BigCartel vs Wix Comparison 2023: Side by Side Testing

Do you want to skip the read and get right to my pick? Between BigCartel vs Wix, the better website builder is Wix.

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Introduction to BigCartel vs Wix Comparison:

You're reading our comparison of BigCartel vs Wix!

Under most circumstances, asking whether a basic site creation platform can hold a candle to a platform specifically meant to create ecommerce marketplaces would be a hypothetical question. But this is precisely the gist of today’s review.

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Overview of BigCartel vs Wix:

Big Cartel:

Big Cartel is the epitome of a 100% independent creative platform. Since 2005, the company has been helping users sell around $2.5 billion worth of unique/bespoke products to a steadily growing clientele.

As of the time we did this review, Big Cartel’s online footprint remains small compared to that of its competitors. It presently boasts of just 83,000 stores worldwide and a user base of 2,876 independent creative teams. This reflects a 25% increase in users over just two years.

We also like that Big Cartel’s management team works virtually from numerous locations, giving it strong regional flavour and diversity in terms of race, gender, and even culture.

Wix:

Close to two decades since it was first launched, Wix is currently the platform of choice for those who want to build, maintain, and securely host a website with minimal effort.

Wix's ability to help even the most clueless users to create visually striking and highly engaging websites in record time has long been its strongest point, and the security of its hosting servers enables users to keep their sites online at all times.

Depending on how creative you’re feeling (or how much time you have on your hands,) you can build a Wix site in either one of two ways: simply encode parameters to generate a site using artificial intelligence (AI) or use a more conventional drag and drop method.

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Quick Comparison Table for BigCartel vs Wix

	Big Cartel	Wix (My Choice!)
Ease of Use	Simplistic interface, particularly designed for artists and creatives. No coding skills necessary.	Highly intuitive, drag-and-drop website builder with an easy-to-use interface.
Features	Basic but solid features for small online stores. Limited in comparison to Wix.	Rich feature set including e-commerce, blogging, and hundreds of apps.
Design Flexibility	Limited templates and customization options.	Hundreds of customizable templates and extensive design freedom.
Customer Support	Email support with helpful resources online.	24/7 customer support, including phone and ticket-based help.
Pricing	Free for up to 5 products. Paid plans are affordable but offer limited features. Check Pricing	Free plan available. Premium plans offer extensive features and start from $14/month. Check Pricing
My View	Ideal for small-scale artists and creatives who prefer simplicity.	Best for users needing versatility and comprehensive design features.
	Try Big Cartel For Free	Try Wix For Free

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Ease of Use:

Big Cartel:

Big Cartel offers one of the easiest onboarding processes we’ve seen on any creative platform. You can easily sign up for an account and immediately get started with a working five-item store.

Also, it allows users to create their own unique online storefronts. Users have at least eighteen different design templates at their fingertips, all of which are customisable in terms of colours, fonts, and widgets. Once that’s set up, you can add your products, then select either Stripe or PayPal as modes of payment, and start doing business.

Wix:

Wix built its name out of features that make any user’s life as easy as it can be. The drag-and-drop system turns anyone into a web designer without knowing deep technicalities.

This, however, does not mean that the platform has not evolved in nearly 20 years. Over the past decade alone, we have seen the development of Wix’s own proprietary ecommerce creation platform – one that is deemed useful (and easy to manage) by both startups and more established businesses.

Winner – DRAW! We’re calling this ease of use match a draw between BigCartel versus Wix.

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BigCartel vs Wix Features and Flexibility:

Out of the box:

BigCartel:

WYSIWYG Storefront Builder

We see this as the ultimate in ease: you don’t need to know any form of coding or even a background in site creation to use Big Cartel’s storefront builder. Much like the most basic and user-friendly site-building platforms, you just point, drag, and click elements to suit your purposes. The fact that it also has eighteen customisable themes pre-installed takes a great deal of stress and guesswork out of the equation and you can create your storefront at a rapid clip;

Store Performance Dashboard

Metrics and analytics can be seen in real time through this particular feature. The dashboard allows users to see how many visitors browsed through the site, what items were purchased, and how many purchases were made during a given time period. This feature also enables users to determine which products are the most popular and which are slow-moving; how much money each product has earned in sales; and even how many times specific items were sold;

Wix:

Two Ways to Create a Website

Wix offers a well-stocked (in terms of features) drag and drop site building platform for those who want to put a truly personal spin on their sites, as well as the AI-driven intuitive tool Wix ADI for those short on time (and knowledge): just answer a few questions, and the platform will automatically create a working site for you;

