Comparison
pcreative Commerce vs WooCommerce
A plugin that turns WordPress into a shop. Free to install, and the most widely deployed store software there is.
How WooCommerce makes money
The plugin is free; the pieces you end up needing are not. Official extensions for subscriptions, bookings or shipping run from roughly $99 to $299 a year each — and Automattic also monetises through hosting and its own payments product.
Free until you need it to do something.
The install costs nothing. Then you need subscriptions, and bookings, and a decent shipping rate, and suddenly you are renewing five subscriptions a year, each from a different vendor, each with its own update cycle and its own idea of when to break. Here, the back office things a shop actually needs — tax invoicing, card-free payments, barcode stock control, reviews with moderation, gift cards and store credit, a marketplace for other sellers — are in the box and stay in the box.
- Built in
Sells through ChatGPT and Claude, checkout stays yours
Your catalogue speaks the agents' protocol: they search it and recommend with real price and stock, and the buy link always points at your site.
- Built in
EU AI Act Article 50 compliance built in
Enforceable from 2 August 2026. Fines up to €15M or 3% of worldwide turnover. Notice in three languages, machine-readable header, and a record of having shown it — without storing a single personal datum.
- Built in
Themes in the stack of your choice
A theme is a website that talks to the store over HTTP. Eight stacks supported. The others tie you to their template language.
- Built in
AI with your own key and a spending cap
Eight providers, including one that runs on your own machine at zero cost. The key never leaves your server, and the daily cap is in euros — not in requests, because a request has no fixed price.
- Built in
Moving in from Shopify or WooCommerce
Everyone imports a CSV. Here you connect the shop with read-only keys and it fetches the lot on its own — catalogue, customers, SEO titles, coupons, reviews, blog posts and the order history a CSV cannot carry. Orders come in as history: they move no stock, charge nothing and send no email. And you get what nobody hands you: one permanent redirect per old URL, in nginx, Apache, JSON and CSV, downloadable before you import anything, because you need it before you touch the DNS.
- Built in
Customer consent survives the move
Customers come over with their addresses, and only whoever said yes explicitly in the file arrives subscribed — blank, odd or missing is a no. If the same address appears twice and one row says yes and the other no, the no wins. What the file said is stored alongside, with the row it came from: a yes you cannot trace is worth nothing if anyone ever asks.
- Built in
Card-free payments out of the box
The five big card gateways are here too (Stripe, Adyen, Mollie, MONEI, PayPal). What is unusual is the rest: bank transfer, cash on delivery, Bizum and crypto on your own server. For sectors where the big gateways close accounts without warning, that is not a checkbox — it is being able to exist.
- Built in
Spanish tax invoicing
Invoice series, issuer and customer tax IDs, and VAT broken out of a VAT-inclusive price — which is how Spanish retail actually prices. Attached to the confirmation email automatically.
- Built in
Barcode stock control
Goods in, goods out, full stocktake with differences, and binding a new barcode to a product without losing the scan.
- Built in
Several stores from one panel
- Built in
Multi-language storefront
Twelve storefront sections translated, catalogue translated from the panel with your AI, and the main language keeps clean URLs. Until recently this row said «no»: it was in the list of what was missing.
Where WooCommerce beats us.
You already know most of this, and a comparison that pretended otherwise would not be worth reading.
It installs on any five-euro shared hosting, in five minutes.
The largest extension ecosystem in commerce, by a distance.
Every developer, agency and freelancer already knows WordPress.
Content and blogging are still better there than anywhere else.
Do not choose us if…
If your hosting is shared PHP and you have no intention of touching Docker, WooCommerce is the right call. Our install genuinely needs a server, and no amount of good documentation changes that.
Feature by feature.
The same table as everywhere else on this site, narrowed to WooCommerce — last section included.
What nobody else brings
Four things you cannot get from Shopify, WooCommerce or PrestaShop today — not with a plugin, not with a paid tier.
| Feature | WooCommerce | pcreative |
|---|---|---|
| Sells through ChatGPT and Claude, checkout stays yoursYour catalogue speaks the agents' protocol: they search it and recommend with real price and stock, and the buy link always points at your site. | Not available | Built in |
| EU AI Act Article 50 compliance built inEnforceable from 2 August 2026. Fines up to €15M or 3% of worldwide turnover. Notice in three languages, machine-readable header, and a record of having shown it — without storing a single personal datum. | Not available | Built in |
| Themes in the stack of your choiceA theme is a website that talks to the store over HTTP. Eight stacks supported. The others tie you to their template language. | Not available | Built in |
| AI with your own key and a spending capEight providers, including one that runs on your own machine at zero cost. The key never leaves your server, and the daily cap is in euros — not in requests, because a request has no fixed price. | Not available | Built in |
Where we are simply better
Others can do it — with plugins, with add-ons, or not at all in Spain.
