Amid COVID-19, e-commerce platforms are redefining the customer shopping experience. Many direct-to-consumer (D2C), B2B, SMEs and large enterprises are rapidly moving to drive business growth online. Those businesses who want a future-proof solution are already heading toward a headless e-commerce solution. During their search, they frequently come across two contenders — Fabric and Shopify Plus.
Shopify Plus is designed for high-growth, high-volume enterprises and the fastest-growing brands that generate over $500,000 per year in revenue. Conversely, Fabric is developed for mid-market business to empower their business growth with microservices and APIs. It creates superior omnichannel buying experiences with headless commerce technology.
What is Fabric?
Fabric is a modern and modular headless e-commerce platform best for retailers, D2C and B2B brands. You can achieve time-to-value gain, modular design and quick scaling through Fabric.
SMEs can leverage Fabric to build e-commerce solutions with Fabric APIs and microservices. Fabric sits on serverless technology, giving it the power to scale infinitely. It seeks to differentiate from traditional commerce through:
- Secured and scalable SaaS
- A full suite of omnichannel headless APIs and microservices
- Quick deployment and transition
- Customizable headless CMS
What is Shopify Plus?
Shopify Plus is a commerce platform specifically designed for high-volume enterprises. Its core advantages are scalability, customizability, speed and agility.
Shopify Plus is also a SaaS e-commerce platform that powers over 7,000 fastest growing brands. It provides unlimited bandwidth with unlimited sales capacity and nearly 100% uptime. There are plenty of features to make it a top choice:
- Unlimited extensions, integrations and customization through apps
- Launch Manager and Merchant Success Manager for exceptional customer support
- Shopify Flow automation tool to manage monotonous task automatically
Fabric vs Shopify Plus
If you’re trying to find the best e-commerce platform for your growing business, read on as we discuss Fabric vs. Shopify Plus.
Flexible platform
Fabric platform provides a full suite of headless e-commerce to build and enrich your customer experience. Fabric’s flexibility allows businesses to add components or personalize any features without a team of engineers. With Fabric, you can launch a new site within weeks without interrupting your current e-commerce platform’s performance.
Shopify Plus also offers a fantastic flexibility option with real-time integration and a higher API limit. It allows accessing 3rd-party logistics and over 1,500 apps from Shopify Plus. You also get a fantastic scope to customize your online store. However, enterprise-level businesses are the main customers of Shopify Plus. Shopify Plus also requires prior knowledge of Shopify’s language, Liquid.
Best: Fabric
Better scalability
Shopify Plus can handle the heavy traffic, whether it’s a flash sale, Black Friday sale, or any high-volume transactions. It can handle high sales volume, unlimited products and bandwidth requirements without crashing. It’s super scalable and provides the fastest-growing experience to enterprise-level businesses.
Fabric is also a scalable platform developed for mid-market businesses. It uses serverless and cloud-first technology, which means you can quickly scale up or down according to your need.
Best: Both
Cheaper
Fabric operates on a SaaS platform where you need to pay a monthly fee. Its pricing starts at $6,000 per month. Unlike Shopify Plus, you get to choose the service that you want. So, you don’t need to pay for an entire platform.
Shopify Plus offers a variable price per plan. A basic Shopify Plus plan starts at $2,000 per month, but its costs increase with the business requirements’ complexity.
Best: Shopify
Better features
Shopify Plus powers the world’s fastest-growing e-commerce stores. It has some fantastic features like unlimited bandwidth, which can handle around 8,000 checkouts per minute. Shopify Plus provides a dedicated launch and merchant success manager so that you can focus on growing your business without any limitations.
Fabric is an open and modular platform that combines powerful APIs and microservices to drive SME growth. It allows you to quickly transition from a traditional e-commerce platform with the fastest time-to-value and match e-commerce’s ever-changing pace.
Best: Both
Better support
Being associated with Shopify Plus, merchants and businesses get first-in-line 24/7 priority support. As a Shopify Plus customer, you get its premium support from Merchant Success Manager and Launch Manager. These support managers help your business grow by providing new business strategies or free consultation.
Fabric claims to take away the burden of engineering from retailers and SMEs. Fabric provides live chat, knowledge base and FAQs to help its merchants whenever and wherever. However, Shopify Plus has the upper hand in customer support with its 24/7 support network and one-on-one support from support managers.
Best: Shopify Plus
Consider Size and Goals
Shopify Plus redefines e-commerce for high-growth and large volume merchants to manage their e-commerce without headaches. If you are generating revenue over $500,000 per year, Shopify Plus can be an excellent solution.
Fabric platform is a modular commerce platform suitable for retailers, D2C and B2B mid-market businesses. It seamlessly re-platforms your legacy e-commerce with headless APIs and microservices. Fabric is an ideal solution for mid-market organizations.
Both Fabric and Shopify Plus allow businesses to speed up digital revenue nearly up to threefold and increase online store growth. Both combine robust APIs with intuitive business applications built as SaaS. But there are areas where one is better than the other. So, opt for the one that helps your weakest link.
