Crate vs BigCommerce
BigCommerce is built for catalogs that have outgrown simple tooling: deep native features, strong APIs, and an assumption that somebody technical is nearby. Crate assumes the opposite.
What BigCommerce is: A hosted commerce platform aimed at larger and more complex catalogs, with deep native features and a strong API surface.
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How does Crate compare to BigCommerce?
BigCommerce and Crate are both hosted commerce platforms, so the split between them is not hosting, it is who the product assumes is using it. BigCommerce puts an unusual amount of function in the box natively rather than behind apps, which suits a large catalog with complicated rules, and it pairs that with strong APIs for teams building on top. That depth costs surface area: there is a lot of it, and most of it assumes a desktop and somebody whose job this is. Crate assumes the person configuring the store is also the person packing the orders and answering the messages, on a phone, between other work. Fewer settings, already correct, and the channels a small business actually sells in included rather than integrated.
Side by side
Qualitative and stable. No prices and no fee percentages for either side, because both change without notice and a comparison table carrying a stale number is worse than no table.
| What | Crate | BigCommerce |
|---|---|---|
| Who it assumes | An owner-operator, on a phone, who also packs the orders. | A team, on desktops, often with technical help available. |
| Catalog complexity | Products, variants, bundles and stock across locations. | Very deep. Complex product rules are a core strength. |
| Selling in chat | Built in. | Not a native channel. |
| APIs | A REST API and webhooks for the common integrations. | Extensive, and a headless-first path is a deliberate part of the offer. |
| Setup effort | Short. The defaults are opinionated on purpose. | Longer, because there is more to decide. |
| Point of sale | Included, on a phone. | Through partners. |
Which one you actually want
Both columns are real. If the right-hand one describes you, take it: a product that does not fit you is a refund with extra steps.
Choose Crate if
- You are the whole team, or close to it.
- You want the store live and correct rather than configurable in every direction.
- Chat and social are where your orders come from.
- Phone first is a requirement, not a nice-to-have.
Choose BigCommerce if
- Your catalog has genuinely complex rules and you need them handled natively.
- You have or are hiring engineers and want a headless path.
- You are running a business-to-business operation with price lists and customer groups at scale.
- You need enterprise procurement, contracts and support tiers.
Where Crate is behind
Every comparison on this site carries this section. A page that only lists what we do better is an advert, and you already know how much to trust one of those.
Where Crate is behind: enterprise catalog scale and the contract around it. BigCommerce has been serving large catalogs, complex B2B price lists and multi-storefront estates for longer than Crate has existed, with the account management and uptime commitments that go with them. Crate is built for the owner-operator end of the same market. If your procurement process starts with a security questionnaire and a negotiated service level agreement, read our security page, then ask us directly rather than assuming.
About switching to Crate from BigCommerce
Short answers, and none of them hedge. If yours is not here, ask us on the contact page.
Does Crate have an API?
Yes, a REST API with webhooks, documented for the common integrations.
Can Crate handle a large catalog?
Yes. Products and orders are unlimited on every plan, so the plan you choose does not cap how much you can list or sell.
How this comparison is kept honest
Last checked
Everything said about BigCommerce here is a qualitative property of the product taken from what BigCommerce publishes about itself: what kind of product it is, which channels it sells through natively, and which capabilities it ships rather than leaves to an add-on. We publish no prices, fees, percentages or counts for any competitor, including ourselves, on these pages, because those change without notice and a table carrying a stale number does more damage than no table.
Claims about Crate on this page do not go beyond what our own feature, pricing and security pages already state. Where they would, they are not made.
Product capabilities change. This page states what was accurate on the date above and nothing beyond it. If a row is out of date, we would rather hear it than rank on it.
Other comparisons
Same structure, same honesty rules, different competitor.
- Crate vs Wix Website builder with commerce
- Crate vs WooCommerce Self-hosted open source
- Crate vs Ecwid Commerce widget for an existing site
- Crate vs Etsy Marketplace
- Crate vs Gumroad Creator checkout for digital products
- Crate vs Payhip Digital product and membership storefront
- Crate vs Sellfy Creator storefront with print on demand
- Crate vs Big Cartel Small storefront for artists and makers
Try it before you decide.
Every plan starts with the same trial and the same full feature set. Import your catalog, take one real order, and judge it on that.
14-day free trial · No card required