BigCommerce: What It Is, How It Works, and What It Costs
If you want a hosted store that includes more features out of the box, so you buy fewer add-on apps, BigCommerce is worth a look. It sits in the same space as Shopify: you pay a monthly fee and the platform handles the hosting, the checkout, and the tools to run the store. This page explains what BigCommerce is, how store owners actually use it, what the 2026 plans and fees cost, and where it falls short.
What BigCommerce Is
BigCommerce is a hosted platform for building and running an online store. You pay a monthly fee, and it gives you the website, the checkout, the product catalog, and the tools to manage orders and inventory. Because it is hosted, you don’t buy servers or install software. You log into a dashboard from a browser, add your products, pick a theme, and go live.
BigCommerce launched in 2009 and is used by a wide mix of sellers, from small shops to larger brands. It handles both direct-to-consumer and wholesale (B2B) selling from the same system. One thing that sets it apart is how much comes built in. Product reviews, real-time shipping quotes, and multi-channel selling are included on every plan, where some rivals make you add an app for each.
How People Use It
A typical setup goes like this. You sign up, pick a plan, and land in the dashboard. You add products with photos, prices, and stock counts. You pick a theme and adjust the colors, fonts, and layout. You set up shipping and taxes, then connect a payment method so customers can check out.
After launch, the dashboard is where you work each day. You process orders, manage stock, reply to customers, and check reports. BigCommerce leans on built-in tools rather than a large app library, so a lot of what you need is already there. It also supports selling across several channels at once, so you can list products on your own site plus places like Amazon and eBay and manage them from one place.
BigCommerce Plans and Pricing
BigCommerce changed its plans on June 1, 2026. The tiers were renamed, the sales limits were lowered, and a new payment fee was added. Here are the current monthly prices.
- Core — $39/month ($29 annually). For newer or smaller stores. Auto-upgrades once your trailing 12-month sales pass $30,000.
- Growth — $105/month ($79 annually). Adds abandoned cart recovery and customer segmentation. Upgrades once sales pass $100,000.
- Scale — $399/month ($299 annually). For higher-volume stores. Above $33,333 in monthly sales, a 0.9% fee applies to the extra.
- Performance — custom, from about $1,499/month. For large operations and B2B sellers who need features like per-customer price lists. This was formerly the Enterprise plan.
Your plan is tied to your sales volume, not just the features you pick. As your trailing 12-month sales cross a threshold, BigCommerce moves you up a tier automatically. The June 2026 change lowered those thresholds, so the same sales now push you to a higher plan sooner than before. Taxes and shipping charges count toward the total.
The Open Payment Provider Fee
This is the biggest change from 2026, and it’s worth understanding. BigCommerce keeps a list of embedded payment providers, such as Stripe, PayPal, and Adyen. If you take payments through one of those, you pay nothing extra. If you use a provider that isn’t on the list, BigCommerce adds a fee on those orders: 2% on Core, 1% on Growth, and 0.6% on Scale. Performance stores can usually negotiate it away.
The fee is charged per order, based on which provider actually processed it. Offering an embedded option at checkout doesn’t help if the customer pays through an outside one. It also hits offline and purchase-order payments, which matters for B2B sellers. For most stores using Stripe, PayPal, or BigCommerce Payments, though, everyday card sales avoid it.
Apps and Themes
BigCommerce covers a lot in its core, and the app marketplace fills the rest. It lists over 1,200 apps for things like email marketing, subscriptions, loyalty programs, and accounting. This is smaller than Shopify’s library, but it covers the main categories. Themes control how your store looks, with free and paid options.
Because so much is built in, many stores need fewer apps than they would on other platforms, which can keep the running cost down. The trade-off is a smaller selection when you do want something specific.
Where BigCommerce Falls Short
BigCommerce is not the right fit for everyone. The June 2026 changes ended its long-standing “no transaction fees” pitch, so on payment cost it now sits close to Shopify. The lowered sales thresholds also mean growing stores hit the next price tier sooner, which can make costs harder to predict. A store selling $28,000 in product can cross the $30,000 Core limit on tax and shipping alone.
There are product limits too. BigCommerce caps a single product at 600 variants, which can be tight for stores with many size, color, and style combinations. Its app library is smaller than Shopify’s, and subscriptions rely on third-party apps rather than a built-in tool. None of this rules it out, but it shapes who it suits.
Is BigCommerce Worth It?
BigCommerce makes sense if you want a hosted store with more built in, sell across several channels, or run both B2C and B2B from one system. The included features can mean fewer apps and a lower running cost than rivals. The main things to weigh are the sales-based pricing, which can climb as you grow, and the payment fee if you use a provider outside the embedded list. For a mid-sized or multi-channel seller who wants tools built in rather than bolted on, it’s a solid option. For a very small store or one that needs a huge app selection, another platform may fit better.
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