Quick answer
For most handmade sellers, Shopify is the safe choice: every plan includes inventory, automated sales tax and selling on social and marketplaces, from $29 a month billed yearly. Square's free plan suits makers who also sell at markets, and Wix and Squarespace suit a brand site with a shop inside.
WordPress.com Commerce ($45 a month billed yearly) runs WooCommerce with 0% transaction fees and a full site export. Hostinger is the cheapest way in, if you pay for years upfront.
An AI app builder (Capacity, which we make, Lovable or Bolt.new) builds a custom store from a description, with more freedom over how it looks and works, and you assemble payments, taxes and shipping yourself. Capacity takes payments through its Stripe extension; Lovable can build a custom storefront on top of a Shopify store.
| Tool | Best for | Paid plans from | Free plan | Watch out for |
|---|---|---|---|---|
 Shopify | product brands that plan to grow, online, in person and on marketplaces. | $29/month (yearly) | No, a 3-day free trial | A fee on outside payment providers |
 Square | makers who sell at markets and want a free store tied to their card reader. | $0/month (Square Free) | Yes, Square Free (processing fees only) | Card fees on every sale |
 Wix | a brand site with a store that also sells on marketplaces and social. | $17/month (yearly) | Yes, with Wix branding | Payments and bookings start on Core |
 Squarespace | a design-led shop with a small catalog. | €12/month (yearly) | No, a 14-day trial | Store and membership fees on Basic |
 WordPress.com | a WooCommerce store on managed WordPress, with plugins and a full export. | $4/month (yearly) | Yes, with ads and a subdomain | The store plan, Commerce, is $45/month (yearly) |
 Hostinger Website Builder | the cheapest store with hosting and email, paid for years upfront. | $2.99/month (48 months upfront) | No, a 14-day trial | Renews at $10.99+/month |
| Capacity | a shop inside a bigger app, or one no theme allows, built from a description. | $25/month | Web app: no. Desktop: 1 project | No built-in tax, shipping or inventory |
 Lovable | a custom storefront designed by chat, with Shopify running checkout and stock behind it. | €25/month | Yes, 5 credits a day (up to 30 a month) | Selling needs a paid Shopify plan or Stripe |
 Bolt.new | a custom store with the code in front of you and Stripe checkout. | $25/month | Yes, 1M tokens a month | Token use grows with the project |
What an online store needs. And where these tools differ.
Fees on every sale
Every store pays card processing on each order. Some platforms add their own transaction fee on top, often only on the cheapest plan or with an outside payment provider, so compare the total cost of a typical order, not the monthly price.
Stock, shipping and sales tax
Store platforms track stock, print shipping labels and work out tax at checkout, though some keep tax or live shipping rates for higher plans. In a store built with an AI app builder, you set all three up yourself.
Selling beyond your own site
Handmade products sell on Instagram, TikTok and marketplaces as much as on a website. A store that syncs those channels keeps stock and orders in one place; check whether the sync costs extra.
What a handmade shop needs
A small catalog with variants, a story behind each piece, and margins that shipping can eat. A store platform covers that. A custom store pays off when buying is unusual: made-to-order options, commissions, a members' shop.
Where the AI comes in
Store platforms now generate the store from a prompt and write product copy (Shopify's Sidekick, Wix's Aria, Hostinger AI Builder), but the checkout, tax and shipping underneath are still the platform's. AI app builders write the whole store as code.
A store platform or a custom store
A platform gives you a tested checkout, tax and shipping on day one, inside its themes and apps. A custom store built with AI is entirely yours, but you connect payments, work out tax and shipping, and test every order path before you sell.
How we compared them. The same questions for every tool.
- Fees on each sale, beyond card processing.
- Inventory, shipping and sales tax at checkout.
- Selling on Instagram, TikTok and marketplaces like Etsy.
- How the AI helps: generating the store, or building a custom one.
- What you pay each month, and what it renews at.
- How much you can change: themes and apps, or the whole store.
Store platforms
01
Shopify
Best for product brands that plan to grow, online, in person and on marketplaces.
