Shopify vs Dukaan 2024: Which Option is Right for You?

Though Dukaan isn’t as well-known, it has quickly become a rising star in the ecommerce industry since its launch in 2020.

If you’re struggling to choose between the two platforms, this step-by-step comparison will tell you everything you need to know.

Dukaan vs Shopify: Which Is Best Overall?

Though we think Shopify is definitely the better option overall for ecommerce vendors, the right choice for you could depend on a few different factors.

For instance, if you’re a small business owner looking to sell services or products online, Dukaan is a highly affordable, and user-friendly choice.

The platform comes with access to multiple customizable themes and pages, staff accounts, in-built analytics, and various payment gateway integrations. Plus, there’s a handy logistics system included to streamline global shipping.

However, if you’re running a slightly larger business, Shopify does offer a lot more versatility. It’s one of the most comprehensive commerce platforms available today, supporting various types of business models.

You can start a dropshipping business with Shopify, or sell print on demand products, as well as your own physical products. Plus, you can sell services, subscriptions and more.

With Shopify, you can even integrate your online store with social media channels, and marketplaces like Amazon and Ebay.

There’s also a point of sale system for small businesses and startups looking to sell products in-store.

Dukaan vs Shopify: The Main Differences

Dukaan might be a much younger platform than Shopify, but the Indian SaaS solution shares a lot of similarities with Shopify’s ecosystem.

Both platforms include inventory management and website building tools, analytics, and access to staff accounts. Both also have their own mobile app, and can integrate with third-party plugins.

The biggest differences:

• While Dukaan integrates with a range of payment gateways for transactions, it doesn’t have its own payment processor. Shopify, on the other hand, has Shopify Payments, and supports one-click checkouts with Shop Pay.
• Shopify comes with built-in tools for search engine optimization (SEO), social media, and email marketing. The only way to access marketing tools with Dukaan is through integrations with third-party tools like MailChimp.
• While Shopify has its own automation tools and logo maker, Dukaan offers a wider range of free tools, such as a terms and conditions generator, privacy policy generator, and background removal tool for images.

Shopify vs Dukaan: The Features

	Shopify	Dukaan
Analytics	Yes	No
Discount Codes	Yes	Yes
Collections	Yes	Yes
Related Products	Yes	Yes
Custom Product Filters	Yes	Yes
Product Reviews	Via 3rd-party apps	Yes
Integrated Checkout	Yes	Yes
Customer Accounts	Yes	Yes
Cookie Banner	Via 3rd-party apps	Yes
Automations	Yes	Partial
POS	Best (Available worldwide)	No
Automatic Tax Calculation	Full	Partial
Real Time Shipping Rates	Yes	No
Abandoned Cart Emails	Yes	No
Email Marketing	Yes	No
Marketing Websites	Via 3rd-party apps	No

Both Dukaan and Shopify offer a wide range of features to business owners and entrepreneurs launching online stores. While the functionality of the two platforms is similar, there are some differences between what Shopify and Dukaan can do.

Shopify’s Key Features

Shopify has dozens of features to explore for everything from store management, to marketing, depending on your business needs.

Some of the core features include:

• Ecommerce Website builder and page editor: Shopify makes it easy to build an attractive ecommerce store, with responsive templates, themes, and a range of customization methods. You can also dive into the code on your website if you want to make granular changes.
• Payment processing: With Shopify, you can process credit card, debit card, and other payments easily via Shopify Payments. There’s also the option to integrate your preferred payment provider (such as PayPal) into the ecommerce software.
• Store management: Shopify offers companies a variety of store management tools, covering everything from order and inventory management, to tax calculations. You can even access fulfillment services through Shopify Shipping, or the Shopify Fulfillment Network.
• Marketing tools: As well as integrating with a variety of marketing tools, Shopify also has built-in marketing solutions, such as integrated technical SEO solutions, options to build your own blog for content marketing, and customer segmentation tools.
• Omnichannel sales: With Shopify, you can sell products and services across a variety of channels, from online marketplaces to your own Shopify store, social media platforms, and even in-person, through Shopify POS.
• Analytics: Shopify offers in-depth reports to help you identify your best-selling products, optimize your ecommerce store, and even calculate tax and VAT rates. You can even track customer preferences and create buyer profiles.

