Is Shopify genuinely cheaper in total cost of ownership than BigCommerce Enterprise or Adobe Commerce at the same $50M/year GMV, once all fees are counted?
Short answer
Shopify Plus cannot be shown cheaper in total cost of ownership at $50M a year, because no vendor publishes the price at that size. Plus starts at $2,300 a month on a 3-year term (shopify.com/plus/pricing, October 2026). BigCommerce Performance, formerly Enterprise, starts at $1,499 a month billed annually (bigcommerce.com/pricing, October 2026). Adobe publishes no Adobe Commerce price (business.adobe.com, October 2026).
- Shopify Plus entry price
- $2,300 a month on a 3-year term$2,500 on a 1-year term. Shopify adds that more complex, higher volume businesses switch to a variable platform fee, and publishes no threshold.Source: Shopify (Shopify Plus pricing)
- BigCommerce Performance entry price
- From $1,499 a month, billed annuallyPerformance is the plan BigCommerce called Enterprise until 1 June 2026. Scale-plan stores move onto it automatically once trailing 12-month GMV reaches $2 million.Sources: BigCommerce (Pricing and Plan Information, 2026 Pricing Update (Fees Explained))
- Adobe Commerce price
- Not publishedAll three editions (Cloud Service, Cloud and Optimizer) show “Get pricing” and no figure.Source: Adobe (Adobe Commerce Product Pricing)
- Published US card rates
- Plus from 2.25% + 30¢; BigCommerce Performance 2.39% + $0.30Shopify Payments standard cards on Plus, and BigCommerce Payments cards on the Scale and Performance plans, both for US merchants. Shopify says Plus card rates vary by country.Sources: Shopify (Pricing, Shopify Plus pricing); BigCommerce (BigCommerce Payments)
Deploi’s call
Shopify Plus cannot be shown cheaper in total cost of ownership than BigCommerce Performance or Adobe Commerce at $50M a year until all three vendors quote in writing. Ask each for the same ten cost lines on the same term, from platform fee and card rates to hosting and exit. A vendor that will not commit its payment-processing rates in writing has told you more than a spreadsheet would.
WaitSkip the three-platform comparison while
- The driver is a capability, such as business-to-business (B2B) depth, rather than cost.
- Your current platform contract has more than a year to run.
- You hold fewer than three written quotes, because one quote against two published entry prices is not a comparison.
DependsGet all three quotes in writing when
- Your current contract renews within the year, so early termination stops being the largest line.
- A hard requirement sits outside software as a service (SaaS), such as self-managed hosting, or your organization already runs Adobe’s wider stack (Deploi decision record, October 2026).
- Every vendor will quote the same ten lines on the same term, with licence, implementation and exit terms in one number.
Basis: Adobe Commerce vs. Shopify Plus: Do You Need an Enterprise Platform?, our Build vs. Buy decision record, scored WAIT.
What does each platform publish about its price at $50M a year?
At $50M a year, Shopify Plus and BigCommerce Performance publish only an entry plan price, and Adobe shows no price for Adobe Commerce (shopify.com/plus/pricing, BigCommerce, Adobe, October 2026). The Advanced versus Plus arithmetic at $500K a month can run on Shopify's printed prices. At $50M a year, sales sets most inputs on all three platforms, so the table holds only what each vendor prints.
| Platform | Published plan price (USD) | Published payment terms | Left to sales |
|---|---|---|---|
| Shopify Plus | From $2,300 a month on a 3-year term, $2,500 on a 1-year term | Standard cards from 2.25% + 30¢, premium cards 2.95% + 30¢; 0.2% on third-party processors | A variable platform fee “for more complex business structures”; card rates outside the US |
| BigCommerce Performance | From $1,499 a month, billed annually | Cards 2.39% + $0.30 through BigCommerce Payments for eligible US merchants; no Open Payment Provider fee under contract | Pricing “tailored to each merchant’s needs” and “Custom payment terms that fit your volume” |
| Adobe Commerce | Not published; “Get pricing” on all three editions | Not published | Every line |
Can anyone build an honest total cost of ownership figure at $50M a year?
No one outside the three sales teams can build an honest total cost of ownership figure at $50M a year, because each vendor sets that price in a contract. Shopify says “More complex, higher volume businesses switch to a variable platform fee based on their revenue and business model” and publishes no threshold for the switch (shopify.com/plus/pricing, October 2026). BigCommerce moves a Scale-plan store onto Performance automatically once its trailing 12-month gross merchandise volume (GMV) reaches $2 million (BigCommerce, October 2026). Asked for the base cost of Performance, BigCommerce offers “pricing tailored to each merchant’s needs” (BigCommerce, October 2026). Adobe shows “Get pricing” on every Adobe Commerce edition and no figure (Adobe, October 2026).
So any published Shopify, BigCommerce or Adobe Commerce total at $50M a year rests on quotes its author could not verify. We do not model one, because a modelled total at this scale is a guess with a decimal point.
Which fee lines should each vendor quote in writing?
Each vendor should quote five fee lines in writing on the same term: the platform fee, any revenue formula, payment processing, overage fees and third-party processor fees. Pricing pages show these lines only in part, so the quote has to fill them.
- Platform fee, with the term length and the renewal uplift cap.
- The revenue formula, if any. Ask at what gross merchandise volume (GMV) your fee stops being fixed. Shopify says higher-volume businesses switch to a variable fee, but not when (shopify.com/plus/pricing, October 2026).
