PrestaShop vs Shopware: which one to choose in 2026?
Both are open source alternatives to Shopify. We compare license, tech stack and features to help you decide which fits your team best.
| PrestaShop | Shopware | |
|---|---|---|
| Category | E-commerce | E-commerce |
| License | OSL-3.0 | MIT |
| GitHub stars | 8k | 7k |
| Tech stack | PHP, Symfony, MySQL | PHP, Symfony, Vue.js, MySQL |
| Replaces | Shopify | Shopify, Magento |
PrestaShop has more GitHub stars, which usually indicates a larger community (not necessarily that it's the best option for your use case).
PrestaShop
Established online store platform, a European alternative to Shopify.
Pros
- Mature ecosystem with many years of development
Things to consider
- Admin interface feels less modern than Shopify's
Shopware
Ecommerce with a visual editor and API-first design, an alternative to Shopify/Magento.
Pros
- Very powerful visual editor for product landing pages
Things to consider
- Some advanced features are Commercial-edition only
Key features
PrestaShop
- Thousands of modules and templates
- Multi-store management
- Strong adoption in the European market
Shopware
- Visual store editor (Shopping Experiences)
- API-first with decoupled admin
- Extension marketplace