Shopify to WooCommerce Migration Cost in 2026

A Shopify to WooCommerce migration costs two things: a one-time bill for the move and a new monthly bill for running the store yourself. The software for the move is $0 to $79 for most stores. The rest is work: rebuilding the theme, replacing apps, redirects and testing. My migration projects start at $500, and each quote follows the store's requirements after a free audit.

There's no price table by store size in this post, on purpose. A "small store, $1,000 to $5,000" row can't tell you whether your store is small, because the number of products matters less than the apps, subscriptions and custom theme work behind them. So this post lists every cost line, gives the price where an official page states one, and shows what makes a quote go up or down. Every price was checked on the vendor's own page on 11 November 2026.

Want a quick figure for your own store first? Put your plan, apps and sales into the store migration cost calculator. It runs in your browser and needs no sign-up.

The two bills: one-time and monthly

You're leaving a platform you rent for one you host. That changes who you pay and when.

The last three lines are the ones people forget. On Shopify they're inside the plan price. On WooCommerce they're yours.

What the data move costs

The data move is the cheapest part. You have four routes.

The free route. WooCommerce has a built-in CSV importer for products. It handles simple and variable products and pulls images from the URLs in the file. It doesn't import customers or orders. Shopify's product CSV also uses different columns from WooCommerce's, so the file needs converting first. My free Shopify to WooCommerce CSV converter does that in the browser, including variants and image URLs.

A Marketplace extension, $79 a year. Migrate & Import Shopify to WooCommerce connects to your store through the Shopify API and brings over products, orders, customers, coupons, pages and blog posts. WooCommerce's own blog points to it, but it's built by a third party (FmeAddons), not by WooCommerce. There is no migrator built into WooCommerce itself in 2026.

A migration service. LitExtension and Cart2Cart price by the number of products, customers and orders. LitExtension's done-for-you package starts at $169 according to its Shopify to WooCommerce page. Cart2Cart shows a price only after you enter your counts in its estimator, so run that with your real numbers instead of trusting a figure from a blog.

The developer route. WooCommerce publishes an open-source tool called migrator-cli. Its own description is "an experimental WP-CLI based migration tool", so treat it as a developer's tool, not something to click through. It's free, and it can move products, orders and coupons with a Shopify access token.

Whichever route you pick, the tool moves rows of data. It doesn't rebuild your theme, set up payments or write redirects. For the steps themselves, see how to migrate Shopify to WooCommerce.

What WooCommerce costs each month after the move

WooCommerce the plugin is free. Running a store on it isn't. Three lines make up the monthly bill.

Hosting, domain and SSL

Hosts advertise a low first-term price that needs one to four years paid upfront. The renewal price is what you'll pay for most of the store's life, so that's the number to budget.

So a realistic hosting budget is about $17 to $45 a month on shared WooCommerce hosting and about $28 to $35 a month for entry-level managed hosting. Busy stores need bigger plans. An SSL certificate is free on all four hosts. Your domain moves with you and costs what it costs now.

Payment fees: how much does each platform take from a $100 sale?

This is where most cost posts get it wrong. Card processing isn't cheaper on WooCommerce by default.

WooPayments charges the same as Shopify Basic and more than Grow or Advanced. It also adds 1.5% for international cards and 1% for currency conversion.

The saving shows up in one case: your Shopify store uses a payment provider other than Shopify Payments. Shopify then adds its own third-party transaction fee on top of the provider's fee. The rate depends on your plan, and WooCommerce's blog describes it as up to 2%. You'll find your exact rate in the Shopify admin under Settings, then Payments. WooCommerce charges no platform fee on any gateway, so a store paying that fee keeps it after the move.

Extensions that replace Shopify features and apps

Shopify apps bill monthly. WooCommerce extensions bill yearly. These are the current one-year prices on woocommerce.com for features stores often need:

Some things Shopify includes also become a plugin or a task on WooCommerce: abandoned cart emails, gift cards, product reviews with photos, backups and security scanning. Many have free plugins. List every app on your Shopify bill and check each one before you assume the new store costs less.

Is WooCommerce cheaper than Shopify?

Sometimes. It depends on what's on your Shopify bill today. Shopify's US plan prices on 11 November 2026 are:

WooCommerce is usually cheaper to run when:

• You're on Advanced or Plus mainly for features that WooCommerce does with a free or low-cost plugin.
• You pay Shopify's third-party transaction fee because you can't or don't use Shopify Payments.
• Your monthly app charges add up to more than the plan itself.