- Payment processing, as a committed rate and fixed fee per card type and region. Shopify prints US Plus rates (shopify.com/pricing, October 2026) and sends other countries to sales (shopify.com/plus/pricing, October 2026). The card rate is also the first lever in a Plus negotiation.
- Overage and above-cap fees. BigCommerce’s Scale plan charges “0.9% on GMV above cap”, which is the kind of fee to ask every vendor about (BigCommerce, October 2026).
- Third-party processor fees. Shopify charges 0.2% on Plus (shopify.com/pricing, October 2026). BigCommerce’s Open Payment Provider fee is 2.0%, 1.0% and 0.6% on Core, Growth and Scale, and none on Performance under contract (BigCommerce, October 2026).
Which cost lines does a total cost of ownership need beyond fees?
A total cost of ownership needs five cost lines beyond fees: hosting, version upgrades, apps, implementation and exit. The first two decide who carries the platform’s risk, and you can judge them before any quote arrives.
- Hosting, infrastructure and Payment Card Industry (PCI) scope. Shopify includes hosting with every plan and says “stores powered by Shopify are PCI compliant by default” (shopify.com/pricing, October 2026). BigCommerce calls itself “Open SaaS”, software as a service running on Google Cloud Platform (BigCommerce, October 2026).
- Version upgrades. Shopify releases a new application programming interface (API) version every three months and supports each for at least 12 months (Shopify developer docs, October 2026).
- Apps, extensions and marketplace fees at your volumes, because app prices at mid-market volumes are not entry-tier prices.
- Implementation and integration, priced apart from the licence.
- Exit: the data export format, the notice period and what happens to your storefront code.
Adobe Commerce splits the first two lines by edition. Adobe Commerce as a Cloud Service has “the latest security patches automatically applied for you” (Adobe Experience League, October 2026). On Adobe Commerce on Cloud and on-premises, each version gets a three-year standard support window, so upgrades become projects on your calendar (Adobe Experience League, October 2026). What self-hosted Adobe Commerce adds in hosting, patching and PCI work has its own answer.
When should you skip the three-platform comparison?
Skip the three-platform comparison of Shopify Plus, BigCommerce Performance and Adobe Commerce when cost is not the real driver, when you hold fewer than three written quotes, or when your current contract has more than a year to run.
Deploi’s point of view
Our own position, from building on Shopify. Kept apart from the sourced facts above.
- What we’ve seen
- TCO decks in this space compare a published Shopify floor against a modelled Adobe figure and call the gap a finding. The Adobe figure is always the one with no source, because there is no source to have.
- Where we disagree
- The standard move is to model the unpublished numbers so the comparison can be completed. We think completing the comparison is the failure. Leaving the cell empty and naming which vendor left it empty is the more useful output, and it is the one that changes how the negotiation goes.
- What this page adds
- That at $50M a year the published arithmetic the parent runs for Advanced and Plus stops working: BigCommerce Performance publishes only an entry price, Adobe Commerce publishes none and Shopify moves higher-volume businesses to an unpriced variable fee, so ten cost lines quoted in writing replace the spreadsheet.
Decision records behind this answer
When this answer changes
- Adobe publishes a price for any Adobe Commerce edition.
- BigCommerce changes the Performance entry price of $1,499 a month, its $2 million automatic upgrade threshold, its Open Payment Provider fees or its BigCommerce Payments card rates.
- Shopify publishes a threshold or rate for the Plus variable platform fee, or changes the $2,300 and $2,500 term prices.
- Your current platform contract enters its final year, which makes the three-quote comparison worth running.
- A requirement appears that software as a service cannot meet, such as self-managed hosting or data residency your integrator must control.
Related questions
- What's the real total cost of ownership difference between self-hosted Adobe Commerce and Shopify Plus once hosting, security, and PCI compliance are included?
Self-hosted Adobe Commerce has no published price, so its total cost of ownership gap with Shopify Plus isn't one number (Adobe's pricing page, October 2026).
- What's the realistic all-in monthly TCO for a mid-market Shopify Plus merchant running a minimal app stack (just email and reviews) versus one running 15+ apps?
A 15-app Shopify Plus stack costs more than an email-and-reviews stack by the sum of the extra apps.
- For a brand doing $40M-$100M with 30%+ B2B/wholesale, does the Adobe Commerce B2B depth justify staying off Shopify Plus?
Adobe Commerce's business-to-business (B2B) depth justifies staying off Shopify Plus at $40M to $100M only when negotiated orders carry most wholesale revenue.
Sources
Every figure on this page traces to one of these. Official and vendor pages are checked on the date shown; Deploi records are our own published decisions.
- Shopify, Shopify Plus pricing
- Shopify, Pricing
- BigCommerce, Pricing and Plan Information
- BigCommerce, 2026 Pricing Update (Fees Explained)
- BigCommerce, Enterprise Pricing FAQs
- Adobe, Adobe Commerce Product Pricing
- Shopify developer docs, About Shopify API versioning
- Adobe Experience League, Adobe Commerce lifecycle policy
- Adobe Experience League, Adobe Commerce as a Cloud Service overview
- BigCommerce, BigCommerce Payments
- Deploi Build vs. Buy, Adobe Commerce vs. Shopify Plus: Do You Need an Enterprise Platform?