E-commerce is going strong with a 23% increase each year. As almost 99% of the population in the UAE has access to the internet, it is now very easy to make a visitor your permanent customer.  According to a survey, almost 58% of all the online purchases were from websites outside the UAE, mostly Aisa and North America. This means people are still going outside UAE for online shopping and there is great potential for UAE based businesses. One of the many benefits that you get by having an online business is that it enables you to earn money while you are asleep.

It is also very easy to set up an online store compared to a physical one. Choose the products that you want to sell, choose an eCommerce platform, hire a well-reputed web development firm to develop your store and that's it. Now choosing an e-commerce platform is one of the most important steps as there are so many options for you to decide from. You need to consider all the pros and cons of each platform before choosing one. Below, we are going to list out some of the best e-commerce platforms available today.

Best eCommerce Platforms

Magento is considered one of the most reliable and best eCommerce platforms for online businesses. Magento is best for scalability and performance which is why it holds almost one-fourth of the e-commerce market share. Brands like Burger King, Huawei & Liverpool F.C. have their stores on Magento. Some unique features of Magento eCommerce are:

• Open-source so very easy to customize
• Over 9000+ extensions available for all sort of functionalities
• Easy to use and manage
• Huge online community
• Free community version

This platform is considered the best e-commerce platform for enterprise-level online stores. If you want to set up a relatively small store you can go with the free version but if you see yourself expanding over the years then going with the enterprise edition is the best choice. One thing to keep in mind is that Magento is not an easy platform. You need experienced developers to develop a Magento store.

Price:

• Hosting: Depends on the package
• Name Domain: $10
• Magento Community Edition: Free
• Magento Development:~$35-$150 per hour
• Magento Enterprise: $15,500 Per Year
• SSL Certificate: $50 per year

Some UAE based made on Magento are listed below:

• www.sporter.com
• www.estilo.ae

Shopify tops the list when it comes to best eCommerce platforms. Shopify was founded in 2004 and now over 1 million merchants around the globe are using it. It very rapidly rose to popularity because of its very clean and easy to use interface. Shopify, unlike Magento, is a monthly subscription service also known as Saas (software as a service). Hosting is also done on Shopify's own servers. Some of the key features of Shopify are as follows:

• Insert product images, descriptions / details
• Manage your inventory
• Organize your products into categories
• Discount code engine
• Creating web pages and blogs
• Track customer and order details
• Accept payments from 70 different payment processors in different currencies
• Set up customer accounts
• Sort your customers by location, money spent
• Manage multiple staff login

Shopify is a good choice for small and medium-sized businesses. One of the most important things to remember is that Shopify is not an open-source platform and it's written in its own language known as "Liquid". So customization will not be an easy option.

Price:

• 'Shopify Starter'  - $5 per month
• 'Basic Shopify' - $29 per month
• 'Shopify' - $79 per month
• 'Advanced Shopify' - $299 per month
• 'Shopify Plus' - fees are negotiable
• Also, charges up to 2% on each transaction if Shopify's own payment system is not used.

Some UAE based sites made with Shopify are listed below:

• www.minimalist.ae
• www.ownthelooks.com

Bigcommerce currently hosts almost 55,000 online stores. Bigcommerce works on the same principle as Shopify but the difference is between the tools and themes both of them provide. Also, Bigcommerce does not charge any fee for use of any payment system. The key features are mentioned below:

• The ability to sell a wide range of either physical or digital goods, in categories of using shipping rates of your choosing
• Easy Integration with Paypal and a wide range of payment gateways
• Full content management (CMS) functionality
• Good search engine optimization (SEO) options
• Integration with Alibaba.com
• Automated reminder emails to people who abandoned their carts at checkout
• Discount coupons and gift vouchers as standard
• Product review functionality
• The ability to tweak CSS and HTML as desired
• Professional level reporting

Price:

• Bigcommerce Standard: $29.95 per month
• Bigcommerce Plus: $79.95 per month
• Bigcommerce Pro: $249.95 per month
• Bigcommerce Enterprise: Varying Prices

Below are some of the UAE based e commerce sites which are made on BigCommerce.