A Built-in SEO Toolkit

There’s absolutely no need to learn coding here if you want an SEO-ready website. Wix has taken care of everything by building SEO features right into its UI, performing a variety of specific tasks like adding meta descriptions, alt text, and even 301 redirects;

BigCartel vs Wix Themes & Template Design:

BigCartel:

The platform offers well-designed, clean, and mobile-responsive themes, making it fast and easy to set up an online store. However, the selection isn't as diverse as other eCommerce builder options. The platform offers 16 themes you can use. They look aesthetically pleasing and are made for artists who are starting. The themes aren't exactly eye-popping, but they look professional.

Wix:

Wix has more than 800 templates in different styles, colours, and categories. This means you can dive right in and build the website you've always wanted.

check the latest wix Themes and templates now

That’s the good news; the bad news is that you can’t switch design templates when your site goes live.

BigCartel vs Wix 3rd party apps market:

BigCartel:

Now this is what sets Big Cartel apart from the competition: third-party app compatibility. For enhanced analytics, it easily interfaces with Google Analytics and Lucky Orange in order to see where they can optimise marketing efforts or select the best products to sell for a specific season. Social media marketing is also a snap thanks to integration with platforms like Instagram, while applications like Mailchimp, Poptin, and Elfsight allow users to work with their email and other social media accounts to reach an even wider customer base.

Wix:

Wix offers over 300 third-party integrations through its App Market, and these include solutions for site functionality, eCommerce, online marketing, events management, design improvement, as well as streaming media (depending on your subscription plan, of course.) Partner companies and platforms include MailChimp, Modalyst for dropshipping, Spotify, Weglot, and Overtok.

Hosting:

BigCartel:

One letdown is that users can't host their online stores elsewhere since the platform is fully-hosted.

Wix:

Backups:

BigCartel:

Backups are possible with BigCartel through AWS integration.

Wix:

Unfortunately, you cannot back a Wix site up externally – and this is a cause for concern, especially with all the cloud server hacking incidents that have appeared in the news of late. Wix enables you to save previous versions of your site, enabling you to revert to a previous version if necessary. You could also save a duplicate of your site, but you will need to update it manually.

Migration:

BigCartel:

You can migrate to BigCartel within a few hours in just a few steps.

Wix:

If you are simply moving a Wix site from one account within the platform to another, you can easily use the Transfer Site function built into the UI.

Unfortunately, if you built your site on a different platform and want to move it to a Wix host, it's a complex process. There are however known workarounds for migrating from other providers with 3rd Party Tools.

Security:

BigCartel:

Addresses and custom domains in BigCartel are all encrypted with SSL.

Wix:

All Wix sites follow SSL and HTTPS protocols, ensuring secure visits between you and your customers.

Winner – WIX! As far as features and flexibility are concerned, we're giving this to Wix in this BigCartel vs Wix comparison.

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BigCartel vs Wix eCommerce Tools:

POS:

BigCartel:

It has a POS feature that lets you sell products from any location physically or online.

Wix:

Wix eCommerce tools include tax and dropshipping, inventory management, point of sale (POS), and abandoned cart recovery, among others.

Abandoned cart saver:

BigCartel:

It doesn't offer an abandoned cart feature by default. You need to integrate third-party apps to do this.

Wix:

You also need to install a third-party application to activate an abandoned cart feature.

Payment Gateways:

BigCartel:

In terms of payment processors, Big Cartel works with ApplePay, PayPal, and Stripe.

Wix:

The platform has its native payment gateway called Wix Payments. But you could also integrate it with other payment options like debit/credit cards, Apple Pay, PayPal, and others using a premium account.

Winner – DRAW! We’re calling this match on eCommerce a draw between BigCartel versus Wix.

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BigCartel vs Wix SEO & Marketing:

SEO:

BigCartel:

All Big Cartel pricing plans come with free SEO functionality, including automated sitemap generation and capability for plain-text URLs. In the paid plans, Google Analytics is integrated into the sites, providing real-time reports and insights.

Wix:

The platform’s interface already has a number of SEO features built into it, so creating meta descriptions, alt text as placeholders for images or graphics, and even code redirects are taken out of the user’s hands as these are generated automatically.

