Google Merchant Center vs Shopify (2024 Comparison) – Forbes Advisor

It’s hard to compare Google Merchant Center vs. Shopify because they’re two different tools. Shopify is an all-in-one e-commerce website builder, while Google Merchant Center is a marketing tool. Still, here’s a look at how the two stack up.

Number of Products

Google Merchant Center isn’t upfront about how many products you can list. However, the online consensus seems to be a maximum of 150,000. Shopify, on the other hand, doesn’t limit your product listings.

Inventory Management

Merchant Center’s inventory management is pretty bare-bones. However, it can mark your products as in stock if there are three or more available, limited stock if there are two or fewer available, on display to order or out of stock. Shopify offers more robust management tools that let you sell products across multiple locations and run inventory reports.

Analytics

In Merchant Center, you can track clicks, impressions and click-through rates. If you link your account and website with Google Analytics, you’ll also get access to conversion data. Merchant Center can also provide personalized, actionable insights based on how customers are interacting with your business and products.

This pales in comparison to Shopify’s analytics, which includes advanced order reports, sales reports, profit reports, fraud reports and more.

Order Management

Shopify has a built-in shopping cart and payment processing system. It also comes with tax calculation and shipping tools, making it a complete solution for selling products from start to finish. Merchant Center has none of this.