The Ultimate Guide to the Best WooCommerce Multi-Vendor Plugins (Compared)

By Naveed Ahmed | Reviewed by Syed Balkhi | August 23, 2024 | Reader Disclosure

Are you looking for the best WooCommerce multi-vendor plugins? Creating your own online store is great, but you could potentially make more money by letting other sellers rent a small portion of the space. With multi-vendor plugins, you can turn your e-commerce site into a professional-looking marketplace, like eBay, Amazon, or Etsy.

In this article, we’re going to go over the best WooCommerce multi-vendor plugins so you can let other sellers promote their products on your website.

As a WordPress expert with over 15 years of experience, I’ve personally tested and reviewed a wide range of multi-vendor plugins. I’ve seen firsthand how these plugins can transform your online store into a thriving marketplace. To make the most of this guide, I recommend actively engaging with the content. Think about your specific needs and how each plugin aligns with your goals. Bookmark this page and return to it as you explore the world of multi-vendor plugins.

Why Do You Need a WooCommerce Multi-Vendor Plugin?

A WooCommerce multi-vendor plugin allows you to turn your store into a marketplace where vendors can easily sell their products. It adds functionality to your WooCommerce site where other users create their own stores and manage products, payments, and orders.

Instead of trying to fiddle with the code, WooCommerce multi-vendor plugins are the quickest way to get started. Creating a marketplace can be helpful if your website has a large audience that wants to buy certain products. Maybe you can drive traffic to the marketplace but don’t have products to sell. In that case, you just need to onboard vendors to your marketplace and earn a commission on each sale.

Here are just some of the benefits of creating your own multi-vendor e-commerce website:

• Earn a commission: As we mentioned, you can profit from sales generated by the vendors on your site. This is similar to dropshipping, where you can make money online without having to deal with the hassle of managing inventory or shipping.
• Wider audience: The more vendors you have on your e-commerce platform, the more customers you’ll have. Each vendor brings their own word-of-mouth referrals, established customer base, and social media presence, resulting in more visits to your platform.
• Sell a wide variety of products: Each vendor can add their own unique products or services. These can be physical or digital products. Everyone wins because customers have more products to choose from.
• Cost savings: Creating a marketplace typically requires a large upfront investment, such as hiring developers to code a website that offers multi-vendor functionality.

That said, let’s look at what are the best multi-vendor WordPress plugins available so you can create a compelling marketplace that attracts both buyers and sellers.

The 9 Best Multi-Vendor Plugins for WooCommerce (Compared)

Here are the top multi-vendor plugins for WooCommerce that we recommend:

1. WC Vendors

WC Vendors is the best WooCommerce multi-vendor plugin out there, and it has all the features you need to turn your online store into a marketplace and start selling third-party products online. You can easily accept applications from potential vendors. This way, they can onboard and start selling on your platform. You can either require admin approval or the vendor applications can be approved automatically.

That said, if you need a more comprehensive application process, then it’s best to use a dedicated form builder. For instance, WPForms would allow you to create a multi-page user registration form to gather all the information you need. You may want to ask vendors about the types of products they sell, their current revenue, and if they already have a retail store.

Furthermore, the plugin offers numerous customization options. Individual vendors can create their own storefronts, and they have the ability to easily upload products, manage inventory, and fulfill orders.

Best of all, you can set the commission rate at a fixed or percentage rate. You can even set up a tiered system where you reduce the commission for top vendors to incentivize them to continue selling on your website. If you’re not ready to commit to a paid plan, then WC Vendors offers a free version to help you get started. You can easily allow vendors to register, and you can set a commission rate on sales. In addition, all vendors can post products.

That said, if you want more advanced features like creating service or digital product marketplaces, providing more SEO support, adding auction features, and creating affiliate programs, then you’ll need to install the Pro version.

Pros:

• With its launch wizard, WC Vendors is easy to set up.
• WC Vendors makes it easy to accept vendor applications.
• You can accept customer reviews and ratings on each product page.

Cons:

• Although there’s a free version, the best features are paid.

Pricing:

Starting at $99.50 per year.

Why We Recommend Using WCVendors:

We recommend WC Vendors as the top choice for turning your online store into a highly profitable marketplace. It has all the necessary features to sell physical, handmade, and second-hand goods, digital products, services, and much more. Plus, since the plugin supports many WordPress themes and plugins, you can easily integrate all sorts of marketing applications to drive sales and conversations.

For more information on its features, see our full WC Vendors review.

2. Dokan

Trusted by over 60,000 marketplaces, Dokan is one of the most popular WooCommerce multi-vendor plugins on the market. Like WC Vendors, it lets you create your own online marketplace, similar to Amazon, eBay, or Magneto, in less than 30 minutes.

