, use OpenCart. In all cases, in order to be able to determine the system that is most suitable for you, compare the features of each system well, and choose from among them the system that is most suitable and compatible with the requirements of your online store.