It’s the question on the minds of everyone in the ecommerce trenches — should I go with Shopify or Amazon? Working with either of these two easily recognizable names could be a huge boon to your company — but which is the right fit in the long run?

Shopify works with over 600,000 businesses and has sold about $82 billion worth of products through their services. You build your own website with their help which is great because it lets you establish a brand of your own and allows you to be as unique as you want. Downside? Hidden extra costs. There’s a monthly fee to use Shopify. Plus, some of their services require the use of third-party apps which can end up costing. Another additional fee you might not have thought of? Marketing isn’t something Shopify can handle for you so that could be a factor.

With over 150 million visitors per month, Amazon seems like the obvious choice. That’s a lot of exposure! Plus, since Amazon can take a lot of tasks off your hands as a business owner — things like housing inventory, doing the shipments, and more — you have time to focus on other important matters. Sounds like a no-brainer right? Everything has a darkside! With Amazon, you’ll have to compete with all the other guys out there — millions and millions of other businesses and products. What’s more, you can’t achieve a great level of unique branding on an Amazon page since there’s a limit to what you can do.

Simply put — the main difference between Amazon and Shopify is that the first one allows you to sell your products through their platform where the second one provides the tools to build an online store for yourself. Ultimately, the right choice will depend on the needs of your unique business — but hopefully we’ve helped make that choice a lot easier for you.