Is Squarespace for Ecommerce Right For You?

Squarespace for Ecommerce is a design-focused website builder, and its low-learning curve and stripped-backed interface make it our favorite e-commerce website builder for features. The provider also launched an AI-builder, Squarespace Blueprint, which streamlines the online store-building process even further.

Squarespace lets you sell an unlimited number of products on both of its ecommerce plans, and it doesn’t charge any transaction fees. This, alongside the builder’s affordable monthly plans starting at $27 per month, makes it a great value proposition. However, larger online stores would probably be better going for Shopify instead, as the ecommerce-first builder offers better inventory management tools for large stocks, as well as enhanced shipping and delivery features.

In this article, we’ll cover everything you need to know about Squarespace – from its sales-focused features to its hidden costs – to help you decide if it’s the best ecommerce website builder for you.

In this review:

• Squarespace Ecommerce: At a Glance
• Squarespace Ecommerce Features
• Squarespace Ecommerce Pricing Plans
• Squarespace Ecommerce Help & Support
• How Does Squarespace Compare With Other Ecommerce Website Builders?
• How Did We Research and Test Squarespace Ecommerce?
• Verdict: Is Squarespace Ecommerce Worth It?

Squarespace Ecommerce: At a Glance

Squarespace is an industry leader for a reason, but it’ll meet the needs of some businesses much more than others. Here are some key deciding factors to know about Squarespace right off the bat.

• Ease of use: Squarespace is a breeze to use, predominantly because of its simple, straightforward design and useful AI features.
• Pricing: Squarespace offers two ecommerce plans, Basic ($27 per month) and Advanced ($49 per month), and doesn’t currently have a free version.
• Templates: Squarespace lets you choose from over 170 ecommerce-focused templates for free, as well as a number of premium, paid options.
• Sales features: Squarespace offers advanced sales features alongside POS integration for in-person selling. However, it doesn’t offer as many omnichannel sales options as Shopify.
• AI builder: Squarespace released its own AI builder, Blueprint, in May 2023. However, it is limited to generating and editing text unlike Wix AI, which generates an entire site.
• Customer satisfaction: The e-commerce builder is generally quite popular among its users. In fact, Squarespace was among the platforms most likely to be recommended to a friend in our testing group.
• Mobile app: Unlike alternatives like Hostinger and Webflow, Squarespace has a useful mobile app that lets you track stock, sales, and traffic on the go.
• Help and support: Squarespace offers 24/7 support via email and Twitter, as well as live chat support from Monday to Friday. If you prefer to reach out to customer support via phone lines, we recommend Wix or Shopify instead.

Who should use Squarespace for Ecommerce?

• Users without tons of technical experience, due to Squarespace’s stripped-back interface and useful set-up tutorial
• Creative e-commerce businesses like fashion retailers, jewelry sellers, or artists, due to Squarespace’s aesthetic templates and useful design tools.
• Budget-conscious businesses, because of Squarespace’s affordable monthly plans and absence of transaction fees

Who shouldn’t use Squarespace for Ecommerce?

• Large ecommerce stores with complex inventory, because Squarespace’s stock management tools aren’t as advanced as alternatives like Shopify
• Users that prefer calling up to resolve queries, as Squarespace only offers support via Twitter email and live chat (on a limited basis).
• International businesses that need ecommerce websites in multiple languages, as many languages aren’t able to be translated automatically

Squarespace Ecommerce Features

Squarespace isn’t solely focused on ecommerce websites, but it still offers the features you’ll need if you want to start an online store, along with some solid deals to get you the most bang for your buck. Below is a detailed review of Squarespace’s top offerings.

Product uploads

Adding and editing products sold on your store is straightforward with Squarespace. In fact, you can get a product onto your site with just a few clicks. However, you can still add lots of detail to your products, from custom stock-keeping units to sizing and weight options. You can also import products from other services, such as Shopify, Big Cartel, Etsy, or via a .csv file, which will be a huge timesaver if you’re transferring items across sites, or in bulk.

All this will make it easier to manage your products and inventory further down the line, without it seeming overly laborious for small or new businesses. You can even list an unlimited number of products with Squarespace, regardless of which plan you’re on.

