Magento vs Shopify in 2026: total cost, deadlines and which fits your store

Shopify is a hosted platform with monthly plans and fees; Magento (Open Source or Adobe Commerce) is software you host or run on Adobe's cloud, then patch and upgrade yourself. Shopify usually costs less to run; Magento gives deeper control. In 2026, Magento's support deadlines are often what forces the decision.

Most comparisons on this topic are written by agencies that sell only one of the two, and several contradict themselves on prices. This one is neutral and dated. Elgrith builds on both, through our Magento development and Shopify Plus development teams, and we don't hold partner status with Adobe or Shopify. Prices below were read on 23 October 2026 from official pages; where a figure isn't published, we say so instead of guessing.

How do Magento and Shopify compare at a glance?

Sources: Shopify UK pricing, Shopify Plus plan, the magento/magento2 repository licence, and W3Techs for Shopify and Adobe Commerce. W3Techs also reports Shopify on 7.9% of sites whose CMS it can identify, against 0.4% for Adobe Commerce.

How much do Shopify and Magento cost in 2026?

Shopify (UK prices, GBP, read 23 October 2026):

For US billing, Shopify's Help Center lists Plus at "$2,500 USD" a month on a 1-year term and "$2,300 USD" a month on a 3-year term, and says larger businesses might pay "a variable platform fee based on your revenue and business model". Shopify shows prices in local currency, and we could not confirm the US prices of the Basic, Grow and Advanced plans from our connection, so US readers should check shopify.com/pricing directly.

The third-party fee is the line most people miss. Shopify's help page is clear: "Third-party transaction fees apply to all transactions processed through third-party and alternate payment gateways" (Shopify Help). Use Shopify Payments where it is available to you and the fee disappears; keep your own gateway and it applies on top of that gateway's processing charges.

Magento:

• Magento Open Source is published under the Open Software License (OSL 3.0) in the magento/magento2 repository, so there is no licence fee. You pay for hosting, extensions, development, security patching and upgrades.
• Adobe Commerce is sold by quote. Adobe doesn't publish a list price, and third-party estimates vary widely, so treat any single figure you see online as a guess. Get a written quote for your revenue band, hosting choice and term.

What is the total cost of ownership over 3 years?

Licence prices are only one line. This worksheet shows the full picture. The figures are illustrative arithmetic on the list prices above for an example UK store with £2 million a year in online sales (£6 million over three years). They are not quotes, and they exclude card processing, which you pay on any platform.

What the worksheet shows:

• On Shopify, payments drive cost more than plans. At £2 million a year, a third-party gateway on Advanced adds more over three years than the plan itself.
• On Magento, the licence is not the cost; maintenance is. Each version gets three years of standard support, so a Magento store needs a planned upgrade cycle, ongoing patching and someone accountable for hosting and security.
• Compare like with like. A fair Magento budget includes hosting, monitoring, patching, extension renewals and upgrade projects. A fair Shopify budget includes apps, payment fees and any Plus platform fee.

Fill in the blank lines with real quotes for your store before you decide.

What Magento support deadlines matter in 2026–27?

Adobe "offers a three-year standard support window from the General Availability (GA) date for each version" (Adobe lifecycle policy, updated 18 September 2026). The extended and security-only periods apply to Adobe Commerce only.

PHP versions come from Adobe's system requirements. Three dates matter right now:

1. 2.4.6 is out of standard support since 11 August 2026. Adobe Commerce customers have extended support until 31 August 2027 and a security-only period to 31 May 2028; Open Source stores don't.
2. Open Source patch downloads now start at 2.4.7. Adobe's October 2026 security bulletin says "Open Source merchants can only download patches for version 2.4.7 or later" (APSB26-153).
3. PHP 8.2 security support ends on 31 December 2026 (php.net). Adobe doesn't support 2.4.6 on any PHP newer than 8.2, and 2.4.7 tops out at 8.3.

So an Open Source store on 2.4.6 or older faces an upgrade either way. That is the moment to compare the cost of upgrading to 2.4.8 or 2.4.9 with the cost of moving to Shopify.

