Shopify vs a custom store

How do Shopify and a custom store really differ?

Both let you sell online, so on the surface they look alike. The difference is in the model underneath, and that's the one that really affects your pocket and your control over your business.

• Shopify is a rental platform: you pay a monthly plan fee to use its system and, on top of that, a fee on every sale that goes through its gateway. Your store lives inside its infrastructure and its rules. In return, you get everything set up and ready, with a dashboard for you to handle.
• A custom store is code built for you, hosted on your own domain. You don't rent anything or pay a percentage for selling: the website is yours. In return, someone has to build it and maintain it well, which is exactly what we do at Zenith.

Neither is "better" in the abstract. They're two different models, and the right one depends on your catalogue, your margin and how much you want to depend on someone else's platform.

How much does each model cost? Let's talk with real data

We're not going to invent Shopify figures to scare you. Its per-sale fee is public and we put it down exactly as it is, because that "small" percentage stays with you on every order for years and it's worth keeping in plain sight.

That fee is the platform's, not the bank's. The bank or gateway fee (taking card, Bizum or PayPal) exists in any system, including a custom store, and it's legitimate: someone processes the payment. What changes between one model and the other is whether, on top of that, they take a percentage for using their shopfront. If you want to see the full breakdown of what drives a store's price, it's in how much an online store costs.

Comparison: Shopify versus a custom Zenith store

This is the table that matters. Pay attention above all to the two rows that weigh most in the long run: the per-sale fee and who the store belongs to.

The fee figure matters, but the heart of it is something else: who the store belongs to and who you depend on. That's the real decision behind "Shopify or custom".

Who does Shopify suit, and who does a custom store suit?

Without bad-mouthing anyone: each model has its place. We tell you straight so you can choose with the maths done.

1. Shopify suits you if you want to set it up yourself, work the dashboard daily and get going fast without depending on anyone, and in return you take on the plan fee and the fee on every sale. It's a valid model and it works for plenty of people.
2. A custom store suits you if you prefer the website to be truly yours, on your domain, without paying a percentage for selling, and you'd rather not touch anything because someone runs it for you. That's Zenith's managed model.
3. If your margin is tight, that 2.1 %–1.6 % per sale weighs more the more you sell: a fixed fee is predictable, a per-sale fee grows in exactly the month you bill the most. Do the maths with your real numbers before deciding.

If what worries you most is not losing margin on every order, we go deeper in online store with no fees. And to see everything the service covers, go back to online stores.

What will we NOT promise you?

Comparing well isn't selling hot air. That's why we make clear what we'll never say:

• We won't tell you that a custom store "sells more than Shopify". Removing the per-sale fee improves your margin per order, which is already something concrete, but selling depends on your product, your price and your market, not on the tool.
• We don't sell a "store that sells, guaranteed" or "pay on results". It would be dishonest, because the result doesn't depend on us alone.
• We won't bad-mouth Shopify or any platform. Its fee-plus-commission model is legitimate and works for plenty of people. We just give you the data so you can compare.
• We don't pretend that with a custom store all fees disappear: the bank or gateway one is still there, just as on Shopify. What we remove is the platform's per-sale fee.

And WooCommerce or PrestaShop? It's not only a choice between Shopify and custom

When someone is looking for what to build their store with, they almost never compare just Shopify against "custom". Also on the table are WooCommerce (the store plugin for WordPress) and PrestaShop, two systems widely used in Spain. It's worth knowing where each one fits before deciding, because they don't resemble Shopify's rental model.

WooCommerce and PrestaShop are open-source software: the program itself is free and they don't charge you a per-sale fee. But "free" refers only to the software. You need hosting that can cope, you install it, configure it, keep it updated and sort out the failures and security yourself. It's powerful and the store is yours, but the technical work falls on someone: either you do it, or you pay whoever does.

Here's the fundamental difference with Zenith. A custom store of ours shares the good side of WooCommerce or PrestaShop — the website is yours, on your domain, with no platform per-sale fee — but we take the entire technical side off your hands: hosting, updates, security and maintenance are all inside the monthly fee. You don't touch a dashboard or even hear about a plugin that breaks.

What if I already have a store on Shopify and want to move to a custom one?

It's a more common situation than it seems: you got going fast with Shopify, you're already selling, and once you add up the plan fee plus the fee on each order you realise the percentage weighs more and more. Changing model is possible and you don't have to lose what you've already built.

What's yours can be taken with you: your product catalogue, your copy, your images and your customer list are your information, and they're exportable. What stays in Shopify is the platform itself and its way of working, because that piece is theirs, not yours. That's why we build the new store on your own domain: from there, the foundation is truly yours.

We're not going to promise you that migrating will make you sell more, or that it's a magic click. Rebuilding a store with its catalogue takes work and is best done sensibly so you don't lose any ranking you already have on Google. What is concrete: you stop paying a platform per-sale fee and the website becomes yours. If you like, we do the maths together with your numbers before moving anything.

Does the platform I choose affect SEO and showing up in AI (ChatGPT, Gemini)?

Plenty of people ask whether building the store on Shopify, on WooCommerce or custom changes its position on Google. The honest answer: the platform, by itself, doesn't put you at the top. Google ranks by relevance, content and experience, not by the brand of the system underneath. No tool "ranks on its own".

What does matter is the technical side the platform lets you control: page load speed, a clean URL structure, the copy on every product page, structured data and being able to adapt each page to what people search for. In a closed-template model you touch what the system allows; in a custom store we control all of that at code level, without fighting a template's limits.

And there's a new front that almost no one covers yet: showing up when someone asks an AI assistant like ChatGPT about products. According to the CNMC Household Panel (Q2-2025, published in October 2025), more than 35% of internet users in Spain already use artificial intelligence tools, and ChatGPT is the most used, at 30.6%. Whether your store is well built and legible for those systems is starting to matter. Here too we don't promise a position or a guaranteed mention: we do the work to make it possible, not to sell you a spot.