Adding items to my Squarespace was easy, you could lot the price and stock details right away. Source: Tech.co user testing

Product sales

After you’ve uploaded your products, Squarespace offers tons of useful features to help you manage sales. Its shipping and fulfillment tools let you set up shipping and pickup options in a couple of clicks, and even print physical labels in house – preventing you from needing to use a third-party app.

You’re also able to track inventory levels directly through your mobile, and even opt-in for automatic push notifications when items are out of stock or have reached a low inventory threshold. However, for product focused businesses, the inventory management tools aren’t as complex as those from other top ecommerce builders like Shopify. As a result, we think that Squarespace isn’t as useful for physical products as it is for digital goods or services.

Learn more about how the builders’ features compare in our Shopify vs Squarespace comparison guide.

Service, or software sales

By default, in addition to listing physical items on your site, Squarespace also lets you sell services or software. There aren’t many ecommerce platforms that will let you sell services or software, and even fewer that will let you sell them alongside regular physical products.

This makes Squarespace a great choice for any business with a wide variety of offerings. You can even sell subscription services (such as magazines) through the platform, and choose between one-time purchase subscriptions or just subscriptions. Squarespace also offers Squarespace Scheduling, which will let you quickly and easily add appointment scheduling to your site. This means that your customers will be able to book your services whenever they want.

Squarespace gave me a choice between one-time purchase subscriptions and just subscriptions, and also let me choose their frequency. Source: Tech.co user testing

Ecommerce templates

Squarespace is renowned for its high-quality templates, and its ecommerce-specific templates are no different, poised to help you improve your ecommerce conversion rates with the right one. The platform offers 178 template options for businesses that sell online.

While this is a small number in comparison to Wix’s 900+ ecommerce template options, all of Squarespace’s templates are highly customizable, so you’re still capable of creating a highly unique online store with the builder.

What’s more, Squarespace’s templates are a lot more modern and stylish that those available with other builders. Their slick layout helps to showcase products in the best light possible, which is why we think that Squarespace will be the best choice for creative sellers like high-end retailers, artists, and designers.

Here are a few examples of what design visuals to expect from ecommerce templates:

A selection of some mobile responsive, fully customizable, ecommerce templates currently available on Squarespace. Source: Tech.co user testing

Squarespace design features

Some ecommerce platforms are so focused on business management that they fail to provide top-drawer website features. But Squarespace offers some of the best designs around, starting with its Fluid Engine, the main content editor for websites using Squarespace version 7.1 (the most recent model). This editor lets users drag and drop content “blocks,” making it easy to adjust and layer them.

A block can be anything from text, images, and videos to lines, menus, or newsletter forms. With a few simple buttons, users can craft their own standout web design. You won’t need to do everything, though, as you can start from dozen of beautiful templates. It can all be adjusted after your website is live.

Form doesn’t overshadow function, as you’ll still be able to add password-protected members area, guest logins, and an excellent blogging platform for keeping customers up to speed with your latest offerings.

Squarespace let me customize the font and color scheme of my template in a couple of clicks. Source: Tech.co user testing

Yet, while Squarespace’s design toolkit is strong, its design score has slightly dropped off since our last round of testing in 2023. This is because some of its templates prioritize style over function and aren’t quite as accessible as options made by Wix and Shopify. We also found that its templates need some manual reformatting after you upload products and other site content. This won’t be a huge issue for most users, but it might mean you’ll need to spend a bit more time tweaking your site’s layout before you’re happy with the end result.

AI features

Squarespace has historically been behind the pack when it comes to AI-powered features, the builder has recently rolled out some new capabilities that put it in direct competition with some of the best.

For example, in 2023 the provider launched its own AI builder: Squarespace Blueprint. Working in a similar way to other AI builders like Wix ADI, Blueprint asks users seven questions about the desired features, purpose, and style of their site, before creating a website based on their answers.

While websites created with Squarespace Blueprint look slightly more generic than output created by more established builders like Wix and Hostinger, the new features make it quicker and easier to build an ecommerce site with Squarespace.

