Shopify vs QuickBooks
Shopify or QuickBooks?
Don’t settle for bloated software that struggles to keep up. Pick Shopify for a point of sale that’s designed to respond to today’s rapidly changing retail environment.
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Compare Shopify POS vs QuickBooks
|
Key features |
QuickBooks |
Shopify POS Pro |
|---|---|---|
| Unlimited sales | No | Yes |
| Local pickup | No | Yes |
| Local delivery | No | Yes |
| Exchange online purchases in store | No | Yes |
| Return online purchases in store | No | Yes |
| Integrated customer profiles, online and in store | No | Yes |
| Integrated customer order history, online and in store | No | Yes |
| Redeem gift cards online and in store | No | Yes |
| Unlimited SKUs, online and in store | No | Yes |
| Custom staff permissions | Yes | Yes |
| Fully-synced inventory, in store and online | Through paid integration | Yes |
| First-party payments hardware | Yes | Yes |
| Payments hardware starting from | USD $389 | USD $49 |
| In-store and online payments | No | Yes |
| Unlimited sales channels | No | Yes |
| Ecommerce | Through paid integration | Yes |
| Website builder | No | Yes |
| Social media selling | Through paid integration | Yes |
| Online marketplace selling | Through paid integration | Yes |
| App integrations | No | Yes |
| Loyalty program integrations | Yes | Yes |
| Built-in marketing platform | No | Yes |
| 24/7 support | No | Yes |
Based on features available in the UK as of June 2021
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10 Things Shopify Can Do vs QuickBooks
No expensive upfront commitment
With Shopify, you can get started for as little as $29/mo. With QuickBooks, you need to purchase their software upfront for upwards of $1,200, leaving you exposed to discontinuations and outdated functionality.
Flexible plans
Fast-growing businesses need a partner that helps them grow. With Shopify you can start at $29/month, and you can upgrade at any time. To upgrade with QuickBooks, you need to make another massive one-time investment.
In-store and online payments
When considering Shopify or QuickBooks, both come with the ability to accept payments but only Shopify allows you to use the same payment processor for online and in-store sales. That means you can manage your money in one place.
Easy to use gift cards
On QuickBooks you need to pay extra to sell gift cards—and they can only be redeemed at the location they were sold from. On Shopify, you can sell physical and digital gift cards, and customers can redeem them in store and online.
Local pickup
On Shopify, customers can check what’s in stock before they come to your store—and when they buy online they can select local pickup or delivery at checkout. QuickBooks doesn’t offer local selling features.
Unlimited sales channels
All Shopify plans come with unlimited access to sales channels, unlike QuickBooks which limits channels based on your plan. Sell on Facebook, Instagram, Amazon, eBay, TikTok, and more, all through your Shopify admin.
Ecommerce included
To integrate QuickBooks POS with ecommerce, you need to use a third-party platform. You also need to subscribe to an ecommerce plan, on top of what you’ve already paid for QuickBooks. With Shopify, ecommerce is included.
Unlimited online orders
QuickBooks’s ecommerce plans limit how many orders you can accept online based on your plan. All Shopify’s plans come with unlimited orders so when you get an unexpected surge in shoppers, you can simply enjoy it.
Powerful inventory
With Shopify, your in-store and online inventory are synced as items are restocked, sold, transferred, or returned. Having this up-to-the-minute view means you’re never at risk of overselling at any location.
Built-in marketing
Unlike QuickBooks Shopify comes with marketing tools and customer profiles that sync across online and in-store shopping. That means you can build tailored email campaigns, incentivize repeat purchases, and create ads all from Shopify.
Why Business Owners Choose Shopify Over QuickBooks
You control your growth
QuickBooks requires a large upfront purchase—which you’ll have to make over and over again as the software is updated and your business needs change. With Shopify POS, seize opportunities without the big investment: add new locations and experiment with sales channels, no strings attached.
You can offer better shopping experiences
Shopify syncs inventory and customer profiles across all your locations, in store and online. That means customers can buy online, pick up in store, or buy in store and have the item shipped to their home. You can also accept returns and exchanges of online purchases at any retail store.
