WooCommerce
WooCommerce is an open-source e-commerce plugin for WordPress. It is designed for small to large-sized online merchants using WordPress. Launched on September 27, 2011,[3] the plugin quickly became popular for its simplicity to install and customize and free base product.
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Original author(s) | Mike Jolley, James Koster |
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Developer(s) | Automattic |
Initial release | 2011[1] |
Stable release | 3.8.1 (November 27, 2019[2]) [±] |
Repository | ![]() |
Written in | PHP |
Operating system | Unix-like, Windows |
Type | e-commerce |
License | GPL |
Website | woocommerce |
History
WooCommerce was first developed by WordPress theme developer WooThemes,[4] who hired Mike Jolley and James Koster, developers at Jigowatt, to work on a fork of Jigoshop[5][6] that became WooCommerce.[7] In August 2014, WooCommerce powered 381,187 sites (or 17.77% of e-commerce sites online).[8]
In November 2014, the first WooConf, a conference focusing on eCommerce using WooCommerce was held in San Francisco, California. It attracted 300 attendees.[9]
In May 2015, WooThemes and WooCommerce were acquired by Automattic, operator of WordPress.com and core contributor to the WordPress software.[10]
Usage
WooCommerce is used by a number of high-traffic websites such as Small Press Expo.[11] For the 3rd week of September 2015, Trends indicated that WooCommerce ran on 30%[12] of e-commerce sites and millions of active installs.[13] Ecommerce is rapidly growing worldwide and WooCommerce has over 39 million downloads as a plugin and is currently active on more than three million websites and is the most popular eCommerce platform in 2018.[14] WooCommerce has approximately 4% of the top million HTML pages.[15] In 2015, statistics show that the percentage of online stores that utilize WooCommerce through Wordpress.org's plugin is more than 30% of all stores.[16] The current 2019 market share for WooCommerce is 22% of the top 1 million sites using eCommerce technologies.[17]
Since Automattic's acquisition WooCommerce has kept gaining market share, and has now become one of the leading E-commerce platforms on the Internet.[18]
Themes
With many Woocommerce-ready themes sold on third party websites it makes it difficult to exactly estimate how many themes can be associated with this Wordpress plugin, but here are some Woocommerce stats for the bigger theme providers.[19]
Extensions
WooCommerce has attracted significant popularity because the base product, in addition to many extensions and plugins, is free and open-source. In 2018, WooCommerce has near 330 extensions and over 1,000 plugins.[22] In addition, there are thousands of paid add-ons for fixed prices. Many Premium Themes now offer capability with WooCommerce as well as plugins that make a theme framework compatible.[23]
Notable WooCommerce extensions include:
WooExpert Partner program
Instead of a certification program WooCommerce uses an official partnership program. WooCommerce recommends users to use these WooExperts for their WooCommerce projects.[26] Suppliers can apply to become a partner and by doing so will undergo a multi-stage application process that includes skill evaluation and an interview. Throughout the process WooCommerce aim to assess familiarity with WooCommerce core and extensions. The partnership program had either a Gold, Silver or Bronze level[27] until late 2017, when it moved to a flat "verified WooExpert" system.[28]
Revenues
A study conducted in 2017 by Todd Wilkins, Head of WooCommerce, suggests that WooCommerce stores would collectively account for nearly $10 billion in sales.[29]
References
- "WooCommerce Has Arrived". WooCommerce. 27 September 2011. Retrieved 17 January 2015.
- "WooCommerce - excelling eCommerce". WordPress. Retrieved November 27, 2019.
- Perez, Sarah (27 September 2011). "WooThemes Launches WooCommerce To Turn WordPress Sites Into Online Shops". TechCrunch. Retrieved 17 January 2015.
- "WordPress Themes, Plugins & eCommerce". WooThemes.
- Imel, Ryan (28 August 2011). "Jigoshop team and WordPress community members share thoughts on forking". WPCandy. Retrieved 17 January 2015.
- "Our forking views". Jigoshop. 26 August 2011. Retrieved 17 January 2015.
- Imel, Ryan (25 August 2011). "WooThemes forks Jigoshop into WooCommerce, launches WooLabs". WPCandy. Retrieved 17 January 2015.
- "WooCommerce Growth Revisited: Four Million and Counting". WooCommerce. 6 August 2014. Retrieved 17 January 2015.
- "Dedicated to store owners & WordPress developers wanting to learn the art of eCommerce using WooCommerce". Wooconf. November 2014. Retrieved 5 October 2017.
- "WordPress Parent Automattic Buys WooCommerce, a Shopping Tool for Web Publishers". Re/code. 2015-05-19. Retrieved 19 May 2015.
- "WooCommerce E-Commerce Usage". WebTechster. Retrieved 2014-05-13.
- "Statistics for websites using Ecommerce technologies (The Entire Internet Tab)". builtwith.com. Retrieved 21 September 2015.
- Warnimont, Joe (14 February 2018). "WooCommerce Review: The King of Ecommerce Plugins on WordPress". Ecommerce Platforms. Retrieved 30 April 2018.
- "How Many Websites Use WooCommerce? Usage Stats 2019". Barn2 Media. 2019-02-11. Retrieved 2019-06-13.
- "How Many Websites Use WooCommerce? Usage Stats 2019". Barn2 Media. 2019-02-14. Retrieved 2019-06-13.
- "How Many Websites Use WooCommerce? Usage Stats 2019". Barn2 Media. 2019-02-14. Retrieved 2019-06-13.
- "How Many Websites Use WooCommerce? Usage Stats 2019". Barn2 Media. 2019-02-14. Retrieved 2019-06-13.
- "WooCommerce keeps gaining Market Share". ProWoos. Retrieved 16 August 2018.
- "WooCommerce Stats 2018: How Many Websites Use WooCommerce?". Barn2 Media. 2018-02-13. Retrieved 2018-09-15.
- "WooCommerce Stats 2018: How Many Websites Use WooCommerce?". Barn2 Media. 2018-02-13. Retrieved 2018-09-15.
- "WooCommerce Stats 2018: How Many Websites Use WooCommerce?". Barn2 Media. 2018-02-13. Retrieved 2018-09-15.
- "[Infographic] 2017 WooCommerce Statistics". Holler Box. 2017-08-01. Retrieved 2018-09-15.
- "WooCommerce Genesis Framework for WooCommerce".
- "WordPress Parent Automattic Buys WooCommerce, a Shopping Tool for Web Publishers". Recode. Retrieved 30 April 2018.
- "Easy Membership Sites With WooCommerce Memberships - Patrick's Programming Blog". Patrick's Programming Blog. 1 November 2016. Retrieved 30 April 2018.
- "WooExperts - WooCommerce". WooCommerce. Retrieved 2017-09-03.
- "Becoming a WooExpert - WooCommerce". WooCommerce. Retrieved 2017-09-03.
- Scott, Robin (2017-12-02). "WooCommerce Ends Gold, Silver, Bronze – Just WooExperts". Silicon Dales. Silicon Dales Ltd. Retrieved 6 February 2018.
- "WooCommerce Stores on Track to Surpass $10B in Sales This Year". WordPress Tavern. 2017-10-19. Retrieved 2018-09-15.