It usually isn't cheaper when:

• You're on Basic or Grow with Shopify Payments and two or three apps. Good hosting alone costs about what Basic does.
• Nobody on your team wants to handle updates and backups, so you'd pay someone for upkeep every month.
• You rely on Shopify's checkout, Shop Pay and built-in sales channels and would need paid plugins to match them.

Run both sides with your own numbers in the cost calculator before you decide. If the monthly saving is small, cost alone is a weak reason to move. Ownership, flexibility and content are better ones.

What you cannot take out of Shopify (and what that costs)

Some things don't export, and each one turns into work on the new store.

• The theme. Shopify themes are written in Liquid, which doesn't run on WordPress. The storefront is rebuilt on a WooCommerce theme or a block theme. For most stores this is the largest single line in a developer's quote.
• Customer passwords. Shopify doesn't hand over passwords, and no tool can move them. Shopify's newer customer accounts don't use a password at all: customers sign in with a one-time code sent by email. On WooCommerce, customers set a new password from a reset email. Budget for one clear email to your customer list.
• Gift card codes. Shopify's gift card export holds only the last 4 characters of each code, for security. Outstanding balances have to be reissued as new codes on the WooCommerce side and emailed to their holders.
• Subscriptions and saved cards. Subscriber records can be moved, but the saved payment details live with the payment processor, not in your export. Whether they can transfer depends on both processors. Ask them before you promise customers an unbroken renewal.
• App data. Reviews, loyalty points, wishlists and bundles live inside each app. Some apps export a CSV and some don't. Check each one while your Shopify plan is still active.
• Checkout customizations. Anything built with Shopify Functions, Scripts or checkout extensions has to be rebuilt as WooCommerce code or replaced with an extension.

Redirects and SEO: free to do, costly to skip

Shopify and WooCommerce use different URL patterns. Products move from /products/blue-mug to /product/blue-mug/, and collections from /collections/mugs to /product-category/mugs/. Every old URL needs a 301 redirect to its new address, or search rankings and old links end at a 404 page.

The redirects cost nothing in software. My migration redirect generator builds the list from your URLs in either direction and outputs .htaccess, Nginx and Redirection plugin formats. The cost is the time to map URLs that changed name, and to test them after launch.

What changes the quote

These are the things I ask about before quoting. Each one adds or removes work.

1. Catalog size and variants. A few hundred simple products import in one pass. Thousands of products with many variants need batches and more checking.
2. Order and customer history. Moving all history takes longer than moving the last year or two. Some stores keep old orders as an archive export instead.
3. Apps to replace. Every app needs a WooCommerce equivalent to be chosen, set up and tested. Five apps is a different project from twenty-five.
4. Subscriptions. Active subscribers mean a payment processor conversation, a cutover date and renewal testing.
5. Theme. Matching a custom Shopify design closely takes much longer than adapting a good WooCommerce theme.
6. Integrations. ERP, warehouse, accounting and email tools each need reconnecting and a test order.
7. Markets and currencies. Several currencies, languages or tax regions add plugins and settings.
8. Content. Blog posts and pages move too, along with their images and internal links.
9. Redirects. A few hundred URLs follow a pattern. A store that renamed products over the years needs a hand-checked map.
10. Hosting setup. If you already have a tuned WordPress host, that's done. If not, setup, caching and email delivery are part of the job.

Send answers to those ten points and any developer can give you a real number instead of a range.

What developers and agencies quote publicly

Published prices for this move are far apart, because they describe different jobs. These are each company's own figures, not mine:

• Codeable lists its WordPress developers at $80 to $120 an hour, with a basic store migration from $2,000 and an advanced one from $4,000.
• ProdSift, a catalog tool vendor, puts a freelancer or agency at $500 to $5,000 or more.
• Webhelp Agency's guide gives $2,000 to $8,000 for an agency migration.
• White Label WP Agency writes that US agencies charge $15,000 to $40,000 for a store with 100 to 500 products and no subscriptions.
• DoodleWeb's service page states USD 15,000 to 80,000 over 8 to 14 weeks.

The low numbers are a data move into a ready-made theme. The high ones are a full redesign with integrations and project management.

My own terms are simple. Projects start at $500. As a policy, I price at about half of what agencies charge for the same scope. Payment is 50% upfront and 50% on delivery, in USD. Every project includes 15 days of free support after launch, the audit before the quote is free, and I reply within 24 hours.