| Feature | WooCommerce | pcreative |
|---|---|---|
| Moving in from Shopify or WooCommerceEveryone imports a CSV. Here you connect the shop with read-only keys and it fetches the lot on its own — catalogue, customers, SEO titles, coupons, reviews, blog posts and the order history a CSV cannot carry. Orders come in as history: they move no stock, charge nothing and send no email. And you get what nobody hands you: one permanent redirect per old URL, in nginx, Apache, JSON and CSV, downloadable before you import anything, because you need it before you touch the DNS. | Partial, or needs an add-on | Built in |
| Customer consent survives the moveCustomers come over with their addresses, and only whoever said yes explicitly in the file arrives subscribed — blank, odd or missing is a no. If the same address appears twice and one row says yes and the other no, the no wins. What the file said is stored alongside, with the row it came from: a yes you cannot trace is worth nothing if anyone ever asks. | Partial, or needs an add-on | Built in |
| Card-free payments out of the boxThe five big card gateways are here too (Stripe, Adyen, Mollie, MONEI, PayPal). What is unusual is the rest: bank transfer, cash on delivery, Bizum and crypto on your own server. For sectors where the big gateways close accounts without warning, that is not a checkbox — it is being able to exist. | Partial, or needs an add-on | Built in |
| Spanish tax invoicingInvoice series, issuer and customer tax IDs, and VAT broken out of a VAT-inclusive price — which is how Spanish retail actually prices. Attached to the confirmation email automatically. | Partial, or needs an add-on | Built in |
| Barcode stock controlGoods in, goods out, full stocktake with differences, and binding a new barcode to a product without losing the scan. | Partial, or needs an add-on | Built in |
| Abandoned cart recoveryDetection, email and recovery rate are there; the automatic trigger is not — today it is sent by hand. | Partial, or needs an add-on | Partial, or needs an add-on |
| No commission per saleShopify charges a monthly fee AND a cut of every sale if you do not use their gateway. WooCommerce and PrestaShop do not charge commission either — this one is about Shopify. | Built in | Built in |
Where we hold our own
Table stakes. Nothing here is a reason to switch on its own.
| Feature | WooCommerce | pcreative |
|---|---|---|
| Admin panel | Built in | Built in |
| Theme catalogue | Built in | Built in |
| Customise a theme without codeThe form is generated from what each theme declares, so it works the same whichever stack the theme is written in. Your settings live apart from the theme: updating it never overwrites them. | Built in | Built in |
| Visual page editorDrag and drop over the real storefront, with desktop/tablet/mobile preview — home page only for now. | Built in | Partial, or needs an add-on |
| Plugin APIA published list rather than open hooks: 9 events, 6 filters, 5 panel slots. What is on the list is a promise; removing it takes a major version. | Built in | Built in |
| Blog and content | Built in | Built in |
| Several stores from one panel | Partial, or needs an add-on | Built in |
| Multi-currency | Partial, or needs an add-on | Partial, or needs an add-on |
| Multi-language storefrontTwelve storefront sections translated, catalogue translated from the panel with your AI, and the main language keeps clean URLs. Until recently this row said «no»: it was in the list of what was missing. | Partial, or needs an add-on | Built in |
What we do not have yet
Ordered by how much it hurts. You are going to find this out on day one anyway — better here than after you have paid.
| Feature | WooCommerce | pcreative |
|---|---|---|
| Five-minute install on shared hostingThis needs a server with Docker. One command brings up the whole thing and a six-step wizard finishes the job — but it is not uploading a folder by FTP, and it never will be. | Built in | Not available |
| Extension marketplaceThe plugin contract exists and is tested. The shop to install them from does not. | Built in | Not available |
| Subscriptions and point of sale | Partial, or needs an add-on | Not available |
| Supplier cost and marginsUnder construction. Nobody in this table has it, and it is where the back office gets genuinely useful — real supplier cost, margin against recommended retail price. | Not available | Not available |
| Managed hosting | Not available | Not available |
4 things WooCommerce does not sell at any price.
Each one is in the code today, and the documentation will tell you if this page is exaggerating.