Shopify is a commerce platform for running an online store and selling in person, on social channels, on marketplaces and in AI chats from one admin. You can generate a storefront from a prompt with its built-in AI or start from a theme, and Sidekick, its AI assistant, writes product copy, edits photos, sets up discounts and reports on sales.
Why pick it
- Online, in-person, social, marketplace and AI-chat sales run from one admin, with inventory management included.
- Automated sales tax calculations and abandoned checkout recovery are on every plan; Grow adds up to 20% off shipping and Advanced live third-party shipping rates.
- Sidekick and the AI store builder are included in every plan, with millions of AI tokens.
Watch out for
- Using a payment provider other than Shopify Payments adds a fee on each sale: 2% on Basic, 1% on Grow, 0.6% on Advanced, 0.2% on Plus.
- Orders synced from marketplaces are free up to 50 a month, then cost 1%, up to $99 a month.
- Paying monthly costs a third more than yearly ($39 instead of $29 for Basic), and Shopify's own cost guide lists paid apps and premium themes as common extra costs.
Pricing
Billed yearly: Basic $29/month, Grow $79/month (5 staff accounts), Advanced $299/month (15 staff accounts). Billed monthly: $39, $105 and $399. Plus starts at $2,300/month on a three-year term. Every plan starts with a 3-day free trial, then a reduced price for the first 3 months. Card rates with Shopify Payments drop as the plan goes up; outside payment providers add 2%, 1%, 0.6% or 0.2% per sale depending on the plan. POS Pro for retail locations is $89/month per location.
02
Square
Best for makers who sell at markets and want a free store tied to their card reader.
Square is a point-of-sale and payments platform whose plans include a website builder for an online store (the product formerly called Square Online) and online booking with Square Appointments. The site, the booking page, your items, inventory and customers stay in sync with Square's point of sale, so in-person and online sales run from one account.
Why pick it
- Square Free costs $0 a month and includes the website builder with SEO tools, an online store and a booking website; you pay only processing fees.
- Online orders share items, inventory and customers with the in-store point of sale, with pickup, local delivery and shipping labels.
Watch out for
- Every card payment has a processing fee: online, 3.3% + 30¢ on Free and 2.9% + 30¢ on Plus and Premium, plus 1.5% for cards issued outside the US.
- A custom domain, abandoned-cart emails and inventory tracking need Plus, at $49 a month per location; real-time shipping rates at checkout need Premium, at $149.
Pricing
The same plans cover the online store and Square Appointments. Square Free: $0/month, processing fees only (3.3% + 30¢ online, 2.6% + 15¢ in person). Square Plus: $49/month per location (2.9% + 30¢ online, 2.5% + 15¢ in person), adds a custom domain, expanded site customization, abandoned-cart emails, subscriptions, waitlists and class bookings. Square Premium: $149/month per location (2.9% + 30¢ online, 2.4% + 15¢ in person), adds real-time shipping rates, resource booking and 24/7 phone support. Plus and Premium have a 30-day free trial; Square Pro has custom pricing for businesses processing over $250,000 a year.
Wix is a website builder with an AI website builder: you describe the site in a prompt, then refine it with drag and drop or with Aria, its built-in AI agent. Hosting is included, and you add business tools as you need them, such as an online store, scheduling software for bookings, or a blog.
Why pick it
- From Core, sell on Google, eBay, Etsy, Amazon, Facebook, Instagram and TikTok, with orders and inventory synced to one dashboard and up to 50,000 products.
- Discounted shipping labels, abandoned-cart emails, and dropshipping or print-on-demand products if you add merch.
Watch out for
- Light can't accept payments: eCommerce starts on Core, at $29 a month billed yearly.
- Automated sales tax starts on Business ($39 a month billed yearly) and covers 100 transactions a month (500 on Business Elite).
Pricing
Free: Wix branding on a wixsite.com address. Billed yearly: Light $17/month (2 GB storage, 2 collaborators, no online payments), Core $29/month (50 GB, payments, basic eCommerce, scheduling), Business $39/month (100 GB, standard eCommerce), Business Elite $159/month (unlimited storage, advanced eCommerce). Wix shows yearly prices only; other billing periods exist. 14-day money-back guarantee.
