How much does an ecommerce store cost in 2023? All you need to know

The exact cost of an online store varies based on different factors like the ecommerce platform, hosting, design, and functionality.

If you’re here for an answer — here’s what you need to know:

You can build an online store for as little as $300 or upwards of $9,000 using any ecommerce solution like Shopify, WooCommerce, or Magento. Your budget determines the store size, design, functionality, and other factors.

Need specifics? Read the rest of my guide to find out. I’ll help you figure out how much money you need to build an online store.

Factors that influence the initial cost of starting an ecommerce store

Now is a great time to get started with ecommerce because Statista predicts ecommerce sales worldwide will cross $6.9 trillion by 2024. But starting an online business comes with a price tag. Here’s what you need to know about it.

The factors that influence the cost of an ecommerce website are:

1. Business model.
2. Business registration and compliance costs.
3. Ecommerce platform.
4. Domain name.
5. Website hosting.
6. Website design.
7. SSL certificate.
8. Extensions and integrations.
9. Payment methods.
10. Marketing and SEO.

Let’s break it down.

1. Business model

A business model is the way your online store generates income. In other words, it’s your money-making strategy.

Different business models require different levels of investment in your online store. For instance, if you plan to sell physical products, you’ll need to invest in inventory, shipping and handling, and product photography.

But if you plan to offer digital products or services, your investment in inventory and shipping might be lower. You’ll still need to invest in other areas like content creation and customer support, but those will cost much less if you do most of it yourself.

It’s generally cheaper to start a dropshipping or digital product store than it is to start a private-label product store. With dropshipping and self-made digital products, you don’t need to worry about inventory or fulfillment — your supplier handles that for you.

Private labeled products will require more upfront investment into manufacturing, freight, and transport costs. But private labeled products offer high profit margins. You won’t get anywhere close to those numbers with dropshipping alone.

Here’s a breakdown of the minimum investment required for different business models:

1. Dropshipping business:

2. Digital products business:

3. Private labeled products business (B2B, B2C, D2C):

2. Business registration and compliance costs

When starting an online store, you’ll need to register your business in the country or state where you’ll operate. The registration cost will vary based on that but typically ranges from $50 to $500 for most places.

If you’re in the US, you’ll also need to obtain a free federal tax ID number, also known as an Employer Identification Number (EIN), from the IRS. Plus, regardless of whether you’re selling online or offline, you’ll need to comply with various federal, state, and local regulations.

Those costs can vary significantly, depending on your business and location. For example, sales tax registration costs about $100 in Connecticut, but it’s free in other states like Delaware and Montana.

3. Ecommerce platform

Your ecommerce platform is one of the primary factors contributing to the ecommerce website cost. Let me explain why that’s the case.

Some ecommerce platforms charge a monthly subscription fee or take a percentage of your sales as a commission. For example, Shopify’s Basic plan costs $39 per month, while their Advanced plan costs $399 per month.

In contrast, WooCommerce and Magento are free, open-source platforms, but you’ll need to pay for web hosting and other add-ons to use them.

And that’s not all. Each platform offers a different level of core functionality. That’s why, it’s important to choose the right ecommerce platform.

WooCommerce, for instance, doesn’t support variation swatches by default, whereas Magento does. Similarly, Shopify doesn’t let you customize the URL structure, but Magento and WooCommerce allow it.

And that’s not all.

Some platforms add paywalls for certain features. For example, BigCommerce has many awesome built-in features, but advanced features like abandoned cart recovery are only available on higher-tier plans.

Ease-of-use also plays a huge role in the online store cost. For example, let’s say you aren’t tech-savvy, but you choose Magento as your ecommerce platform. You’ll spend a lot of time figuring out how to perform basic tasks like extension and theme updates.

And if that’s the case, you should use a beginner-friendly platform like Shopify that empowers you to sell online without technical skills.

Want to learn more about the best ecommerce platforms? Read my guide on the top 10 ecommerce platforms to learn which one you should choose and why.

Here’s an overview of the cost of different ecommerce platforms:

Based on these numbers, you can expect to spend anywhere from $33 to over $399 on your ecommerce platform alone. That cost doesn’t include hosting or design fees. I’ll get to those in a bit.

