TL;DR: After 40+ hours setting up live storefronts across six platforms, Square Online is the strongest all-around pick for US and UK sellers who want zero transaction fees with a genuinely usable free plan. Ecwid is the best portable option if you already have a website. Big Cartel wins for makers and artists with a small catalog. WooCommerce is the right call if you’re comfortable with WordPress and want no ceiling on products or platform costs.
How We Tested
We didn’t read spec sheets. We built stores.
Each platform got a live storefront with physical products, a digital download, and at least one test purchase processed through to confirmation. We tracked every fee that appeared — from the platform side and from the payment processor — and noted where features that should be standard got gated behind paid upgrades.
Our core criteria:
- Zero platform transaction fees — the platform takes nothing on top of what your payment processor already charges
- A genuinely usable free plan — not a 14-day trial dressed up as a free tier
- Enough product and order management to actually sell — not a demo mode
- Transparent limitations — platforms that hide their restrictions until you hit them got penalized
One distinction before we get into findings: standard payment processing fees (Stripe, Square, PayPal) are not what we mean by “transaction fees.” Those processor fees are unavoidable regardless of which platform you build on. What we’re measuring is whether the platform takes an additional cut on top. Several well-known names quietly do.
The Best Free Ecommerce Platforms With No Transaction Fees
Foto: Mikhail Nilov
Here’s what we found after weeks of hands-on testing.
Square Online — Best Overall Free Plan
Square Online is the platform we kept returning to as the baseline everything else got measured against. The free plan includes unlimited products, a published storefront, and no transaction fees from Square. You pay only the standard card processing rate — 2.6% + 10¢ in the US, comparable rates in the UK — and nothing else.
Setup ran under 30 minutes from a blank account to a live store. The editor is drag-and-drop, product pages load fast, and mobile checkout worked cleanly across every device we tested. We ran a test store across three product categories for two weeks without hitting any wall that forced an upgrade.
What surprised us most: Square Online’s free plan includes SEO settings, coupon codes, Instagram and Facebook catalog sync, and basic order management. Competing platforms routinely lock coupon codes and social commerce behind paid tiers. Getting them free is a real differentiator.
The main constraint is payment flexibility. Square processes all payments on the free plan — PayPal and Stripe require upgrading. For most small businesses that’s not a dealbreaker, since Square’s processing rates are competitive. But if your customers have strong payment preferences, confirm that before you commit.
Best for: Small businesses and solo founders in the US or UK who want to start selling immediately without a monthly fee.
Ecwid by Lightspeed — Best for Adding a Store to an Existing Site
Ecwid’s free plan caps you at 5 products, which looks restrictive on paper. The platform’s real value isn’t the product limit — it’s portability. You embed Ecwid into any existing website (WordPress, Wix, Squarespace, a handbuilt HTML page) and it runs without Lightspeed taking a transaction fee cut.
We embedded the storefront on both a WordPress installation and a plain static site. Both integrations were seamless — the checkout widget felt native to the host site rather than bolted on, and the flow held up cleanly on mobile. No custom domain purchase required, since Ecwid inherits the host site’s domain entirely.
The free plan also includes Facebook Shopping and Google Shopping catalog sync — two features we didn’t expect at zero cost. If you’re testing product-market fit on a handful of SKUs, Ecwid’s free tier covers real ground.
The 5-product ceiling is the genuine friction point. Once you exceed it, the jump to the Venture plan at $25/month is steep. But as a zero-cost, zero-transaction-fee starting point for an embedded storefront, nothing else we tested came close.
Best for: Bloggers, consultants, and creators who already have a website and want to add a small shop without rebuilding from scratch.
Big Cartel — Best for Artists and Makers
Big Cartel’s free Gold plan allows up to 5 products, no transaction fees, and no time limits. We stood up a mock handmade goods store in about 20 minutes. The interface is minimal by design — fewer settings, fewer dials — because the platform was built for independent creators, not retailers managing hundreds of SKUs.
Checkout converted well on mobile in our tests, and the purchase flow had fewer steps than most competitors. The free plan’s limitations are documented upfront rather than revealed when you hit them — a small thing, but rare enough to be worth noting.
Big Cartel charges zero transaction fees on every plan, including paid tiers. That policy gets more valuable as revenue scales. A high-volume seller on a small catalog pays the same zero platform fee whether they’re on the free plan or the $19/month tier — no percentage skim as sales grow.
What the free plan won’t give you: inventory tracking, discount codes, or meaningful analytics. Those require upgrading. If you need them from day one, the free tier isn’t the right starting point. For a maker testing demand before investing further, it’s a clean, low-risk way to find out.
Best for: Independent artists, crafters, and makers selling a focused product range who want a clean, permanent free option.
WooCommerce — Best for Full Control
WooCommerce isn’t a hosted platform — it’s a free WordPress plugin. That changes the entire equation. You’ll pay for hosting (realistic starting point: $5–10/month on a decent shared host), but WooCommerce charges no transaction fees and sets no product limits.