Squarespace builds websites from templates, with built-in AI tools, a custom domain free for the first year of an annual plan, and commerce on every plan: products, services, invoices, content and memberships.
Why pick it
- Its store tools sync inventory online and in person, offer flat-rate, weight-based or real-time shipping, calculate sales tax rates automatically, and connect Printful for print-on-demand.
- Core adds professional shipping and tax services, unlimited contributors and full CSS and JavaScript customization.
Watch out for
- Basic takes a 2% online store transaction fee and 7% on digital content and memberships; Core drops the store fee to 0%.
- Card rates start at 2.0% + €0.25 on Basic and Core (shown from France), and there's no free plan, only a 14-day trial.
Pricing
Billed yearly: Basic €12/month, Core €18/month, Plus €32/month, Advanced €69/month (prices shown in euros from France; paying monthly costs up to 36% more). 14-day free trial.
05
WordPress.com
Best for a WooCommerce store on managed WordPress, with plugins and a full export.
WordPress.com is hosted, managed WordPress: themes, plugins on paid plans, and the WordPress Agent, an AI website builder that generates pages, layouts, images and copy from a prompt and keeps helping in the editor. It covers blogs, newsletters and business sites, and online stores through WooCommerce.
Why pick it
- Online stores with WooCommerce: a plugin on paid plans, pre-installed on Commerce with 0% transaction fees.
- Over 60,000 plugins on any paid plan, and you can export your full site anytime.
Watch out for
- The AI website builder needs a paid plan, has usage limits on Personal and Premium, and its build flow doesn't include ecommerce.
- The store plan, Commerce, is $45 a month billed yearly ($70 monthly); below it, standard payments carry a fee (4% on Premium, 2% on Business).
Pricing
Free: a wordpress.com subdomain, 1 GB, ads shown to visitors. Billed yearly: Personal $4/month (6 GB, custom domain free for a year, no ads, plugins), Premium $8/month (13 GB, payment buttons), Business $25/month (50 GB, developer tools), Commerce $45/month (WooCommerce store). Billed monthly: $9, $18, $40 and $70 (no free domain). Two- and three-year terms go down to $2.75/month. Excluding taxes.
06
Hostinger Website Builder
Best for the cheapest store with hosting and email, paid for years upfront.
Hostinger's website builder is part of Hostinger AI Builder, which has two modes: Manual, where AI generates a site from your description and you refine it with drag and drop, and Agentic, where you build websites and web apps by chatting with AI. Plans bundle hosting, and email mailboxes and a domain free for the first year on terms of 12 months or more (each mailbox then renews at $0.59 a month, per hostinger.com/website-builder).
Why pick it
- Online stores with 0% transaction fees and 100+ payment methods.
- Inventory, orders, shipping and taxes in one dashboard, with tracking through 40+ carriers including DHL, UPS and FedEx.
Watch out for
- Headline prices assume paying 48 months upfront: Premium is $11.99 on a monthly plan, and every plan renews higher ($10.99 a month for Premium).
- Hostinger lists an Ecommerce add-on at $1 for 3 months, then $8.99 a month; check what your plan includes before you pay for years upfront.
Pricing
Paid upfront, excluding VAT. Premium (3 websites, 250 AI credits): $11.99 for 1 month, $3.99/month on 12 months ($47.88), $2.99/month on 48 months ($143.52), renews at $10.99/month. Unlimited (unlimited websites, 500 credits): $18.99, $4.99 or $3.99/month, renews at $16.99. Cloud Startup (1,000 credits): $27.99, $9.99 or $7.99/month, renews at $25.99. Hostinger Ecommerce add-on: $1 for 3 months, then $8.99/month.
Source: Hostinger Website Builder pricing page, October 17, 2026
Build a custom store with an AI app builder
07 · our product
Capacity
Best for a shop inside a bigger app, or one no theme allows, built from a description.
