The Magento engine is the most popular among many other platforms for building an online store: its share in the eCommerce market is roughly 30% (aionhill.com). In general, Magento is utilized by large and medium-size businesses. As far as this platform is an open source software, any changes are possible; however, they require a more delicate approach.
Nevertheless, being in search of the best option for a landing platform for the future online store, the owners hesitate about which edition will most fully satisfy their needs: Magento Community or Enterprise?
Table of content:
- What are Magento Open Source and Magento Commerce?
- Magento Open Source and Commerce Comparison from the manufacturer
- Magento Community and Enterprise – Similarities in built-in features
- Magento Community and Enterprise – Differences
– Magento Community Edition
– Magento Enterprise Edition Pricing
– Magento Enterprise Cloud Edition (Commerce Cloud) - Features available in Magento Enterprise Edition
- Conclusion: Magento CE and EE – for whom?
What are Magento Open Source and Magento Commerce?
All articles on the Internet speak only about two versions – Magento Community (CE) and Magento Enterprise (EE). However, these names cannot be found on Magento.com – there are only Magento Open Source and Magento Commerce products. This puts many of Magento’s potential customers at a standstill. However, the clarification is too easy: Magento Open Source means the Magento Community Edition, and Magento Commerce means Magento Enterprise Edition.
Therefore, we can classify Magento Editions as follows:
- Magento Open Source,
- Magento Commerce,
- Magento Commerce Cloud
Magento Open Source and Commerce Comparison from the manufacturer
The detailed comparative analysis of both editions is provided here by the Magento website – //magento.com/products/compare-open-source-and-magento-commerce. We will try to explain each point thoroughly. Let’s start with similarities.
Magento Community and Enterprise – Similarities in built-in features
To answer the question, first, let’s determine what similarities the editions have.
- Common Core
Both Magento Editions have a common core and a set of core functions. Thus, having run your business on the Magento Community Edition, you build it on the reliable and functional core of the Enterprise solution, which can turn out further. - APIs integrability
Magento Community and Enterprise enable to use API web services for integration with various databases. - Mobile Optimized Shopping
Both Editions propose the possibility to build mobile-friendly stores with a product catalog fully adapted to mobile gadgets. - Integrated Checkout, Payment, and Shipping
Both Editions are equipped with modules to take orders from the shopping cart, to pay for products and deliver them from parcel services. - Global Selling
The opportunity to cooperate with worldwide shipping services, set currencies and switch through multilingual versions. - Catalog Management
Pre-installed parameters of product segmentation – simple, configurable, bundled, customer-personalized products. - Extended Functionality via App Marketplace
Both Editions can use Magento Marketplace – a store of Magento extensions – and be able to integrate with applications to improve functionality.
Magento Community and Enterprise – Differences
1. Magento Community Edition – Free Download
To purchase this platform, simply download it from the Magento website or another source. All further actions will concern customization of the downloaded template. In fact, Magento CE can be called a naked version of Magento EE, devoid of all the extra stuff. It is a virtually pure core, which can be filled with any functionality according to store owner’s preferences.
2. Magento Enterprise Edition Pricing
Magento Enterprise Edition ranges from $22,000.00 – $125,000.00 per year (pre-discount) based on expected annual gross sales revenue. Downhere, you can observe the table with Magento Enterprise prices, regarding of the annual turnover.
Sales Revenue |
Magento 2 EnterpriseEdition (EE) Cost |
Magento 2 Enterprise CloudEdition (ECE) Cost* |
| $0 – $1 million | $22,000.00 | $40,000.00 |
| $1 – $5 million | $32,000.00 | $55,000.00 |
| $5 – $10 million | $49,000.00 | $80,000.00 |
| $10 – $25 million | $75,000.00 | $120,000.00 |
| $25 – $50 million | $125,000.00 | $190,000.00 |
* Combined cost of hosting and Enterprise licensing is negotiable.
3. Magento Enterprise Cloud Edition (Commerce Cloud)
This edition includes the Magento Enterprise suite, as well as the possibility of cloud hosting. Now, Magento 2 offers a cloud hosting called Enterprise Cloud Edition (ECE) that combines licensing, managed hosting based on AWS, and ranges from $ 40,000.00 – $ 190,000.00 per year based on the expected annual revenue from gross sales.
More companies increasingly use cloud hosting as AWS. Given the inherent flexibility in the number of servers online at any time in the configuration of cloud hosting, the price for the server is quite low.
Magento 2 Enterprise Cloud Edition is a new offer for the release of the Magento 2 platform and combines both the Enterprise license and hosting in a single payment structure. Prices start at $ 40,000 annually for vendors that produce less than $ 1 million. For new customers, Magento Enterprise Cloud Edition offers monthly payments to allocate the current annual costs during the year.
Features available in Magento Enterprise Edition
Let’s turn to the comparative table again – //magento.com/products/compare-open-source-and-magento-commerce.
- Business Intelligence Dashboards
Ready-to-use reports built in the dashboard for faster and more convenient utilization. - B2B Functionality
Capabilities to form a list of companies with which you collaborate and manage B2B workflows. - Advanced Marketing Tools
More opportunities to take the marketing on your site under control just from the dashboard. - Content Staging and Preview
All changes in content are visible, and you can always rewind to the proper stage. In addition, there is an opportunity to schedule the content, appointing some widgets, theme to the exact time in the calendar. - Customer Loyalty Tools
Enabling reward points, gift registries, wish lists, and exclusive private sales events. - WYSIWYG Page Builder
CMS management with drag-and-drop capabilities. - Visual Merchandising
Organizing products on catalog pages so that they will be grouped and shown to the definite customer segment. - Support
Magento Open Source (Community) has no technical support from the manufacturer. Third-party development firms, Magento partners, could provide the maintenance. In the contrast to this, Magento Commerce (Enterprise) has a native technical support, directly from the Magento company.
Conclusion: Magento CE and EE – for whom?
Summing this up, we can say that Magento EE is the most suitable for merchants in average revenue tiers — from $5 to $25 million range. For them, using Magento Enterprise Edition is much easier because the spent sum of money is quite purposeful according to challenges of the store. In contrast to businesses generating less than $5 million in revenue, it seems tougher to cover annual expenditures over Community Edition.
If you are still not convinced, watch the video about Magento Community and Enterprise comparison from the unbiased expert.