Dukaan’s key features

Dukaan might be a little simpler than Shopify overall, but it still has a lot of excellent features to explore, such as:

• Website design features: Dukaan comes with a range of themes to choose from, designed to load up to 6 times faster than existing solutions. You can customize your themes to suit your brands using an easy editing tool, and even create unique custom pages.
• Payment gateways: Although Duukan doesn’t have its own payment processor, it does offer seamless integrations with a range of payment gateways. You can also offer order tracking features to customers, and create branded invoices.
• Store management: Dukaan comes with an inventory control solution that allows you to automate inventory updates, sale orders, deliveries and returns. You can also create specific employee accounts for staff members, with different access levels.
• Shipping options: With an included logistics system, you can quickly ship products across the globe. You’ll be able to find carriers, get shipping quotes, and track the progress of orders, all in the same unified backend environment.
• Free business tools: As mentioned above, Dukaan offers a range of free business tools to beginners, such as slogan and terms and condition generators, QR code makers, image enhancers, and a product description generator.
• Integrated Analytics: Like Shopify, Dukaan offers reporting tools that provide in-depth insights into your orders and customer information. However, there are fewer reporting options available, unless you use an integration with Dukaan.

Shopify vs Dukaan: Ease of Use

Ecommerce businesses looking for straightforward and intuitive platforms can’t really go wrong with either Dukaan or Shopify. We found both tools to be incredibly easy to use, even if you don’t have any prior coding or business management experience.

Shopify Ease of Use

Shopify is incredibly easy to use. You can sign up for an account in minutes, and immediately start creating a custom ecommerce website in seconds, with a range of free and premium templates to choose from.

You can even manage your business on the move with Shopify’s mobile app for iOS and Android. We consider the backend for Shopify to be one of the cleanest and easiest to navigate.

You’ll have no trouble finding the features you need, whether you want to add product pages to your store, make changes to your storefront, or access analytics.

Plus, you can even use Shopify Flow to automate various tasks, like sending order updates to customers, or managing fulfillment.

The biggest downside with Shopify is that if you want to make extensive edits to your themes, the code can be a little complex. You might need to consider seeking help from a Shopify Expert here.

Dukaan Ease of Use

Dukaan was built for simplicity, and that’s definitely something that shines through when you begin interacting with the platform. You can sign up for free and start experimenting with a variety of themes in a couple of clicks.

All of the themes are designed with a mobile-first approach in mind, so you can rest assured pages will load quickly on any device.

Customizing your themes is simple, with a convenient editor where you can change colors, logos, and photos.

Plus, there are plenty of features on Dukaan to make your life easier as a business owner. You can upload and import products in bulk, add staff accounts in seconds, and even automate all of your tax calculations, without having to pay extra fees.

Unlike Shopify, Dukaan also allows you to rapidly convert your website into a mobile app. This is extremely useful if you’re targeting the 76% of US adults who say they only ever buy products using their mobile device.

Shopify vs Dukaan: Customer Support

If you’re looking for a little extra help with running your online business, both Shopify and Dukaan have a range of options to choose from.

Shopify Customer Support

Shopify is clearly committed to supporting business owners around the world in a variety of ways. You can access webinars and videos online from Shopify’s team to learn more about the platform.

There’s a massive knowledgebase full of articles, an FAQ section, and a blog for extra information. Plus, you can hire Shopify Experts through the Shopify Partner program.

Shopify has a range of contact options available too, though they can vary depending on where you live. Phone support is available in some countries, though live chat and email is accessible everywhere. You can also join various online community forums for assistance.

Dukaan Customer Support

Dukaan has some great options in the “resources” section of its website, such as a selection of video tutorials, and a blog filled with useful tips.

There’s also the option to join Dukaan’s community group, and get real-time support from other people using the platform.

The help center is well-organized and brimming with useful articles on everything from delivery methods to marketing strategies.

Unfortunately, if you want direct support, the only option is live chat, which is only accessible through your Dukaan dashboard.