Capacity builds a working app from a plain-language description: a React front end, a server and its own database, published at a capacity.studio address or on your own domain. You change it by chatting and see each change in a preview, with a full version history. Two online stores built with Capacity, Ojai Home and NOVA/07, are live on capacity.so/discover.
Why pick Capacity
- The store is an app you shape freely: the catalog, the pages and the order flow come from your description, and you change them by asking.
- Payments through the Stripe extension, email through Resend, Brevo or SendGrid, and analytics with Google Analytics 4, Hotjar or DataFast.
- Build it from Claude, ChatGPT or Mistral through Capacity's connector: your own subscription writes the code, Capacity hosts the store, and building this way is unlimited on every paid plan.
Watch out for
- It isn't a store platform: there's no built-in tax calculation, shipping rates or inventory system like Shopify's, so plan how you'll handle them before you sell.
- Customer accounts need the Clerk, Auth0 or Supabase extension: login isn't built in.
- The web app has no free plan: paid plans start at $25 a month (100 credits). Capacity Desktop has a free plan with one project.
Pricing
Starter $25/month (100 credits), Growth $69/month (250 credits), Professional $129/month (500 credits), Business $299/month (1,000 credits). Every plan includes unlimited projects, custom domains and unlimited building from Claude and ChatGPT.
08
Lovable
Best for a custom storefront designed by chat, with Shopify running checkout and stock behind it.
Lovable builds web apps from a chat with a live preview beside it. Lovable Cloud adds the backend, with a database, user login, file storage and server functions on a Supabase foundation, and your code syncs both ways with GitHub on every plan.
Why pick it
- It creates a new Shopify store or connects yours, then builds the storefront by chat, while Shopify handles payments, inventory and logistics.
- Without Shopify, it builds Stripe checkout and subscriptions: built-in payments on paid plans, or your own Stripe account on any plan.
Watch out for
- Claim a new Shopify store within 30 days or Shopify removes it; once the 120-day trial that starts when you claim it ends, selling needs a paid Shopify plan.
- Each message uses credits, and Lovable Cloud usage is billed in credits too once its monthly grant is used.
Pricing
Free: 5 build credits a day, up to 30 a month. Pro: €25/month for 100 monthly credits, with rollovers, top-ups and custom domains. Business: €50/month, adding a team workspace and SSO. Prices shown in euros from France.
Bolt, from StackBlitz, builds websites and web apps from a chat in your browser and deploys them, with the code right there whenever you want to open it.
Why pick it
- Its Stripe integration imports your products from Stripe and builds one-time payments, subscriptions and webhook handling.
- A free plan with 300K tokens a day, up to 1M a month, to build and test before you pay.
Watch out for
- Stripe needs Bolt Database or Supabase and user login set up first, and the integration covers checkout and subscriptions, so shipping, tax and stock are separate work.
- Billing is in tokens, and long fix-and-retry sessions on a large project use them up faster.
Pricing
Free: 300K tokens a day, 1M a month. Pro: $25/month, no daily limit, from 10M tokens a month, unused tokens roll over. Teams: $30 per member per month.
The 9 store builders, side by side. From each official site, October 17, 2026.
| Feature | Shopify | Square | Wix | Squarespace | WordPress.com | Hostinger Website Builder | Capacity | Lovable | Bolt.new |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Paid plans from | $29/month (yearly) | $0 (Square Free) | Store from $29/month (Core, yearly) | €12/month (yearly) | Commerce $45/month (yearly) | $2.99/month (48 months upfront) | $25/month | €25/month | $25/month |
| Platform fee per sale (besides card processing) | None with Shopify Payments; 2% to 0.2% with another provider | None; card fees 3.3% + 30¢ online on Free | None listed on products; 4% on pricing plans (Core) | 2% on Basic, 0% from Core | 0% on Commerce | 0% | Stripe's rates | Stripe's or Shopify's rates | Stripe's rates |
| Sales tax | Automated on every plan | Not in its plan comparison | Automated from Business (100 a month) | Automatic rates; tax services from Core | WooCommerce tax rates you set | Managed in the store dashboard | You set it up | Shopify's, if connected | You set it up |
| Shipping | Discounts from Grow; live rates on Advanced | Labels on Free; real-time rates on Premium | Discounted labels | Flat, weight-based or real-time rates | WooCommerce shipping zones | 40+ carriers, with tracking | You set it up | Shopify's, if connected | You set it up |
| How you build | A prompt or a theme, with Sidekick | Square's website builder | AI or drag and drop | Templates with AI tools | Themes and plugins; WordPress Agent for pages | AI Builder, Manual or Agentic | A description, or Claude and ChatGPT | A chat, with a Shopify integration | A chat in the browser |
How to choose. Start from what you need, not from the ranking.
