What is it?
OpenCart is an online store shopping cart platform and customer management system developed by Christopher G. Mann in 1998. Despite progress stalling considerably after it’s release, it was revived by Daniel Kerr, who released his version in 2009. Although there are alternatives such as Magento and WooCommerce on the market, OpenCart is perfect for start-up and independent businesses due to its intuitive design.
What are some of the benefits of OpenCart?
Free
OpenCart is an open source and free software. As well as this, the maintenance costs are low. This is great for small businesses as it means that expenses can remain lower and you can compete with the prices of much larger ecommerce sites.
Supports a number of languages and currencies
One of the key benefits to OpenCart is that it supports a wide number of different languages and currencies. Having an online store itself opens up a variety of opportunities for your business, and supporting different languages and currencies opens up the potential for more international sales. With automatic rate changes, supporting multiple currencies is easy.
Over 14,000 extensions available.
OpenCart is a popular option for shopping cart software because of how customisable it is. With over 14,000 extensions available, OpenCart can make sure that your site has all the functionality needed to run effectively and to your needs. OpenCart also has an extensive community where fellow developers can query any issues and offer advice when needed.
Customisable with themes
OpenCart also supports an extensive database of themes that can be installed to make sure your website has the exact look and feel desired. With a variety of themes developed by the community, there is sure to be one that suits your needs. The benefit of themes from the community is that you can communicate with the creators with any questions or issues you have to get them resolved.
There are around 317,000 live websites running on OpenCart including the British Red Cross and Volvo. It is an immensely popular shopping cart system and is a fantastic option for startup and small businesses, whilst also having the capabilities to work for larger businesses.
Here at Expand Digital we see the benefits of an OpenCart website for eCommerce sites and have experience in developing and designing websites using it. An example of a website we have produced using it is Ambulance Uniform Store. With a wide variety of ambulance related products ranging in prices considerably, OpenCart allowed us to categorise the products and present them in an effective way, whilst making the website visually appealing, with transitioning images on the homepage. Another key benefit is that it’s SEO friendly, allowing you to get an advantage over competitors in search rankings organically.