4. Domain name

Once you settle on an ecommerce platform, you’ll need a domain name to help customers reach your website. Let’s look at how that will impact your ecommerce website cost.

The cost of a domain name usually varies based on the top-level domain (TLD) you choose. For example, a .com TLD typically costs around $10 to $15 per year, while a more specialized TLD like .store or .shop can cost upwards of $30 to $50 per year.

Besides the TLD, you’ll also find premium domains cost hundreds if not thousands of dollars for some word combinations. The more brandable a domain is, the higher its cost will be.

The domain name doesn’t really impact the success of your online business.

Yes, a great domain name might help you build a brand and convey trust and professionalism. But you shouldn’t spend too much on it, especially if you can’t afford it. Your products, customer service, and store design have a much bigger impact on the success of your business.

So budget at least $20 for your domain name.

If you need help with choosing a domain name, make sure you read my guide on picking a domain name where I share my 10-step process for choosing a domain name.

5. Website hosting

Website hosting is a service that lets you rent space on a server to store files and data. The cost for that service generally depends on the ecommerce platform, hosting provider, and type of hosting plan.

If you choose a SaaS solution like Shopify or BigCommerce, you won’t need to worry about website hosting. The platform will include the hosting costs in its monthly subscription plan.

But let’s say you choose an open-source platform like WooCommerce or Magento. In that case, you’ll need to pay for hosting separately, and the costs for that can vary from as little as $2.49 to several hundred dollars per month, depending on your store size.

Here’s a breakdown of the hosting costs for different ecommerce platforms:

Based on those numbers, you should expect to spend at least $30 per month for a good managed hosting provider.

For more details about hosting online store, consider reading my guide on ecommerce hosting. I explain the basics and share the top 3 choices for hosting online stores.

6. SSL certificate

SSL certificates encrypt and protect sensitive information, such as payment details, login credentials, and other personal data. Not only that, but they also help build trust with customers.

When customers see the padlock icon and “https” in their browser address bar, they know that your website is legitimate and trustworthy. That alone can be the difference between a sale and a cart abandonment at times.

The good news is that no matter what you’re using, an open source or SaaS ecommerce platform, SSL certificates are often free. SaaS solutions like Shopify and Wix will give you a free SSL certificate with your subscription plan whereas you can generate a free SSL certificate using services like Let’s Encrypt if you’re hosting an online store yourself.

However, if you prefer, you can also purchase an SSL certificate. Depending on the type, SSL certificates can cost anywhere from $25 to over $1,500 per year.

That said, in most cases, you won’t need to spend anything on an SSL certificate.

7. Website design

Website design also impacts the overall cost of building an online store. However, this cost usually depends on several factors, such as the design complexity, number of pages, and features you want to include.

Regardless of which ecommerce platform you choose, you’ll have access to a wide range of pre-designed templates. However, there won’t be too many free options available. So expect to spend around $150 to $200 for a paid theme.

You can settle for a free theme until your website generates revenue if you’re on a budget. But if you have the resources, I strongly recommend investing in a paid theme or a professionally designed custom theme.

Website design and development costs usually vary based on the experience and location of the designer and developer. But you should expect to spend at least $2,500 to $10,000 for a professionally designed store.

That isn’t to say you need to spend that amount. A good, off-the-shelf theme will go a long way and serve your business for years. However, a custom-built design can give you an edge over your competitors.

So the takeaway for website design costs is: you should expect to spend anywhere from $0 to $200, on average, on your store design.

8. Extensions and integrations

Add-ons and extensions are absolutely essential to customizing your online store to meet your business needs. They improve your online store’s customer experience and help you optimize business workflows.

Every major ecommerce platform offers a massive collection of free and paid extensions besides an ecosystem of developers that will help you build anything you need. Let’s look at some numbers for Shopify, WooCommerce, and Magento and how they add up.

Shopify’s app store offers over 8,000 free and paid extensions for Shopify stores. The prices for their apps vary based on specific features and functionalities they add to your store.

For instance, an SEO app like Yoast SEO costs around $19 per month. In contrast, a landing page builder app like Shopgun can cost as much as $499 per month.