The overlap month and other costs people forget

• Two platforms at once. Product images import from Shopify's servers, so the old store has to stay live and public until the import is finished. Plan for one or two months of paying for both Shopify and hosting.
• The final sync. Orders keep arriving while you build. A last import of new orders and customers happens on launch day, and someone has to run and check it.
• Closing Shopify. Shopify keeps a store's information for 2 years after deactivation. Export orders, customers and gift card balances before you close anyway. If you pause the store instead of closing it, uninstall paid apps first, because apps keep billing on a paused store.
• Staff time. Your team learns a new admin for orders, refunds and products. Allow a few slower days.
• Yearly renewals. Extension licences and hosting renew every year. Add them to a calendar so the second-year bill isn't a surprise.

When does the move pay back?

The method is short:

1. Add up your current monthly Shopify cost: the plan, every app, and any third-party transaction fees from your last few bills.
2. Add up the new monthly cost: hosting at its renewal price, yearly extension licences divided by 12, and upkeep if you'll pay for it.
3. Subtract the second from the first. That's your monthly saving.
4. Divide the one-time migration cost by the monthly saving. The answer is the number of months until the move has paid for itself.

If that comes out under 12 months, cost is a sound reason to move. If it's over 24, move only if you want something Shopify can't give you: full control of the code, checkout and data, or a content site and store in one WordPress install. And if the saving comes out negative, stay on Shopify. I'll tell you that in the audit too.

Common mistakes that raise the cost

• Budgeting hosting at the intro price. The renewal price is three to nine times the intro price on the shared plans above.
• Assuming payment fees drop. With Shopify Payments on Grow or Advanced, your card rate goes up on WooPayments, not down.
• Cancelling Shopify too early. Images, gift card balances and app data are easiest to get while the store is still live.
• Counting products instead of apps. Apps and custom checkout logic drive the work, not the product count.
• Skipping redirects. Lost search traffic costs more than the hours needed to map the URLs.

Frequently asked questions

How much does it cost to migrate from Shopify to WooCommerce?

The migration tool costs $0 to $79 for most stores. Developer time depends on the theme, apps, subscriptions and integrations, and published quotes run from a few hundred dollars to tens of thousands at agencies. My projects start at $500, quoted after a free audit.

Is WooCommerce cheaper than Shopify?

It's cheaper for stores paying for Advanced or Plus, third-party transaction fees or many apps. For a store on Basic or Grow with Shopify Payments and a few apps, the costs are close, because hosting, extensions and upkeep replace the plan fee.

Can I migrate from Shopify to WooCommerce for free?

Products, yes. Export the product CSV from Shopify, convert the columns, and import the file with WooCommerce's built-in importer. Customers and orders need a paid extension, a migration service or a developer's script.

Do customer passwords transfer from Shopify to WooCommerce?

No. Shopify doesn't export passwords, and its newer customer accounts sign in with an emailed code and have no password. On WooCommerce, customers set a new password from a reset email.

Can I move Shopify subscriptions and gift cards to WooCommerce?

Subscriptions can move with WooCommerce Subscriptions ($279 a year), but saved payment details depend on the payment processors, so confirm with them first. Gift card balances are reissued as new codes, because Shopify's export shows only the last 4 characters of each code.

What hosting does a WooCommerce store need, and what does it cost?

A host with current PHP, caching that works with a cart and checkout, daily backups and free SSL. At renewal prices that's about $17 to $45 a month on shared WooCommerce hosting and about $28 to $35 a month for entry-level managed hosting.

How long until the migration pays for itself?

Divide the one-time migration cost by your monthly saving. Under 12 months is a strong case. Over 24 months means the move should be for control and flexibility, not cost.

How long does a Shopify to WooCommerce migration take?

A straightforward store moves in days, including a test import and your review. Large catalogs, many apps or a new design take a few weeks. The timeline comes with the quote.

When to get help

If your store has a standard theme, a few apps and no subscriptions, you can do much of this yourself with the tools above. When there are subscriptions, custom checkout logic, integrations or years of SEO to protect, the risk is in the details, and that's the work I do. See my Shopify to WooCommerce migration service for what's included, or send me your store URL for a free audit and a written quote within 24 hours. Going the other way? Read the cost to migrate WooCommerce to Shopify.