Shopify and Dukaan Pricing Plans

Value for money is always important when shopping for business tools and platforms.

While Shopify is a little more expensive than Dukaan, it’s worth remembering you do get extra functionality in most packages.

Pricing

	Shopify	Dukaan
Free Trial	Yes	Yes
Free Plan	No	NO
Paid Plans (Monthly)	$5 – $399	$14.99 – $49.99
Free Domain	No	No
Transaction Fees	0 – 2%	0

Let’s take a closer look at the princing plans and fees for Dukaan and Shopify.

Shopify Pricing

Overall, Shopify offers 5 pricing plans: 3 core plans, 1 Enterprise plan (Shopify Plus), and the “Starter” plan. The Starter plan, for $5 per month (and 5% transaction fees) doesn’t give you an online store builder, but allows influencers and creators to sell across social media and messaging channels like WhatsApp, with buy buttons and links.

The 3 core plans offer a 25% discount on annual plans. Plus, you can try Shopify for free for 3 days, then access a plan for $1 per month for 3 months (at the time of writing). The central plans include:

• Basic Shopify: $39 per month: The Shopify website builder, marketing tools, SSL certificates, 1,000 inventory locations, payment processing features, and 2 staff accounts.
• Shopify: $105 per month: The features of “Basic” plus 5 staff accounts, more advanced reports, and lower transaction fees.
• Shopify Advanced: $399 per month: All the features of “Shopify” plus import tax management tools, 15 staff accounts, and advanced custom reports.

All plans have transaction fees to consider, even if you’re using Shopify Payments. The more expensive your plan, the cheaper the fees will be. There are also extra fees to consider if you want to integrate a third-party payment processor.

Shopify’s Enterprise plan, Shopify Plus, includes custom pricing, starting at $2,000 per month, and features unique integrations, API access, headless commerce tools, and other unique features.

Dukaan Pricing

One thing we did appreciate about Dukaan’s platform is how straightforward the pricing structure is. There are only three plans to choose from, and there are no transaction fees on any. However, you will still need to pay the processing fees charged by your payment gateway.

If you sign up for an annual plan, you get a 17% discount. Otherwise, the monthly plans include:

• Entrepreneur: $14.99 per month: 1 online store, unlimited products, payment gateway integration, order management, free SSL certificate, themes, plugins, discount codes, and 5 staff accounts.
• Agency: $49.99 per month: All the features of Entrepreneur, plus 10 online stores, with 10 staff accounts for each individual store.
• Enterprise: Custom pricing: Everything in Agency, plus tailor-made themes, custom CRM integrations, and extra support.

Keep in mind, there may be additional fees to pay for plugins and integrations too.

Top Alternatives to Shopify and Dukaan

If you don’t think either Shopify or Dukaan are right for you, then there are other options worth considering too. Some of our favorite alternatives include:

1. Wix

If you’re looking for simplicity, Wix is an incredible choice. It’s one of the most straightforward website builders available, with integrated AI capabilities from Wix ADI.

Plus, it allows companies to sell everything from digital downloads to physical products. Wix is also extremely affordable, even for smaller businesses.

2. Squarespace

For creatives and artists, Squarespace is the go-to pick. It’s great for selling digital products like downloads, and even has booking features on some plans.

Plus, it comes with some of the most attractive themes around. Squarespace does lack a little flexibility if you’re going to be selling physical products, however.

3. Surecart

Designed for WordPress users, Surecart allows companies to plug ecommerce features into their existing site. It’s packed with tools for creating compelling checkout forms, order pages, and more.

It also makes it simple to automate various processes, and integrates with a huge variety of existing business tools.

The Verdict: Dukaan or Shopify?

We were pretty impressed by the ease of use and flexibility Dukaan had to offer, but we still had to choose Shopify as our favorite ecommerce platform overall. Dukaan is great for smaller businesses just getting started online, but Shopify offers a lot more flexibility and scalability.

If you’re looking for a platform that can grow with your business, and help expand your revenue with access to omnichannel sales tools and marketing capabilities, Shopify is our top pick.

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