If you sell in Morocco and are torn between Shopify, WooCommerce, PrestaShop and a custom build, the short answer is: it depends on three things. How you get paid (CMI, local alternatives, cash on delivery), how large your catalog is, and how many hours a week you can personally put into the store. Everything else, design, theme, SEO, can be sorted out later.

This is not a price list. It is a decision guide for the retailer or SME owner who wants to make up their mind before asking for quotes, so that an agency does not pick the platform it happens to sell best.

The cost ranges below are orders of magnitude observed on the Moroccan market in 2026. Confirm them with your providers and your bank.

Why the ecommerce platform Morocco decision is strategic

Switching platforms means migrating a catalog, customer accounts, order history and hard-won search rankings. A store rebuild often costs more than the original launch because everything has to be redone without losing traffic. Your first choice commits you for three to five years.

In Morocco, that choice comes with constraints that international comparisons ignore: card payments mostly run through CMI, whose integration is not native everywhere; cash on delivery remains the dominant payment method in many segments; Law 09-08 governs how you process customer data; and last-mile logistics (Amana, private carriers) impose their own address formats and tracking flows.

Finally, the platform decides who can evolve your store. A SaaS makes you autonomous day to day but limits you to what it offers; an open-source or custom solution opens everything up, provided you have a provider who actually answers the phone.

Shopify, WooCommerce, PrestaShop or custom: the 2026 landscape

Four families cover most Moroccan projects. The differences between them are mostly about control, available skills and total cost, not intrinsic quality.

Shopify: hosted SaaS

You rent the store. Hosting, security, updates and backups are included in a subscription billed in dollars. You can open a working store in days without a developer. The limits: deep customisation goes through paid third-party apps, data is hosted outside Morocco, and taking Moroccan cards requires an external connector because Shopify Payments is not available in Morocco.

WooCommerce: the WordPress ecommerce extension

Free and open-source, it turns a WordPress site into a store. It is the most common choice among small Moroccan retailers because WordPress skills are plentiful and hosting is cheap. In return, you own hosting, updates and security, and the pile of plugins eventually slows the store down beyond a few thousand products.

PrestaShop: open-source built for retail

Historically popular in France and the Maghreb, PrestaShop natively handles larger catalogs, multi-store setups and more complex pricing rules than WooCommerce. CMI payment modules have existed for years. The downside: paid modules add up quickly, major version upgrades are delicate, and the pool of skilled developers is smaller than for WordPress.

Custom: a store built around your business

An application developed specifically for you, often with a modern framework and a headless architecture, shaped around your catalog, logistics and ERP. Reserved for volumes or business models that do not fit the boxes: B2B with negotiated prices, configurators, subscriptions, marketplaces. We explained the reasoning in our SaaS versus custom software comparison.

Online payment in Morocco: CMI integration and local alternatives

This is the criterion that eliminates options fastest. To accept Moroccan bank cards online, the standard route is an ecommerce contract with your bank, which connects you to the Centre Monétique Interbancaire (CMI). The file usually takes several weeks: company documents, trade register, description of the activity, online terms of sale and validation of the payment page. Setup fees and the per-transaction commission are negotiated with the bank; check them before signing, they differ from one bank to another.

On the integration side:

• WooCommerce and PrestaShop have CMI modules, free or paid depending on the publisher, that need careful configuration (keys, return URLs, failed-payment handling).
• Shopify goes through a third-party gateway app or a compatible payment provider; expect a monthly app fee and an extra commission.
• Custom builds integrate the CMI API directly, with fine-grained handling of statuses, refunds and accounting reconciliation.

Alternatives and complements exist: Moroccan payment aggregators that simplify onboarding in exchange for a higher commission, cash on delivery (still essential for most consumer stores), bank transfer for B2B, and the telecom operators’ mobile wallets (MT Cash, inwi money, Orange Money), whose adoption is still gradual. Whatever the platform, plan for cash on delivery from day one and a clear rule to limit refused deliveries.

What each option costs: 2026 price ranges

The right metric is three-year total cost of ownership, not the initial quote. Here are orders of magnitude for an SME store (a few hundred to a few thousand products), excluding content creation and advertising.

• Shopify: subscription around 300 to 1,000 MAD per month depending on the plan, plus 200 to 800 MAD per month in apps (payment, reviews, shipping), a premium theme between 1,500 and 4,000 MAD, and setup by a provider between 15,000 and 50,000 MAD. Over three years: roughly 60,000 to 130,000 MAD.
• WooCommerce: hosting 1,500 to 6,000 MAD per year, paid plugins 1,000 to 5,000 MAD per year, setup 20,000 to 80,000 MAD, maintenance and security 500 to 2,500 MAD per month. Over three years: 60,000 to 200,000 MAD.
• PrestaShop: close to WooCommerce, with generally pricier modules and setup between 30,000 and 120,000 MAD for a structured catalog. Over three years: 80,000 to 250,000 MAD.
• Custom: 150,000 to 600,000 MAD and up for the first version, then 15 to 20% of the initial amount per year in maintenance and evolutions. Over three years: rarely under 250,000 MAD.