Mobile First:

BigCartel:

For those who want to keep tabs on their online business whilst on the go, Big Cartel actually offers a mobile application that works on either Apple iOS and Android devices. While these don’t exactly have the same level of functionality as the desktop/website version of the platform, they will nevertheless help users track orders and make necessary adjustments to orders whenever necessary, regardless of their location and the time of day.

Wix:

Unfortunately, you can't edit your website directly from your mobile phone. Still, all Wix pages are mobile-optimised and will appear stunning on whatever device.

Marketing:

BigCartel:

Another neat thing about Big Cartel is that digital or intellectual property creators like musicians, authors, and cineastes can actually sell their work through the platform through an application called Pulley. This medium for selling digital downloads is, unfortunately, a premium service, but users can try it for free for a fourteen-day trial period.

Wix:

Wix offers several marketing tools and analytics that let you track the progress of your Facebook ad and other social media campaigns.

Pagespeed:

BigCartel:

The platform's mobile pagespeed score over Google is 58 out of 100, while its pagespeed score for desktop is 89 out of 100. Pretty impressive!

Wix:

Wix websites are known to be laggy, with mobile pagespeeds rating 28 out of 100 and desktop pagespeeds at 87 out of 100.

Winner – DRAW! Between BigCartel vs Wix, both platforms are tied in terms of SEO and marketing features.

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Support and Resources:

Big Cartel:

As with most creative platforms, Big Cartel’s primary online support measure is its Help Centre which is divided into different sections ranging from the basics of setting up, to online security, to customisation, to billing – practically everything you need to know about working with the platform and more.

However, despite the fact that Big Cartel allows its users to interact with it through its social media channels, online technical support is only offered through its website during business hours (EST) and only from Monday through Friday.

For more pressing concerns regarding your Big Cartel account and / or transactions, you will need to send the platform an email requesting for support. Turnaround is a little slow, though: around two days tops.

But what we like about Big Cartel is that even customers are given priority when it comes to support as there is a separate email address where they can air their grievances regarding certain vendors on the platform.

Wix:

You can find plenty of guides, video tutorials, and references on Wix’s Help Centre. You can also connect with support staff via email and a phone call. Monday to Thursdays, 5 am – 5 pm EST.

Winner – BigCartel! In this support comparison between BigCartel vs Wix, BigCartel offers better help.

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BigCartel vs Wix Pricing :

Big Cartel:

Big Cartel is free to use under its Gold plan, but users may only sell five products at any given time.

The Platinum plan will set you back by $9.99 monthly and the Diamond plan by $19.99 a month. Both allow users to sell more products and also gain access to numerous premium features that will enhance their store management experience.

Click for the latest BigCartel pricing

Wix:

Where Wix is concerned, the price of your subscription will be dependent on why you’re building a website in the first place.

To build a personal website, you can start with a free plan or, if you want a bit more pizazz for your site, consider the Combo for $8.50 a month. However, if you’re setting up an online store, go for the Unlimited plan for $12.50 monthly.

Click for the latest Wix pricing

Free trial, refund policy, and money-back guarantee:

Big Cartel:

As stated in their service terms, Big Cartel is free to use but keep in mind that features will be limited.

Wix:

For those on a very tight budget, their service terms say you can actually use this platform for free but with the annoying ads.

Winner – Wix! We think that comparing BigCartel vs Wix for value for money, Wix has a slight advantage.

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Comparison Winner: BigCartel vs Wix?

Wix is the winner in our BigCartel vs Wix comparison test!

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Conclusion and Recommendations to our BigCartel vs Wix comparison:

What is BigCartel best for?

Big Cartel offers features specifically designed for those who want to take their businesses to the digital marketplace.

What is Wix for?

Wix wins in terms of ease of use, as well as its stripped-down but fully functional interface that allows users to create a diverse range of websites, including ecommerce hubs.

BigCartel vs Wix Alternatives:

Great alternatives to Wix and BigCartel include;

BigCartel vs Wix Final word:

When it comes to comparing two highly thought-of and widely used site creation / ecommerce hub-making platforms, we're leaning towards Wix. Try out their free plan and see for yourself whether this builder is the right one for you.

Click for the latest Wix pricing

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That's all for now:

If you've read all the way through this Big Cartel vs Wix comparison, we are thankful. We hope you can now answer the question of what are the pros and cons of these website builders! We have a large collection of articles, guides, and comparison reviews of eCommerce solutions, web hosting providers, website builders, and more! Feel free to check them out;

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Please share any comments below!