Squarespace Blueprint asked me seven questions before creating my AI site, including what pages I’d like to add to my site. Source: Tech.co testing

Once an outline of your site has been created, you’re able to use Squarespace text-generator when adding descriptions of your products or services. When we used Squarespace we were really impressed how capable its text-generator was at creating high-quality captions, copy, and even long-form blog posts.

Want to free up some time by using AI? Take a look at how our best-rated AI website builders compare.

Squarespace’s text generator lets you create original copy in a couple of clicks, giving you a way to get the ball rolling if you’ve got writer’s block. Source: Tech.co user testing

Sales reporting

We’ll admit that Squarespace doesn’t have the most granular sales analytics tools on the market – head to Shopify or BigCommerce for that – but it does have a dedicated Analytics app to give you insight into your store’s performance.

With the app, you’ll be able to track key website metrics such as traffic sources. You’ll also be able to keep an eye on sales metrics. For example, you can easily see your top products, track conversions through the purchasing funnel, and compare performance over time.

In-person selling

Squarespace has a unique integration with point of sale giant Square. The two companies have worked to integrate Square’s in-person point of sale expertise into Squarespace’s ecommerce platform, allowing you to track both real-life sales and online sales seamlessly. This means that you won’t have to worry about setting up a separate point of sale system.

You’ll need to be on one of Squarespace’s Online Stores plans and have a Square account to access the system — neither of which will take too long to set up. You’ll also need a Square card reader but, again, these are easy to get ahold of. At the moment, the Square-and-Squarespace integration is only available in the US to users with iPhone devices.

Find out more about Square or the Square and Squarespace integration

Squarespace third-party extensions

Squarespace allows you to quickly and easily integrate a range of 31 third-party services helpful for running a business, covering areas including taxes, sales and marketing, SEO, and drop shipping. For example, you could add the AfterShip extension to add branded product tracking pages and deliver bespoke automated notifications to customers.

The service also offers 55 in-house integrations for categories like marketing, social media, and online ordering. For example, you’re able to automatically push content and encourage visitors to share content from social media platforms like Instagram, Facebook, and Pinterest.

Squarespace payment processing

With Squarespace you can sign up for Stripe and PayPal merchant accounts within 30 seconds, with no paperwork to sign. You can also take credit card payments using Stripe, or accept Apple Pay and PayPal.

As part of Squarespace’s 2023 Refresh, the website builder also launched its own payment solution ‘Squarespace Payments‘. Squarespace Payments is an in-house payment service that lets merchants accept payments directly through the website builder platform. It uses Stripe as the payment processor, and fees will depend on your specific billing plan and what you’re selling.

This makes selling products a breeze, as customers can use any service they want to buy your stuff.

Squarespace Ecommerce Plans

Squarespace offers four plans in total, two for non-ecommerce websites and two for ecommerce websites. We have a Squarespace pricing page devoted to the pricing and features of all four, but the page you’re on now will just look at the two ecommerce plans, Basic Commerce and Advanced Commerce.

Squarespace Basic Commerce

Basic Commerce costs $27 per month when paid annually, and $36 per month when paid monthly. You’ll pay no transaction fee for each sale, which is nice.

Like all Squarespace plans, Basic comes with a host of standard features including unlimited bandwidth, SSL security, one year of a custom domain, 30 minutes of video storage, templates, SEO tools, metrics, and 24/7 customer support. You’ll also get unlimited contributors and a suite of fully integrated ecommerce tools covering order, inventory, and product management, plus payment, taxes, and shipping.

You’ll be able to sell in-person with point of sale, build customer accounts, offer mobile-optimized checkout, use analytics, and list products on Instagram.

Squarespace Advanced Commerce

Advanced Commerce costs $49 per month when paid annually, and $65 per month when paid monthly.

You’ll get everything that Basic has to offer, plus five more features: Abandoned cart recovery, support for selling weekly or monthly subscriptions to a product or service, zip code tracking for advanced shipping, more advanced discount options, and commerce APIs for building your own integrations.

While the abandoned cart recovery is a genuinely useful tool for any business, the rest of these new features are advanced enough that most small businesses are better off with Basic. But if your revenue is high enough that the hike in price won’t impact your bottom line much and you like the extra perks, Advanced is for you.