You can sell anywhere, anytime
With Shopify, you can open a new retail store, turn Instagram followers into customers by selling on social, and list your products on marketplaces like eBay and Etsy. On QuickBooks, you need to be on the most expensive plan to have more than one location and the number of sales channels you can use is limited by your ecommerce plan.
You can build stronger customer relationships
No matter where your customers buy from you, you can associate all their purchases with one customer profile with Shopify POS. That means you can use their purchase history to make meaningful in-store recommendations. QuickBooks customer profiles are in-store only.
You get a commerce-first solution
Shopify was built for selling—QuickBooks was built for accounting. Shopify comes with the tools you need to run a business out of the box, from selling online and in store to managing all your inventory from a centralized admin, so you can skip the clunky integrations.
You get a website, and the tools to manage it
All Shopify’s plans come with ecommerce at no extra cost. That includes hosting, use of the drag-and-drop website builder, and access to a library of free and paid website templates. QuickBooks only offers ecommerce through a paid integration.
From the seamless checkout experience, to the ecommerce integration and apps, to the simple and powerful reporting, there’s no beating Shopify POS.
Ben Sehl, Kotn
Shopify has allowed me to seamlessly sell products on my website, in my brick and mortar store as well as on Facebook & Google. I load my products once and it's done… Once one realizes that the Shopify platform is a one stop shop for marketing and selling it is literally off to the races.
Curt, via G2 Reviews
Shopify, Shopify POS, and the back-end reporting has helped us to really analyze our business in a way that we couldn’t before. To have one system where every aspect of the store is put together has been really, really helpful.
Ale Tarver, Assembly New York
Learn More About Shopify
Compare Shopify POS
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Try Shopify POS Free for 14 Days
Start unifying in-store and online sales with Shopify to streamline operations, make more sales, and keep customers coming back.
Try Shopify free for 14 days, no credit card required. By entering your email, you agree to receive marketing emails from Shopify.
FAQs
Does Shopify work with QuickBooks POS?
Yes, you can integrate Shopify with QuickBooks POS. However, it’s expensive and it doesn’t provide the same seamless integration you get when you use Shopify for both your online and in-person sales.
To integrate QuickBooks POS with Shopify, you need to use a third-party tool and you need to to choose an ecommerce subscription plan. That means that in addition to paying for QuickBooks POS and Shopify, you’ll also be paying a monthly subscription for Webgility. The subscription plans start at $39/mo, and they impose limits on how many orders you can process each month as well as how many sales channels you can use.
With Shopify, you can sell online and in-person for as low as $29/mo, with no limits on your orders or sales channels.
Does Shopify POS cost extra?
No, you don’t need to pay extra for Shopify POS. However, you can add the Shopify POS Pro subscription to your Shopify plan for an additional $89/month per location if you want to.
All Shopify’s plans include both online and in-person selling. That means you can sell online and in person for as little as $29/month with Shopify—though Shopify’s $79/month plan is best for businesses running an online store and retail location. You can choose to add the POS Pro subscription at an additional $89/month per retail location. We recommend this option if your retail business has multiple locations, lots of staff, high volume, or a large product catalog.
When comparing Shopify vs QuickBooks pricing, with Shopify you get ecommerce and a POS for one fee. For QuickBooks, you get a point of sale, and you need to pay more for ecommerce.
Can you use Shopify POS on a computer?
No, you can’t use Shopify POS on a computer. Shopify is our business software and Shopify POS is our point of sale software. Shopify is available anywhere you have an internet connection while Shopify POS is an app you can download for iOS and Android and run on your mobile device or tablet. While Shopify POS is connected in real-time to your back office, keeping them separate means your retail staff won’t be able to access your entire business while checking customers out in your store.
What POS does Shopify use?
Shopify has its own POS called Shopify POS. While you can integrate your Shopify online store with other major POS providers, we highly recommend using Shopify POS if you’re also using Shopify to run your online store. That’s because Shopify’s superpower is its ability to bring together your in-store and online sales, inventory, payments, reporting, and customer profiles. When all your business data is centralized, you can offer the kind of customer experience that sets your business apart from competitors, from offering buy online, pick up in store to accepting returns and exchanges at any location.
Page last updated June 2021
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