The best thing about Dokan is that each vendor has their own customizable control panel in the storefront. They can easily control and navigate all aspects of their store, such as creating product listings, managing orders, generating coupons, and viewing sales reports. However, backend access is restricted to only administrators.

Dokan has possibly the most payment gateways available with over 100 integrations including Apple Pay, Stripe Express, Google Pay, Razor Pay, and more. Vendors can enjoy automatic payment distribution, meaning that the plugin automatically calculates and distributes payments with the commissions already included.

In addition, vendors can also easily manage shipping by selecting their own shipping zones or by setting a flat shipping rate. It’s a good idea to have a built-in shipping calculator on the checkout page so that customers can see the final price and avoid any unexpected surprises.

Pricing:

Free to get started with limited features. But if you want a full-featured marketplace, with bulk product edits, multiple commission types, and reporting, plans start at a one-time fee of $559.

Pros:

• Dokan has over 20 extensions, which lets you add a ton of different functionalities to your marketplace.
• The plugin comes with an order tracking system so both vendors and customers can see the status of their shipments.
• It’s an easy-to-use plugin with an intuitive interface.

Cons:

• Dokan’s paid plan is more expensive than WC Vendors.
• It doesn’t have advanced commission setup like WC Vendors.

Why We Recommend Using Dokan:

It’s hard to argue against Dokan, especially with all its add-ons and integration capabilities. Dokan also provides all the essential features you need, such as commission setup, vendor customization, and much more.

3. MultiVendorX

MultiVendorX is one of the best plugins to create a niche marketplace. What’s great about MultiVendorX is that it’s not limited to just doing an e-commerce marketplace. You can also add subscriptions, auction features, or even a rental marketplace. Let’s say you only want to sell handmade goods, similar to how you would with Etsy. With MultiVendorX, you’re in full control.

MultiVendorX gives you a broader range of monetization strategies than other platforms. While you can charge a commission, you can also charge subscription fees, listing fees, pay-per-contact, pay-per-action, or a mixed model. Pay-per-contact and pay-per-action would be better suited for a service marketplace. For instance, when a user books a table at a restaurant through your marketplace, they would pay you for it.

MultiVendorX also offers an easy-to-read analytics dashboard so you can see the performance of sales. You can filter by vendors, products, product categories, and so on. There’s even a Google Analytics integration so you can track your traffic sources. That said, we recommend using MonsterInsights to get insights from Google Analytics directly in your WordPress dashboard.

Pricing:

Free to get started, but if you want advanced features, plans start at $399 per year.

Pros:

• Many monetization strategies available.
• Vendors can create a product catalog.
• You can create many different niche marketplace types.

Cons:

• Paid plans are more expensive due to the diversity of its features.

Why We Recommend Using MultiVendorX:

If selling products isn’t your primary goal, then MultiVendorX could be the perfect solution. It allows you to create niche, subscription, and auction marketplaces. So, if you want to be the next eBay or Craigslist, there’s something for everyone. The plugin offers many monetization options, so you’re not just limited by charging commissions either.

4. WooCommerce Product Vendors

WooCommerce Product Vendors is an official WooCommerce plugin that lets you turn your store into a powerful marketplace. At its core, the plugin lets you:

• Build a diverse community of vendors.
• Set a commission rate for each vendor.
• Receive detailed revenue and sales reports.

Although vendors don’t have the same level of customization over their storefronts as plugins like WC Vendors or Dokan, they still have some control. For instance, they can manage their shipping rules, see sales performance, control their public profiles, and send tracking numbers to customers.

The biggest advantage of using this plugin is that it’s part of the larger WooCommerce ecosystem. It lets you sell anything from digital downloads and handmade products to music, themes, photographs, and much more. You can even sell services and have customers book appointments using WooCommerce Bookings.

Pricing:

It costs $119 per year.

Pros:

• You can tailor the look of vendor pages to match your brand.
• Woo Product Vendors lets you easily onboard new vendors with a customizable registration form.
• Vendors can manage their product listings, orders, and inventories.

Cons:

• Vendors need to have PayPal accounts to use the plugin’s automatic payment feature, which can be very limiting for vendors in certain regions.
• It doesn’t allow vendors to customize the storefront interface.

Why We Recommend Using Product Vendors:

WooCommerce Product Vendors is a simple solution that lets you easily turn your store into a multi-vendor site. You can enable commissions based on a fixed amount, percentage, store, product, vendor, or individual. Beyond that, you can set up payments to be sent on a schedule like weekly, bi-weekly, or monthly.