WordPress’s ecosystem also has similarly priced plugins for WooCommerce. However, I’ve found that there are nearly ten times more free plugins for WooCommerce than for any other platform on the market.

Magento’s extensions are usually priced a lot higher than Shopify and WooCommerce. On average, you should expect to spend upwards of $300 per extension for the first year with Magento.

9. Payment methods

Payment processors help you accept payments from your customers securely and efficiently. In exchange for their service, they charge you some fees, which can add to the cost of an ecommerce store.

The payment methods you can offer depend on factors such as the location of your business and the ecommerce platform you use.

Shopify, for example, provides a payment processing platform, Shopify Payments, which is available in select countries. You can expect to pay between 2.4% and 2.9%, plus a $0.30 fee for each transaction.

Although Shopify allows other payment gateways like PayPal and Stripe, the platform charges an additional 1% to 2% on each transaction for that convenience. That’s on top of the payment processing fees you’ll pay the third-party provider.

On the other hand, WooCommerce and Magento let you accept payments using a processor of your choice. There are no extra charges besides those charged by the processor, which is usually around $2.9% +$0.30 per transaction.

In most cases, you won’t need to pay any monthly fees to use a payment processor. You might only pay more when you need something beyond the basics.

For example, Stripe charges an extra 0.5% per transaction to calculate taxes. If your ecommerce platform does that on its own, you won’t need to worry about it.

If you aren’t using a platform with a default payment gateway like Shopify, I recommend choosing a payment processor like Stripe or PayPal to keep your ecommerce website setup costs low.

10. Marketing and SEO

Driving traffic to generate sales is fundamental to running an online business. Without it, your website won’t reach the right audience or become profitable.

There’s a lot you can do when it comes to marketing your online store and optimizing it for search engines. But to keep things simple, here’s a marketing strategy that sticks to the basics to give you a realistic idea of the costs:

1. Write great copy: There’s no substitute for good website copy. Budget anywhere from $10 to $50 per product description and around $100 on average for well-written landing page copy. Remember that the longer the page is, the higher those costs will be.
2. Invest in basic SEO: You don’t need to pay a marketing agency for basic SEO work. Install a good SEO extension and spend some time reading free resources from Ahrefs and Semrush. Those will give you a solid start without spending any money.
3. Use social media: Create accounts on relevant social media platforms and regularly post engaging content related to your products. Use hashtags and join relevant groups to expand your reach for free.
4. Collaborate with influencers: Find influencers in your niche and collaborate with them to promote your products. This could be through sponsored posts or product reviews. But this is optional since you might need to invest anywhere from a couple hundred dollars to a few thousand dollars.
5. Run targeted ads: Use platforms like Facebook Ads or Google Ads to run targeted ads that will reach potential customers based on demographics, interests, and behavior. A budget of $50 per day is a great place to start. It’ll get you some quick sales and boost your motivation.
6. Offer discounts and promotions: Encourage people to visit your store by offering exclusive discounts and promotions. Make sure you share those deals on your social media profiles. You can work the discounts into your margins.

Remember, except for ads and influencer marketing, you can do almost everything else for free.

However, if you have some money to spare, you can consider picking up an AI SEO tool subscription and use ChatGPT for ecommerce tasks like writing product descriptions and social media posts.

Adding it all up: Here’s what an ecommerce store costs in 2026

I’ve broken down the different cost considerations for building an ecommerce website and explained everything you need to know about them. Here’s a detailed breakdown summarizing the costs, including the average and minimum cost of an ecommerce website:

Remember, these costs are estimates. You can decide how much or how little you want to spend based on your budget. For example, if you use a free theme and extensions, you’ll bring down the total startup costs to as little as $300.

Further, if you choose not to invest in ads or other forms of paid marketing, you can reduce your budget even further.

Wrapping it up

I hope you found this ecommerce store cost explanation useful. I’ve tried my best to cover all bases with the latest costs for building an online store.

As mentioned above, the exact numbers will vary depending on your choices. However, you should expect to spend at least $300 in your first year.

If you have any other questions or suggestions, leave them in the comments below and make sure you sign up for our newsletter to keep up with the latest developments in the ecommerce industry.