Shopify Plus vs Adobe Commerce: which suits larger brands and B2B?

At the top end, both platforms serve high-volume and B2B merchants, but in different ways.

Shopify Plus gives you a predictable platform fee ($2,500 USD a month on a 1-year term or $2,300 USD on a 3-year term in the US, from £1,800 a month in the UK), the lowest third-party payment fee (0.2%), and Shopify's managed infrastructure. Shopify B2B is no longer a Plus-only reason to upgrade: Shopify's own help page says "Shopify B2B is available on all plans", although "Unlimited B2B catalogs and direct catalog assignment to company locations are available only on the Shopify Plus plan", and the variable platform fee is calculated differently for B2B and direct-to-consumer orders.

Adobe Commerce suits complex catalogues, multi-brand and multi-region setups, custom pricing logic and heavy ERP integration, where full code access matters. You pay for that flexibility with a quote-based licence, an upgrade cycle and a larger engineering budget.

A practical rule: if your B2B and catalogue requirements can be met by Shopify's built-in B2B features plus a few apps or custom functions (our Shopify app development team builds these), Plus will usually cost less to run. If your business logic lives in the platform and changes often, Adobe Commerce or a well-maintained Open Source build is easier to bend. Our Shopify vs Shopify Plus guide covers the Plus decision in detail.

How do you migrate from Magento to Shopify?

Shopify's own help page sets the order: "Import your products first, then your customers, and then any historical orders" (Shopify Help). Shopify offers a Store Migration app, CSV imports, third-party migration apps and its APIs for custom migrations. If you import historical orders, turn off order notifications first, or staff will get an email for every imported order.

The SEO side is where migrations go wrong. A safe plan:

• Crawl the Magento site first and export every indexable URL, title, meta description and canonical tag.
• Map every old URL to its new one. Magento and Shopify use different URL structures for products and categories, so most URLs will change.
• Set up 301 redirects in Shopify's URL redirects before launch, not after.
• Carry over structured data, image alt text and internal links, and resubmit the sitemap.
• Watch Search Console for 8–12 weeks and fix any 404s as they appear.

Our website migration team runs platform moves end to end, and our website migration checklist lists every step.

Where does WooCommerce fit?

WooCommerce is the third option for many Magento stores. It is a free, open-source plugin for WordPress and, according to W3Techs, runs on 11.5% of sites whose CMS it can identify (7.8% of all websites). Like Magento Open Source, you host and maintain it; unlike Magento, it sits inside WordPress, which suits content-heavy brands and smaller catalogues. A Magento to WooCommerce move is worth costing if your team already runs WordPress. See our WooCommerce development service and our Shopify vs WooCommerce comparison.

When should you stay on Magento?

Moving platforms is not always the right call. Stay on Magento, and budget for an upgrade to 2.4.8 or 2.4.9, if most of these apply:

• Your catalogue or pricing logic is complex: configurable products with many attributes, customer-specific prices, multi-warehouse stock or quote-based selling.
• Integrations are deep: your ERP, PIM or warehouse system relies on custom Magento modules that would need rebuilding elsewhere.
• You run several stores from one install: multiple brands, countries, languages and currencies with shared data.
• You have a team or agency that already knows the codebase, with testing and deployment in place.
• Your customisations are the business: checkout rules, configurators or B2B workflows that a hosted platform can't match without heavy workarounds.

If you stay, treat the upgrade as a chance to clean up: remove unused extensions, review custom modules and move to supported PHP. Our Magento development team handles upgrades and migrations, and UK brands can work with our London Magento agency, served through our London client-partnership center with engineering at our New Delhi HQ.

How can Elgrith help?

Elgrith has delivered 1,000+ projects for 250+ clients since 2015, from our New Delhi headquarters and client centers in New York, London and Shanghai. We upgrade and maintain Magento stores, migrate stores to Shopify, and build on Shopify Plus, WooCommerce and our wider ecommerce development stack. We'll cost both routes honestly. You get a fixed written quote after a free call. Book a call or start a project.