Does Squarespace Have a Free Plan?

No, Squarespace does not offer an on-going free plan. The closest Squarespace comes to a free plan is its 14-day free trial, which allows users to try out the platform for a few weeks before commiting to paying a monthly or annual price for the plan.

One other cost-related perk worth mentioning is Squarespace’s student discount: Verified students can get 50% off of their entire first year of Squarespace, provided they sign up to pay for the whole year in one installment.

Squarespace Help & Support

Squarespace has a wide range of support options, as you’d expect from a website builder.

• 24/7 email support
• 24/7 Twitter support
• Video tutorials
• Knowledge center
• Live chat support Monday to Friday

Squarespace also has one of the most extensive and trustworthy user support forums in the industry. This means that you’ll be able to lean on the expertise of advanced users, as well as Squarespace’s support team, in the event of a problem.

Squarespace doesn’t lock any of these support options behind more expensive pricing tiers, either – you’ll be able to get the same level of support regardless of whether you’re paying $27 or $49 per month.

Sadly, unlike alternatives like Wix and Shopify. Squarespace doesn’t offer phone support in any capacity. The provider doesn’t offer an AI-customer service chatbot either, so the website builder is unfortunately less suitable for users that want instant replies to their queries.

How Does Squarespace Compare With Other Ecommerce Builders?

Squarespace performed extremely well in our research. In fact, out of all the options we reviewed, it emerged as one of the best website builders for ecommerce, behind Wix and Shopify, because of its low-learning curve and intuitive software. However, it won’t be a natural fit for every business. Established ecommerce businesses will be better off going for Shopify, as the builder offers the best sales features in the industry, including social media selling and price-based shipping rates – both features that Squarespace lacks.

If you’re looking to leverage AI to build a site in a flash, you should turn to builders like Wix or Hostinger. Wix’s powerful AI builder, Wix ADI, lets you get a site live quickly, and assists with a wide range of processes from SEO to content generation, while Hostinger’s AI logo generator helps you give your branding a professional make-over for free.

Take a look at our comparison table below to see how Squarespace compares to the wider competition:

How Did We Research and Test Squarespace Ecommerce?

We take our impartial research and analysis seriously, so you can have complete confidence that we’re giving you the clearest, most useful product recommendations.

After conducting an initial exploration to identify the most relevant, popular, and established tools in the market, we put them through their paces with hands-on testing to see their real strengths and weaknesses. In this case, we put 16 website builder products to the test across 398 areas of investigation.

Based on years of market and user needs research, we’ve established an ecommerce website builder testing methodology that scores each product in seven main categories of investigation and 33 subcategories; this covers everything from customer feedback to design, ease of use, and more.

Our main testing categories for ecommerce website builders are:

• Website Features: the capabilities and functionalities offered by a website builder, e.g. blog functionality, SEO capability, and marketing capacity.
• Sales Features: the sales-focused tools a builder offers, including payment features, POS integrations, AR & VR integrations, check-out options, and more.
• Design Functuality: the aesthetic appeal and visual layout of a website created using a website builder. It encompasses aspects such as page templates and customizable themes.
• Customer Satisfaction: external customer opinion. This is the feedback and ratings given by customers who have used a particular website builder – the market position and reputation a website builder holds.
• Ease of Use: how user-friendly and intuitive a website builder is for people with varying levels of technical expertise.
• Value for Money: the balance between the cost of a website builder and the benefits it provides. It considers factors such as pricing plans, subscription models, and available features.
• Help and Support: the assistance and resources available to users when they encounter issues or need guidance while using a website builder.

When it comes to calculating a product’s final score, not all testing areas are weighted evenly, as we know some aspects matter more to our readers than others, which are simply “nice to have.” For example, when assessing the best ecommerce builders, we weigh sales features more heavily than other categories.

After hundreds of hours, our process is complete, and the results should ensure you can find the best solution for your needs. We also have a number of full-time in-house researchers, who re-run this testing process regularly, to ensure our results remain reflective of the present day.

Learn more about our research.