5. YITH WooCommerce Multi Vendor/Marketplace

YITH WooCommerce Multi Vendor is a WooCommerce multi-vendor plugin for beginners that allows you to create and manage an e-commerce marketplace similar to AliExpress, SHEIN, or Amazon. It comes with free and paid versions so you can try the tool before committing.

What makes the YITH WooCommerce Multi Vendor plugin unique is that you can customize what appears on the vendor side. For instance, you can do things like set the size and color of the vendor header, personalize the related products section, and much more. You’ll also get instant compatibility with all YITH plugins. For instance, if you wanted to add reviews for all products to each listing, then you could connect your site with the YITH WooCommerce Advanced Reviews plugin.

Pricing:

It costs $149.99 per year.

Pros:

• You can easily create your marketplace.
• The plugin allows you to customize the registration form and approve or deny vendor applications.
• As the marketplace owner, you can set vendor permissions.

Cons:

• Vendors don’t have many customization options to personalize their own storefront.

Why We Recommend Using YITH WooCommerce Multi Vendor:

We like the YITH WooCommerce Multi Vendor plugin because it gives the owner a lot of control over what vendors can and can’t do. You can set commissions and permissions. For instance, you can decide if you want to allow them to generate coupons, manage reviews, or limit the number of products they can post.

6. WCFM Marketplace

WCFM Marketplace is a free marketplace plugin from the WordPress repository. It has many of the essential features you’d expect, such as flexible commissions, vendor registration, bulk product uploads, and more.

Vendors have a lot of control over their shipping rates. They can set them by zone, country, distance, weight, country, and even zip code. The plugin also offers the marketplace owner a lot of control. For instance, you can set rules for withdrawals and payouts. It also supports reverse withdrawals in case a customer requests a refund.

You can set up refund settings for vendors. For instance, you may want refunds to be automatically approved or to set a threshold of days for refunds allowed. But if you want additional features, then the WCFM Marketplace has a wide range of paid add-ons. For instance, the WooCommerce Frontend Manager add-on allows you to set the store schedule, store holidays, add reviews, and much more. The Analytics add-on gives you the ability to analyze visitors and sales by product category, specific products, traffic sources, and so on.

Pricing:

Free to get started, but they offer a variety of premium extensions available ranging from $19 to $249+.

Pros:

• Marketplace owners have a lot of control when setting the rules for how their multi-vendor stores operate.
• It’s a relatively affordable plugin with a free plan.
• Vendors can set up their store SEO by placing the right keywords.

Cons:

• There are complaints about the quality of customer service.
• You need to pay for add-ons that let vendors customize and manage the front-end of their stores.

Why We Recommend Using WCFM Marketplace:

WCFM Marketplace is a good option with a wide range of feature sets for both the marketplace owner and the vendors. Plus, it has unique customizations like vendor verification and badges. Verification ensures that a vendor verifies they’re a real person, and the badge will display the top vendors on your site.

7. Easy Digital Downloads

Easy Digital Downloads is a popular plugin for selling digital products such as ebooks, courses, audio, pdf, templates, and more. Although it’s not a WooCommerce plugin, it’s the best choice for people who are looking to turn their website into a digital product marketplace.

With the Frontend Submissions add-on, you can set up your own e-commerce store to sell third-party products. Once set up, you can allow anyone to sell digital products through your store, similar to Etsy or Gumroad.

**Note:** While there is a free version, you’ll need the Pro plugin to access the Frontend Submissions add-on.

On the front-end, vendors can sign up to become vendors on your marketplace. Once approved, they’ll have access to a vendor dashboard where they can create new products, add product pages, manage orders, access revenue statistics, and communicate with customers.

The best thing about this add-on is that it integrates with the Reviews extension. This way, customers can rate and leave reviews about the products they’ve purchased. Vendors gain valuable feedback about their products, and they can leverage these reviews as social proof to get more orders. Everything is drag and drop so vendors can easily create their product listings without writing any code. All they need to do is add a product description, upload images, and set a price.

For a full tutorial, see our complete guide on how to create a digital product marketplace on WordPress.

Pricing:

Starting at $99.50 per year.

Pros:

• Easy registration process for vendors.
• Vendors can easily create their own storefronts since everything is drag and drop.
• Vendors can track their statistics and communicate with customers.

Cons:

• Easy Digital Downloads is geared towards selling digital products, not physical ones.

Why We Recommend Using Easy Digital Downloads:

If you plan to sell digital products, then Easy Digital Downloads is the perfect choice. While it’s not a WooCommerce plugin, it works for all WordPress websites. Easy Digital Downloads also comes with a wide range of extensions like multi-currency capabilities, email marketing service, and payment gateway integrations, add-to-cart pop-ups, and much more.

