Shopify vs Custom Website Philippines: A Fair Guide
You want to sell online from Metro Manila. Shopify is the famous name, but a one-time custom store is the quieter option many local owners never compare. Here is the honest side by side.
You have decided to sell online. A friend says Shopify, your cousin says just use Facebook, and someone mentioned a custom store. Three answers, and each person swears theirs is right. The truth is that all three can work for a Metro Manila small business. What differs is the cost over time, how much you truly own, and how well the store fits the way Filipinos actually pay and shop.
This is an honest comparison, not a sales pitch dressed as advice. Shopify is a genuinely good product, and we will say so plainly. But if you have never seen the numbers stretched over two or three years, you are only seeing half the picture. Let us lay it all out so you can decide with your eyes open.
What Shopify actually is
Shopify is a subscription platform. You rent a store built on their system, pay a monthly fee, and in most cases pay a small cut of every sale on top of that. You do not own the software. You are a tenant in a very large, very well maintained building. That is not an insult. For plenty of businesses, renting is exactly right.
Where Shopify shines: it is fast to start, it almost never goes down, and it has thousands of apps for everything from loyalty points to abandoned cart emails. If you plan to sell hundreds of orders a day, ship internationally, or need a big warehouse-style catalog with heavy inventory logic, Shopify is built for that scale and it earns its keep. We will not pretend otherwise.
What a custom Commerce site is
A custom store is one you own outright. With our Commerce ecommerce build, you pay one time, the site is yours, and there is no monthly platform fee taking a slice of every sale. We tailor it to your products, your look, and the districts you serve, whether that is a bakery in San Juan or a supplement shop in BGC. GCash, Maya, and cash on delivery are built in from day one, because that is how your customers here want to pay.
The honest tradeoff: a custom store is not built for a business selling ten thousand SKUs with complex warehouse syncing across borders. It is built for the local shop, the boutique, the specialty food seller, the clinic selling products, who wants a clean, fast, professional store they control, without the meter always running.
If you expect fewer than a few hundred orders a month and sell mainly to customers in Metro Manila, a one-time custom store almost always costs less over time. If you are scaling to national or global volume fast, Shopify's tooling may be worth its rent.
The side by side
| What matters | Shopify | Custom Commerce site |
|---|---|---|
| Upfront cost | Low to start | One time P45,000 |
| Monthly platform fee | Yes, every month, forever | None |
| Cut of each sale | Often a small percentage per order | None from us (only your payment provider's normal fee) |
| Ownership | You rent it | You own it |
| Look and feel | Template based, can feel familiar | Tailored to your brand |
| GCash, Maya, COD | Possible, sometimes via extra apps | Built in from day one |
| Best for | High volume, national or global scale | Local shops wanting control and low ongoing cost |
| Time to launch | Fast | About 7 days |
Notice we did not mark Shopify as losing across the board. Its speed to start and its app ecosystem are real advantages. The question is whether you will use enough of that power to justify paying rent on it for years.
The cost over time, made simple
Numbers beat opinions. Let us imagine a modest store doing steady but not huge sales. We will keep the Shopify figures conservative and in peso terms so the comparison is fair. Say a mid plan runs roughly P2,000 a month, plus a small transaction cut, plus a paid app or two for features you need. Round that to about P3,000 a month all in. That is a reasonable, even gentle, estimate for a working store.
| Timeframe | Shopify (about P3,000 per month) | Custom Commerce site (one time) |
|---|---|---|
| Day one | P0 down, meter starts | P45,000 |
| After 1 year | About P36,000 | P45,000 |
| After 2 years | About P72,000 | P45,000 |
| After 3 years | About P108,000 | P45,000 |
By somewhere in your second year, the rented store has quietly cost more than the one you would have owned outright, and it keeps climbing every month after. The custom site stops at P45,000 and stays there. Even if you add our optional care plan at P4,000 per month for hosting and support, that is never required, and many owners handle their own hosting and only call us when they want changes.
The cheapest thing to start is rarely the cheapest thing to keep. A rented store feels light on day one and heavy by year three.
To be fair to Shopify one more time: if that store is generating strong monthly profit, the platform fee is a rounding error and its convenience may be worth it. This math matters most for the careful owner watching every peso in the early years, which is most small businesses we meet.
What about just using Facebook?
Many owners start selling through their Facebook page and messages, and there is nothing wrong with that as a beginning. But a page is not a store you control, and one algorithm change can bury your reach overnight. We wrote a full piece on the tradeoffs in Facebook page versus a real website. The short version: a page is great for chatter and reach, a proper store is where orders, payments, and trust come together in one place you own.
Which one fits you?
Choose Shopify if you are heading for large volume quickly, want a giant app marketplace on tap, and the monthly fee is comfortably small next to your sales. Choose a custom Commerce store if you are a local Metro Manila business that wants a professional, tailored shop you own, with local payments built in and no meter running in the background.
You do not have to guess. Before you commit a single peso, we design a free preview of your real store so you can see it, click it, and feel it. See examples of stores we have built in our recent work, check the full package pricing, then request your free website preview. If you love it, you launch in about 7 days. If you do not, you owe nothing. That is the fair way to make a decision this important.
Frequently asked questions
Is Shopify bad for a Philippine small business?
No, Shopify is a solid platform, especially if you are scaling to high volume or selling nationally and internationally. The main downside for a small local shop is the ongoing monthly fee plus a cut of each sale, which quietly adds up. If you sell mostly to Metro Manila customers at modest volume, a one-time custom store usually costs less over two to three years.
How much does a custom online store cost with Manila Web?
Our Commerce package is a one-time P45,000 and the site is yours to own. There is no monthly platform fee taking a slice of your sales. An optional care plan for hosting, updates, and support is P4,000 per month, but it is never required. You can see the full breakdown on our pricing page.
Can a custom store accept GCash, Maya, and cash on delivery?
Yes. GCash, Maya, and cash on delivery are built into your Commerce store from day one, because that is how customers here actually prefer to pay. You are not stuck bolting on extra paid apps just to accept the payment methods every Filipino shopper already uses.
When does Shopify end up costing more than a custom site?
At a gentle estimate of about P3,000 a month all in, Shopify passes the one-time P45,000 of a custom store somewhere in your second year, and it keeps climbing every month after that. The custom site stops at P45,000. The higher your monthly Shopify spend, the sooner the custom store becomes the cheaper choice.
Do I really own a custom website, unlike Shopify?
Yes. With a custom Commerce build you own the site outright after your one-time payment. With Shopify you are renting a store on their system, so you stop having a store the moment you stop paying. Ownership means no one can raise your rent or change the rules on the platform you depend on.
Can I see the store before I pay anything?
Yes. We design a free preview of your real store first, so you can click through it and decide if you love it before spending a single peso. If it is right, we take it live in about 7 days. If it is not, you owe nothing. Just request your free website preview to start.
Want to see your business with a site like this?
Tell us a little about what you do and we will send back a free preview of how your site could look, usually within a day. No commitment, no pressure.