We built a WooCommerce store on a $7/month shared hosting plan to simulate a realistic low-budget setup. After about 8 hours — WordPress installation, theme selection, WooCommerce configuration, payment gateway connections — we had a fully functional store with Stripe, PayPal, and bank transfer all active simultaneously.
The flexibility is genuinely unmatched. Custom checkout fields, subscription products via WooCommerce Subscriptions, wholesale pricing tiers, appointment booking through WooCommerce Bookings — the plugin ecosystem covers nearly every commerce use case, with over 800 official extensions and thousands of third-party add-ons, most of them free or low-cost.
The tradeoff is real: WooCommerce requires more technical comfort than any hosted platform in this list. Updates need manual attention, security is your responsibility, and when something breaks you’re the one debugging it. For a non-technical founder, that overhead is significant. For someone already running WordPress sites, it’s manageable.
Best for: Developers, technically confident founders, and businesses that need deep customization with no appetite for platform fees at any scale.
Platform Comparison at a Glance
| Platform | Free Products | Transaction Fee | Payment Options | Setup Time |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Square Online | Unlimited | None | Square only (free plan) | ~30 min |
| Ecwid | 5 | None | Stripe, PayPal, Square | ~45 min |
| Big Cartel | 5 | None | Stripe, PayPal | ~20 min |
| WooCommerce | Unlimited | None | Any processor | ~6–8 hrs |
| Shift4Shop | Unlimited | None* | Shift4 Payments only | ~2 hrs |
*Shift4Shop’s free plan is US-only and requires Shift4 Payments as your processor. The platform takes no transaction fee, but you’re locked into a single payment provider — more restrictive than Square’s arrangement, with noticeably rougher UX in our testing. Worth considering if you need unlimited products at zero platform cost, but not our first recommendation.
Hidden Costs That Aren’t Transaction Fees
Foto: Tima Miroshnichenko
“No transaction fees” doesn’t mean zero cost. These are the expenses that consistently trip up new sellers.
Payment processing fees are unavoidable. Stripe charges 2.9% + 30¢ per transaction in the US. Square charges 2.6% + 10¢. These aren’t platform transaction fees — they’re processor fees — but they affect margins on every order. At low average order values, the fixed per-transaction component bites hardest. A $10 sale through Stripe loses $0.59 to processing — nearly 6%.
Abandoned cart recovery. On every platform we tested, automated abandoned cart emails required a paid plan. If that’s part of your conversion strategy, budget for it from the start.
Custom domain. Most free plans give you a subdomain: yourstore.square.site, yourname.bigcartel.com. A custom domain typically requires a paid plan or separate purchase. Ecwid sidesteps this entirely because it runs on your existing site’s domain.
Theme limitations. Free plans restrict you to a small set of templates. Square Online’s free templates are current and well-maintained. Big Cartel’s are functional but visually dated. If your brand has specific presentation requirements, test the free templates before committing.
Hosting for WooCommerce. Budget shared hosting starts around $5/month, but shared infrastructure can slow noticeably under traffic spikes. If you expect volume, factor hosting quality — not just cost — into your setup from day one.
Which Platform Fits Your Situation
Start with Square Online if you’re building from scratch in the US or UK and want the fastest path to a live store. Unlimited products, zero transaction fees, and a free plan that doesn’t expire — it’s the closest thing to “open the box and start selling” we tested.
Choose Ecwid if you already have a website and want to add ecommerce without rebuilding. The 5-product limit is real, but for a starter catalog it’s often enough, and the social commerce integrations punch above their weight at zero cost.
Go with Big Cartel if you’re a maker or artist with a tight product line who values simplicity over features. The no-transaction-fee policy across every plan tier makes it a strong long-term option for high-revenue, small-catalog sellers.
Use WooCommerce if you want full ownership of your store and have WordPress experience. It’s the only option here with truly unlimited scalability at no platform cost — provided you’re willing to manage the infrastructure.
Final Recommendation
Foto: Ivan S
For most freelancers, startup founders, and small business owners in the US or UK looking for a free ecommerce platform with no transaction fees, Square Online is where we’d send you first. It offers the most capable free plan, gets you selling in under an hour, and doesn’t quietly skim your revenue on every order.
Ecwid is the runner-up for anyone with an existing site. Big Cartel is the right call for creatives. WooCommerce wins if you want full ownership and control.
The worst outcome isn’t picking the “wrong” platform — every option above will get your products in front of buyers without taking a cut of each sale. The real risk is spending weeks comparing them instead of launching.
Square Online takes about 30 minutes to set up from scratch. Start there, validate that customers will buy, and move to a paid plan or a different platform once revenue data can guide that decision.
Frequently Asked Questions
What did you test each ecommerce platform on?
We built live storefronts with physical products, digital downloads, and processed test purchases to track all fees from both the platform and payment processors.
What counts as a transaction fee vs. payment processing fee?
Transaction fees are charges from the platform itself, separate from standard payment processor fees. We measure platform-level fees, not unavoidable processor fees from Stripe, Square, or PayPal.
What is the best free ecommerce platform overall?
Square Online is the strongest all-around pick for US and UK sellers, offering unlimited products, a published storefront, and zero transaction fees on the free plan.
