Saleor vs BigCommerce
Both are alternatives to Shopify. Here's how they stack up — verified facts, no spin.
Also searched as BigCommerce vs Saleor — same comparison, one verdict.
Saleor
GraphQL-native commerce built for complex, multi-region catalogues.
Saleor is a mature Python and GraphQL commerce platform aimed at the harder end of the market: multi-channel, multi-warehouse, multi-currency, complex tax and permission models. Where Medusa is the lightweight modular option, Saleor is the one that handles genuine enterprise complexity without an enterprise licence. BSD-3-Clause, around 23k stars. The GraphQL-first API is excellent and it is a real commitment — the whole team ends up working that way.
BigCommerce
Shopify's closest hosted rival, with no platform transaction fee.
BigCommerce is a hosted platform in the same shape as Shopify with one meaningful difference: it charges no additional platform fee for using your own payment provider, which for a store negotiating its own card rates is real money. It also allows deeper API access and headless use on lower tiers than Shopify does. It is proprietary and hosted, so the sovereignty position is no better — but if the driver is the payment levy specifically rather than ownership, it addresses exactly that.
Side by side
| Saleor | BigCommerce | |
|---|---|---|
| Sovereignty Score | 91 | 32 |
| Open source | Yes | No |
| Self-hostable | Yes | No |
| Local-first | Yes | No |
| License | BSD-3-Clause | Proprietary (hosted service) |
| Pricing | Free and open source. Saleor Cloud is an optional paid hosted tier. | Plans from roughly $39/month with no additional platform transaction fee on your chosen gateway. Annual revenue thresholds move you up tiers. |
Saleor edges it on the Sovereignty Score, but the right pick depends on the trade-offs below.
Saleor
Strengths
- +BSD-3-Clause — the most permissive licence in this comparison
- +Handles multi-channel and multi-warehouse properly, not as an add-on
- +GraphQL API is comprehensive and well documented
- +Proven at large catalogue sizes
Trade-offs
- −Heavier to run than Medusa — Python, Postgres, Celery, Redis
- −GraphQL-first is a commitment for the whole team
- −Smaller plugin ecosystem than Shopify by orders of magnitude
- −Overkill for a straightforward single-region shop
BigCommerce
Strengths
- +No platform fee for using your own payment provider
- +Strong API and headless support on standard tiers
- +More built in before you reach for paid apps
- +Migration from Shopify is comparatively straightforward
Trade-offs
- −Proprietary and hosted — the ownership problem is unchanged
- −Revenue thresholds force tier upgrades whether you want them or not
- −Smaller app ecosystem and theme market than Shopify
- −Still a platform whose roadmap is not yours
Related alternative guides
Facts verified 2026-08-07. Licenses and pricing change — spotted something out of date? That's a correction we want.