These figures follow the logic of our guide to professional website pricing in Morocco, but an online store always costs more than a brochure site: payment, logistics and catalog add weeks of work.

CNDP and customer data: what to check before choosing a platform

An online store collects personal data from the very first order: name, address, phone, purchase history. Law 09-08 applies, and the CNDP expects a declaration (or an authorisation request, depending on the processing) before you go live. This is not a detail to handle after launch.

What to check, platform by platform:

• Where is the data hosted? Shopify hosts outside Morocco. Transferring personal data abroad is regulated under Law 09-08 and may require prior authorisation; check the procedure on the CNDP website before committing.
• Can you answer an access or deletion request? On WooCommerce and PrestaShop the tools exist but must be enabled; on a custom build they have to be in the specification.
• Are your processors identified? Carrier, payment provider, emailing tool: each one processes data on your behalf and must appear in your declaration.
• Cookies and consent: a working banner, not a decorative one, with a real option to refuse advertising tracking.

We gathered the practical steps in our CNDP Law 09-08 compliance checklist. The key point: the platform does not make you compliant; it either gives you the tools to be, or it does not.

Decision criteria by catalog size and sales volume

Three thresholds change the answer.

Under 500 products, under 300 orders a month

Shopify or WooCommerce. Pick Shopify if you want to manage neither hosting nor updates, and if cash on delivery plus a CMI connector is enough. Pick WooCommerce if you already have a WordPress site, want to host in Morocco, or care about keeping your data in-house.

500 to 10,000 products, several hundred to a few thousand orders a month

PrestaShop or a seriously optimised WooCommerce (dedicated hosting, caching, external search engine), or Shopify on a higher plan. At this level, synchronisation with your inventory system or ERP becomes the real topic: ask every provider how they do it and what happens when it fails.

Beyond that, or an unusual business model

Catalogs with complex variants, per-customer B2B pricing, multi-country sales, deep integration with an existing system: custom or headless is justified, because workarounds on a standard platform end up costing more than development.

Two quick questions to place yourself: how many hours a week can you personally spend on the store, and do you have someone in-house who can fix a bug on a Saturday night in the middle of a promotion? If the answers are “few” and “no”, favour SaaS or a firm maintenance contract.

The most common pitfalls when launching an online store

• Launching without a signed CMI contract. The bank file takes weeks; start it before development, not after.
• Underestimating cash on delivery. Refused deliveries hurt cash flow; plan phone or WhatsApp confirmation, and a threshold above which prepayment is mandatory.
• Choosing the platform the agency prefers. A provider who only works with one tool will always recommend it. Ask why the other options are ruled out for your case.
• Neglecting ownership. Domain name, hosting account, Shopify account, admin access: everything must be in your name, not the provider’s.
• Leaving logistics out of the specification. Delivery zones, fees per city, parcel tracking, returns: these are features, not details.
• Dealing with the CNDP after launch. See above.
• Stacking plugins. Every module is a dependency to maintain and a potential vulnerability. The fewer there are, the better the store ages.

To assess the provider itself (references, contract, reversibility), our guide to choosing an IT services company in Morocco lists the questions to ask.

Our recommendation by company profile

• Independent retailer, young brand, under 500 products: Shopify if you accept foreign hosting and a subscription in foreign currency; WooCommerce hosted in Morocco if you want control and minimal recurring costs.
• SME with a structured catalog, stock to synchronise and a team: PrestaShop or optimised WooCommerce, with a clear maintenance contract and native CMI integration.
• SME or group with a specific business model, B2B, or several sales channels: custom or headless, provided you accept a higher initial budget and a long relationship with the provider.
• You do not yet know whether online will work for you: start small on a SaaS platform, measure for six months, then decide with real numbers. A well-prepared migration to another platform remains possible.

Whatever you choose, ask every provider for a three-year costing (setup, subscriptions, modules, maintenance, payment commissions) rather than a simple build quote. It is the only honest basis for comparison. Arrowlancer’s web services are described on our services page.

What now?

Arrowlancer designs and builds websites and web applications in Casablanca: stores on Shopify, WooCommerce or PrestaShop, and custom ecommerce platforms when the business requires it, with CMI integration and CNDP requirements built into the specification from the start. If you want an opinion on the right platform for your catalog and volumes before you send out requests for quotes, write to us through the contact form.