Hosted platforms
Hosted systems can reduce infrastructure and maintenance work while providing a mature checkout, app ecosystem and administration interface. The trade-off is working within platform rules, subscription costs and extension patterns. They are often a good fit when speed to market and predictable operations matter more than deep control.
Open-source commerce
Open-source systems can offer more control over hosting, code and integrations, but that control creates responsibility. Security updates, plugin compatibility, performance tuning and backups need ownership. The right implementation can be flexible; a poorly governed plugin stack can become expensive.
Custom commerce
Custom builds make sense when the business model itself is unusual: complex quoting, proprietary fulfilment logic, specialized account structures or integrations that standard platforms cannot support cleanly. Custom does not automatically mean better. It means the organization is choosing to own more software decisions.
Compare total operating effort
Do not compare platform fees in isolation. Consider payment costs, hosting, apps, development, content operations, reporting, support and the time staff spend working around limitations. A less expensive platform can become costly if routine tasks require manual intervention.
Plan the exit before committing
Understand how product data, customer data, order history, content and URLs can be exported. Platform flexibility includes the ability to leave. Clear data ownership and migration options reduce long-term risk.
Evaluate the administration experience
The storefront gets most of the design attention, but staff may spend hours every week in the administration system. Ask merchandising, customer-service and fulfilment teams to test routine tasks before committing: bulk product edits, refunds, partial fulfilment, content updates, promotion setup and reporting. A platform that is elegant for developers but painful for daily operators can slow the business long after launch.