A handmade brand that sells online, in person and on marketplacesShopify
Selling at markets and online with one card readerSquare
A brand site that also sells on Etsy and AmazonWix
A design-led shop with a small catalogSquarespace
A store you can move anywhere, with pluginsWordPress.com
The lowest monthly price, paid upfrontHostingerA shop inside a bigger app, built from a descriptionCapacity
A custom storefront on top of ShopifyLovable
A custom store with the code in front of youBolt.newQuestions people ask. Short answers, with the details above.
What is the best AI online store builder for handmade products?
Shopify, for makers who plan to grow: inventory, automated sales tax and marketplace selling on every plan, from $29 a month billed yearly, with AI that builds the storefront and writes product copy. Square, if you also sell at markets: its free store runs on the same account as your card reader. Wix or Squarespace, if the shop sits inside a brand site. For a store unlike any theme, Capacity, Lovable or Bolt.new.
Should I sell on Etsy or build my own store?
Etsy brings buyers who are already searching. It charges $0.20 per listing and 6.5% of the item price and shipping, plus payment processing, and its Offsite Ads take 15% of the orders they bring (12% once your shop passes $10,000 in sales over a year). Your own store costs a monthly fee instead and keeps the customer, but you bring the traffic. Many makers run both; Wix can sell on Etsy from its Core plan.
AI app builder or Shopify for an online store?
Shopify, if selling is the business: checkout, inventory, sales tax and marketplace selling come tested. An AI app builder, if the store is part of something larger or you want full control of the code. Capacity, Lovable and Bolt.new build it from a description; on Capacity and Bolt.new, payments run through Stripe and tax and shipping are yours to set up. Lovable can also put a custom storefront on top of a Shopify store.
Which online store builder has the lowest fees?
Hostinger and WordPress.com Commerce charge 0% transaction fees, Squarespace 0% from Core (2% on Basic), and Shopify nothing extra with Shopify Payments (2% on Basic with another provider). Square Free has no monthly fee but charges 3.3% + 30¢ per online card payment. Card processing applies everywhere, so compare the cost of a typical order.
Can I build an online store with ChatGPT or Claude?
Yes, in two ways. Shopify can list your products in AI chats such as ChatGPT and Gemini, where shoppers check out in the conversation. To build the store itself from a chat, Capacity connects to Claude, ChatGPT and Mistral: your subscription writes the code, Capacity hosts the store, and payments go through its Stripe extension, with tax, shipping and stock left for you to set up.
Which store builders calculate sales tax?
Shopify includes automated sales tax on every plan. Wix automates it from Business ($39 a month billed yearly), for 100 transactions a month, or 500 on Business Elite. Squarespace calculates rates automatically and adds tax services from Core, and Hostinger manages taxes in its store dashboard. On Capacity or Bolt.new, you set tax up yourself. What you owe depends on where you sell, so check with an accountant.
Is there a free online store builder?
Square Free costs $0 a month, with 3.3% + 30¢ per online card payment. Wix's free plan can't take payments and WordPress.com's has no plugins, so neither runs a store. Shopify starts with a 3-day free trial. Lovable and Bolt.new have free plans for building; the Capacity web app doesn't, and Capacity Desktop has a free plan with one project.
Related comparisons
Need a store that works your way? Try the app builder we make.
Describe your app in a sentence and Capacity builds it, or connect it to Claude or ChatGPT and build from the chat. Plans from $25 a month.