Does Shopify Make WooCommerce Better?

In less than two weeks I’ll be speaking at the upcoming WordCamp Europe 2026 on “Why WooCommerce loves its competitors, and I’d like to pressure-test an idea before I get on stage.

One of my slides may surprise a few people. It’s titled “Why Shopify Is Good for WooCommerce“.

For years, many people in our ecosystem have looked at Shopify as the enemy. The company with thousands of employees, massive marketing budgets, and enough money to put their brand in front of almost every merchant on the planet. The instinctive reaction is to compare ourselves and feel threatened… but I see it differently.

The more I think about it, the more convinced I become that Shopify’s growth has been one of the best things that could have happened to WooCommerce.

This is one of those topics where I know people can land on completely different conclusions. That’s why I’d love your feedback. If you think Shopify has helped WooCommerce, tell me why. If you think I’m wrong, tell me where my argument falls apart. Comments are open.

WooCommerce Was Comfortable…

Before Shopify’s growth during the pandemic years, WooCommerce was in a very comfortable position. The ecommerce market was growing, WordPress was dominant, and many agencies built websites almost exclusively around WooCommerce. There was competition, of course, but not at the scale we see today.

Comfort is nice when you’re running a business, but I think it’s not great when you’re building software.

When there is little pressure from outside, it’s easy to focus on maintaining what already works. The urgency to rethink products, improve onboarding, simplify experiences, or challenge assumptions becomes much lower.

Or maybe I’m giving Shopify too much credit here (challenge me in the comments). But if I look at the last 2-3 years, it’s difficult for me to believe that WooCommerce would have changed as much as it has without a strong competitor applying constant pressure from the outside.

Competition Creates Progress

One thing I often hear is that Shopify is taking merchants away from WooCommerce. That’s true in some cases, and I’ve even seen it first-hand at Checkout Summit 2026 through Patrick Rauland’s talk about a huge migration case study.

At the same time, I honestly don’t know how many merchants go in the opposite direction, but that’s exactly the point: this is only one side of the story.

The other side is that Shopify constantly raises expectations. Merchants compare experiences, agencies compare workflows, developers compare documentation. Every improvement Shopify makes creates pressure on WooCommerce to think about what comes next.

That pressure is, according to me, healthy. Very healthy!

Without strong competitors, software products can become complacent. With strong competitors, every decision matters a lot. And every weakness becomes way more visible.

I genuinely believe WooCommerce is a better product today because it has been forced to compete.

Challenge that assumption in the comments, if you dare! If you think Shopify has been bad for Woo, I want to understand why.

The Ecosystem Is More Connected Than Ever

Another thing many people overlook is how much overlap now exists between the two worlds. A growing number of agencies work with both WooCommerce and Shopify. Developers build extensions on both platforms. Consultants advise clients across different ecosystems.

The “all my eggs are in the WooCommerce basket” mindset feels outdated, and with me being one of those, I’m very much aware that relying too heavily on a single ecosystem is becoming harder to justify in today’s market. The ecommerce landscape is broader, more competitive, and more interconnected than it used to be.

Many of the people building WooCommerce plugins and themes also understand Shopify app development and customization.

And this brings ideas, practices, and expectations from one platform to another. Everyone learns from everyone else, like Katie Keith showed at Checkout Summit 2026, where Shopify experiments fed back into better WooCommerce products.

Maybe I’m overestimating this overlap… In your experience, has Shopify actually changed how you build or sell WooCommerce solutions, or would nothing really be different without it? If you disagree with the premise, even better—drop it in the comments.

Scale Matters Less Than We Think

People often point out that Shopify has thousands of employees and marketing resources that WooCommerce simply cannot match. That’s true.

But that doesn’t mean that the biggest company automatically wins.

What matters is whether competition creates better products, better ideas, and better outcomes for merchants. In many ways, Shopify’s scale is exactly why it is useful for WooCommerce to have it as a competitor. The bigger the challenge, the harder WooCommerce has to think about its future, its strengths, and its differentiation.

The goal should not be to become a Shopify alternative. The goal should be to become the best possible version of WooCommerce.

Is Shopify Good for WooCommerce?

The title of my presentation (and its content) is intentionally provocative because I know many people will disagree. And that’s perfectly fine!

To me, competition is valuable because it challenges assumptions, forces conversations, creates momentum, and prevents stagnation.

When I look at the last few years, I don’t see Shopify’s growth as a threat to WooCommerce. I see it as one of the reasons WooCommerce continues to evolve.

So, do you agree that Shopify has been good for WooCommerce? Or, instead, you think that Shopify’s growth has harmed the ecosystem?

Well, leave a comment below and tell me where you stand. I’m especially interested in hearing from developers, agency owners, product founders, and merchants who work with Woo every day.