Big Cartel vs BigCommerce Comparison 2026
Big Cartel prices a shop by how many products it lists, with sales themselves uncapped at every tier, including a genuinely free Gold plan for a first release. BigCommerce prices a shop by how much it sells, starting at $29 a month for up to $30,000 in trailing annual sales and moving itself up a tier automatically once that ceiling is crossed, with no free-forever plan, only an unspecified trial. The real choice is which variable you would rather be measured on: a small catalogue sold repeatedly, or growing revenue against a platform built to scale with it.
A small shop for people who make things
A hosted store priced against how much you sell
At a glance
- Big Cartel starts cheaper, at $15.
- Only Big Cartel has a free tier.
Side by side
Big Cartel | BigCommerce | |
|---|---|---|
| Starting price (they differ) | From $15 | From $29 |
| Pricing model (they differ) | Free plan, paid tiers | Free trial, then paid |
| Free tier (they differ) | Yes | No |
| Billing | Monthly or annual | Not stated |
| Free trial | 7 days | Not stated |
| API |
Big Cartel
A small shop for people who make things
Big Cartel has sold for artists and bands since before most of this category existed, and the product still reflects that: a handful of themes, a product limit rather than a transaction limit, and no upsell machinery. Setting up a shop takes an evening. The free plan is genuinely usable for a first release, and the paid ones are cheaper than any general storefront. Anybody who wants apps, subscriptions or a hundred variants should look elsewhere.
Our note
Count your products before choosing, because that single limit is the whole pricing model and it is easy to outgrow in a month if you sell variants as separate listings. For a catalogue that stays small this is cheaper than any general storefront in this directory and stays that way as sales grow.
Only on this side
- Covers merch & print on demand
BigCommerce
A hosted store priced against how much you sell
BigCommerce is a hosted storefront whose tiers are drawn around sales volume rather than around features, so the question at signup is what a shop turns over rather than which capabilities it needs. Crossing a tier's ceiling moves the account up on its own, which is worth knowing before the first busy quarter. The platform adds no transaction fee of its own on top of the payment provider's. Anybody below the first threshold is paying for headroom they will not use for a while.
Why people weigh these two
- BigCommerce instead of Big Cartel
- The pay-more-elsewhere option Big Cartel's listing points at: a $29 hosted store priced on sales volume, for catalogues that outgrow a product limit.
- Big Cartel instead of BigCommerce
- A small shop for people who make things, free tier then $15; the cheaper storefront BigCommerce's own listing concedes will do until $30,000 a year arrives.
Which one should you pick
Choose Big Cartel for a small, repeatable catalogue: an artist, a band or a maker selling a handful of things over and over, with no cap on how much any of them sell. The free Gold plan actually ships a shop, and Platinum at $15 a month is cheaper than BigCommerce's entry price. Count the products first, though, since that limit is the entire pricing model, and a wide catalogue outgrows it fast.
Choose BigCommerce for a shop that already knows roughly what it turns over and would rather pay against that than track a product count. Core is $29 a month for up to $30,000 in annual sales, nearly double Big Cartel's entry price, and the account upgrades itself automatically past that ceiling, up to Scale's $299 a month before a 0.9 percent overage applies. There is no free-forever plan, so a shop well under $30,000 a year is paying for headroom it does not need yet.
Common questions
- Which is cheaper, Big Cartel or BigCommerce?
- Big Cartel to start: Platinum is $15 a month, against BigCommerce Core at $29, nearly double. Big Cartel also has a genuinely free Gold plan with no time limit, while BigCommerce offers only a free trial of unstated length before Core's $29 a month begins.
- Do Big Cartel or BigCommerce charge a transaction fee on top of the subscription?
- Neither adds one. Big Cartel states there is no transaction fee layered on the subscription, and BigCommerce adds nothing on top of whatever the payment provider itself charges. The difference between the two is not fees. It is what the subscription tier is measured on.
- What happens if my BigCommerce shop grows past its plan's sales limit?
- The account moves up a tier on its own: past $30,000 in trailing annual sales, Core becomes Growth at $79 a month, and past $100,000, Growth becomes Scale at $299. Big Cartel does not work this way at all, since its tiers are set by how many products are listed, not by how much they sell, so growing sales alone never forces an upgrade.
- Is Big Cartel or BigCommerce better for a shop with only a handful of products?
- Big Cartel. Its tiers are drawn around product count rather than sales volume, so a small, repeatable catalogue can sell without limit on a $15 a month plan, or free on Gold. BigCommerce's tiers exist for the opposite kind of shop, one whose revenue is the number worth tracking, and its $29 entry price is overhead a small catalogue does not need.
Ratings are the average of reviews readers left. The facts are stated by each tool’s own listing and are not verified by CloutStack. How we make money.