• www.bookcorner.ae
• www.discount.ae

You Might Like to Read: Top Ecommerce Websites in UAE

Essentially WooCommerce is a WordPress plugin, which dynamically changes your WordPress site into an online store. Despite being a plugin, WooCommerce is very powerful, equipped with almost all the ingredients that any other platform offers. WooCommerce is being used by 3.8 million online merchants worldwide which makes it the most used eCommerce platform.

The unique feature of WooCommerce is that as it is a WordPress Plugin, you will have all the benefits of WordPress. Some other key features are as follows:

• Sell physical products, digital products, software, even affiliated products from a marketplace
• Multiple payment gateways
• Flexible shipping settings including free shipping
• Tax handling on sales, and automatic tax calculations
• Multiple product categories
• Stock levels control
• Geo-location support
• Hundreds of free and paid WooCommerce extensions

WooCommerce is available free of cost and it is also open-source. You need to have a WordPress site already set up to use WooCoommerce. WooCommerce is suitable for small to medium-size businesses, but if you are looking for an enterprise-level solution this might not be a good choice. One thing to keep in mind is that WooCommerce is not out of the box solution that you can set up in one day like Shopify. WooCommerce solution can take considerable time to launch.

Price:

WooCommerce is free plugin.

• Hosting for WordPress site: $10 to $15 per year
• Name Domain: $10
• E-commerce Theme: ~$60 (Free available)
• SSL Certificate: $50 per year
• Shipping Extension: ~$80
• SEO Extension:~ $50

Some UAE based site examples are:

• www.alharamainperfumes.com
• www.kitensurf.ae

OpenCart is also a free eCommerce solution which is written in PHP. It is free to use, upgrade and own. It is basically based on the core-plus extension model, where you have the basic structure and add extensions for extra functionalities. There are more than 13,000 extensions available for OpenCart which covers almost all aspects of an online store. Some of the features are listed below:

• Unlimited categories
• Unlimited products and manufacturers
• Sell digital products
• Multi-currency supported
• Multilingual
• Product reviews and product ratings
• More than 20 payment gateways
• More than 8 shipping methods
• Multiple tax rates
• Weight and size shipping calculations
• Discount coupon system
• Backup and restore tools
• Printable invoices
• Sales reports

OpenCart is also best suited for small to medium-sized businesses. It's out of box solution is very limited and you need to buy an extension for almost every crucial functionality. If you do not need any customization than OpenCart can work for you very nicely but as you want to integrate some specific functionality, the development cost can be a huge hurdle.

Price:

• Hosting for the site: $10 to $15 per year
• Name Domain: $10
• E-commerce Theme: ~$50(Free available)
• SSL Certificate: $50 per year
• Shipping Extension: ~$100
• SEO Extension:~ $99
• Premium Support:~$99 per month

Here are some UAE based e commerce sites made with OpenCart:

• www.zanedo.com
• www.lialijewellery.com

You Might Like to Read: Guide to Build the Perfect Ecommerce Website for your Startup

ShopGo is a true Middle East based e-commerce platform that claims to be designed specifically for the MENA region. Once being featured in Forbes, ShopGo has proved itself to be a reliable solution. ShopGo offers complete e-commerce solutions from shipping to payment gateways. Some of the key features are as follows:

• 20GB bandwidth
• 10GB storage
• No Transaction Fees
• Multiple language support
• Multiple currency support
• Customization of themes and look & feel
• Payment integration-ready
• Shipping integration
• Automatic monthly backups
• Google Analytics
• Coupon code ready
• Order management

Price:

• ShopGo Basic: $73 per month
• ShopGo Professional: $150 per month
• ShopGo Plus: $450 per month

Here are some UAE based sites made with ShopGo:

• www.waqtee.com
• www.kruzinfootwear.ae