But as the business evolves from running a single storefront to onboarding multiple sellers, the very simplicity that made Shopify attractive becomes a serious limitation. It wasn’t built for marketplaces, especially those involving multiple independent sellers, whether in D2C aggregators or B2B supplier networks. And while apps and plugins can provide stop-gap solutions, they often introduce more problems than they solve.
If you're building a multi-seller platform, Shopify might feel familiar, but it will start holding you back faster than you think. Here's why.
Shopify Was Built for a Single Merchant Model
At its core, Shopify assumes that there’s one seller managing everything: the catalogue, pricing, taxes, logistics, returns and customer communication. That model works great if you're one brand selling your products.
But marketplaces operate differently:
Each seller manages their catalogue
Orders may need to be split between multiple sellers for fulfilment
Returns and refunds are often seller-specific
Shipping logic, pricing rules and tax structures vary across sellers
Shopify has no native concept of a “seller” in its architecture. You’ll find yourself trying to simulate seller behaviour using tags, metafields or app’s fragile workarounds that simply aren’t scalable.
There’s No Seller Dashboard Unless You Build It Yourself
One of the first things you’ll realise while building a marketplace on Shopify is that your sellers have no way to manage their side of the business. They can’t see orders, process returns, or manage inventory. There’s no seller portal or admin view for them.
That means you’re left with two options:
Build a seller dashboard from scratch, integrating with Shopify’s APIs which by the way, aren’t designed with sellers in mind.
Use a third-party app like Webkul or Multi-Vendor Marketplace. These apps attempt to add seller functionality on top of Shopify, but often bring restrictions in terms of customisation, speed or UI consistency.
Either way, you’re investing time and money to compensate for something that just isn’t native to the platform.
Apps Can’t Replace Core Infrastructure
Shopify’s app store is its biggest strength and its biggest trap. Many teams think they can solve their marketplace needs by stacking enough apps together. And while some apps do work well for simple workflows, you’ll often run into issues:
App conflicts: Two apps trying to touch the same data in different ways.
Limited APIs: Most apps aren’t open enough to let you customise deeply.
Performance bottlenecks: Extra JS, API calls and database loads.
No control: You’re dependent on another company’s roadmap and uptime.
This “plug and pray” model works in the early days until it breaks during your first major campaign, seller onboarding push or custom payout integration.
What Complex Platforms Actually Need
If you’re running a multi-seller platform especially in the B2B world you’ll likely need functionality like:
Role-based access for different sellers
Split orders between sellers
Per-seller return and refund logic
Flexible pricing models and discount rules
Custom payout schedules
Seller performance dashboards
On Shopify, none of this comes out of the box. Every piece must be either hacked together or built from scratch. That’s not just effort it’s future maintenance cost and a slower path to scale.
Commerce Engine: Marketplace-First by Design
This is exactly where Commerce Engine (CE) stands apart. Unlike Shopify, CE was built from the ground up with seller-powered platforms in mind. That means:
Sellers are a first-class entity with native roles, dashboards and permissions.
Order splitting, returns, partial refunds and taxes work the way marketplaces need them to.
Catalogues, pricing and inventory are managed at a seller level.
It’s API-first, so your developers get complete flexibility without workarounds.
You don’t have to install ten apps just to make the basics work. You don’t have to rebuild seller workflows from scratch. It all comes pre-baked.
In Summary: Stop Fighting Your Stack
Shopify is fantastic for single-brand stores. But when your business depends on third-party sellers when your catalogue, fulfilment and growth are seller-led trying to retrofit Shopify is a battle you’ll never win.
What you need isn’t another plugin. It’s a platform built for the model you’re actually running.
With Commerce Engine, you stop hacking things into existence and start building with infrastructure that’s marketplace-ready from day one.
