WordPress is one of the most widely used content management systems, offering access to a wide range of plugins for building almost any type of website — including blogs, corporate sites, and online stores.
Speaking of building online stores, if that is what you are looking for, WooCommerce is the perfect plugin. It is integrated into WordPress as a host content management system, and its current market share is around 30%, at least in Spain.
The most widely used alternative and main competitor is PrestaShop. But WooCommerce has been gaining ground — mainly because of its focus on simplicity. It helps your store sell effectively and is easy to use both for the administrator and for the customer.
Most important features of WooCommerce
There are many aspects that have made WooCommerce stand out, but among the most important features are the following:
- The process of building an online store with WooCommerce is very straightforward.
- It is the most popular plugin among all available WordPress plugins.
- It offers a variety of additional plugins that allow you to improve shopping cart functionality.
- It is completely free and open source — no licence is required to use it.
- You can build scalable online stores, from small ones to large stores with over 100K products, without any loss of hosting performance.
- You do not need to handle technical jargon or be an expert programmer — it is straightforward to use.
- Installing it does not put any other feature on your site at risk.
- Almost all payment methods or payment gateways are compatible with this plugin.
- The user community is very diverse, meaning that when problems or questions arise, you will have access to all kinds of information — including tutorials where you can learn how to fix errors or make better use of all its features.
Can all types of sales be made with WooCommerce?
Yes, almost all types of sales you can find on the web can be made through an online store built with WooCommerce.
- Physical products with a warehouse.
- Dropshipping, like AliExpress.
- Downloadable digital products.
- Physical products without a warehouse.
- Services such as courses, memberships, and more.
- Tickets or subscriptions.
- Affiliate services.
- Overselling, like products from eBay, Amazon, Rakuten, and others.
Steps to set up and launch an online store with WooCommerce
If you are thinking about launching an online store using WooCommerce with WordPress, it is important to carry out a detailed planning process to ensure success.
The steps you need to follow to launch your online store are as follows:
- Start by registering a domain for the store and purchasing hosting to host it along with its related services.
- Then install WordPress and any essential plugins.
- Block search engine indexing while you are building and customising the store.
- Choose a theme that fits your needs and install it — make sure it is compatible with WooCommerce.
- Install an SSL certificate — this is essential for any web project.
- Now proceed to install WooCommerce, apply configurations, and install any plugins you need to extend functionality — for example, payment gateways.
- Customise the store: add your data, branding, location, and any other details.
- Create the legal pages and texts — such as the cookie policy.
- Create the returns and refund policy page.
- Then create the shop page, checkout, cart, and more.
- Connect the domain to Google Analytics to have tracking in place from launch.
- Set up suppliers, shipping methods, payment methods, and of course the products.
- Create and customise notification emails.
- Complete any remaining configurations and customisations specific to your store.
- Always make a test purchase to verify that the platform works correctly end to end.
Once you complete these steps, all that remains is managing the products in your online store — because it will already be up and running.
What are the requirements to run WooCommerce?
If you want WooCommerce to work properly, make sure you have the following requirements:
-
- The latest stable version of WordPress and WooCommerce.
- MySQL 5.6 or MariaDB 1.0 or higher.
- PHP 7.2 or higher.
- The Apache mod_rewrite module enabled.
- Apache or Nginx.
- HTTPS.
- CURL or fsockopen support — used by WooCommerce to integrate PayPal IPN, for example.
- SOAP support.
- Multibyte string compatibility (required if running a non-English store).
- Minimum timeout of 60 seconds — 300 seconds is recommended.
- cURL enabled on the server.
- PHP Safe Mode disabled.
- OpenSSL.
- post_max_size = 16 MB or higher.
- allow_url_fopen = On
- upload_max_filesize 16 MB or higher.
- max_input_vars minimum 4000, recommended 10000 or more.
- memory_limit 128 MB or higher.
- max_execution_time 60 or more.
- suhosin.request.max_vars = 6000 or more.
- suhosin.post.max_vars = 6000 or more.
- suhosin.get.max_vars = 6000 or more.