Other Helpful Plugins for WooCommerce Websites

Besides having a WooCommerce multi-vendor plugin to simply create the marketplace, you may want to download some additional tools to help provide vendors and buyers with a better user experience. Here are some tools to keep in mind.

8. TeraWallet

TeraWallet is a free plugin for WordPress that lets your customers easily store money in a digital wallet on your multi-vendor marketplace website. Recurring buyers can add money to their wallets using various payment methods, and then they can use it later to make purchases. With this plugin installed on the website, customers won’t have to fill out their payment information every time or for every vendor they buy from.

Beyond basic wallet functionality, TeraWallet has a useful cashback and rewards system that allows you to give discounts to customers based on their purchases. For instance, you can set cashback percentages for specific categories or products and even offer extra cashback during special events or seasonal promotions. It’s a great way to retain customers and attract more buyers to your marketplace.

Pricing:

Free to use

Pros:

• The plugin is free to use.
• Customers can deposit funds, transfer money to other users, and make purchases with their wallet balance.
• Customers can even make partial payments with the balance and the rest with their credit cards.

Cons:

• It’s not a multi-vendor-specific plugin, so it also works for regular WooCommerce and online stores.

Why We Recommend Using TeraWallet:

We like TeraWallet as a plugin for improving the user experience. If you want your customers to keep coming back to your website, then it’s a good idea to ensure a seamless checkout experience. With TeraWallet, customers can maintain a balance in their account, and vendors can reward them with cashback.

9. Product Feed PRO for WooCommerce

Product Feed PRO for WooCommerce is a plugin that helps you set up better e-commerce marketing campaigns. It helps you add product feeds to your marketing channels, like Facebook, Google Shopping, Bing Ads, and others. Adding these feeds will help you showcase your best-selling products, which will help you increase your sales. Best of all, this plugin has an unlimited number of products you can put in your product feeds.

Furthermore, you can set various filters and rules to only display the most profitable products from your vendor. You can exclude products that are low in stock, have low-profit margins, or include only sale products.

Pricing:

Free to use

Pros:

• There are both free and paid versions.
• Filtering rules so you can showcase the best products for your marketing campaigns.
• Over 100 templates included for marketplaces and shopping comparison engines.

Cons:

• It’s not explicitly designed for multi-vendor sites, so each vendor doesn’t have their own set of controls.

Why We Recommend Using Product Feed Pro for WooCommerce:

We like Product Feed Pro for WooCommerce because it’s a good way to help promote your marketplace. Adding product feeds to your Google Shopping campaigns will let you show some of the most popular products on your website and, in turn, help your vendors.

How to Choose the Right WooCommerce Multi-Vendor Plugin

Not all WooCommerce multi-vendor plugins are created equal. This is because you may have specific needs that are different from other e-commerce marketplaces. Still, here are some key features and factors to consider when making a decision.

Vendor Management Tools

At the heart of any successful e-commerce marketplace is the ability to easily manage multiple vendors. So, you’ll want to look for vendor management features such as:

• Unlimited product uploads and variations.
• Inventory management.
• Sales data dashboard and reporting.
• Shipping management.
• Vendor registration.

For instance, WC Vendors offers a comprehensive dashboard so you can see all your orders and shipping status. The idea is for the plugin to be able to manage all activities for multiple vendors, contributing to smoother operations.

Individual Vendor Storefronts

Your branding plays a vital role in attracting vendors and customers. That means the platform you choose should offer a high level of customization. These customization options can include things like flexible layouts, adjustable themes, and custom storefronts for vendors. Each vendor should have their own independent storefront with unique URLs that customers can send.

In addition, vendors should be able to add custom logos in the dashboard, unique headers, and product descriptions.

Commission Structure

Since you’re responsible for driving all the traffic to your marketplace, it’s a good idea to have a commission structure in place. The best multi-vendor plugins offer a flexible commission system. With this system, you can charge vendors a fixed or percentage commission for each successful sale made through your platform.

For instance, WC Vendors lets you set up multiple commission types. You can even offer tiered commissions based on the product price, product sales, or total sales. Basically, it lets you take a small cut for providing the customer base, infrastructure, and platform for vendors to sell their goods or services.

Payment Gateways

Without a comfortable payment gateway, your visitors will be very likely to abandon the checkout cart. No matter how many pop-ups, social proof, countdown timers, or other trust badges you add, customers need a reliable payment option they can trust, such as Stripe and PayPal.

These are trusted WooCommerce payment gateways that are available in most countries. They allow you to process credit card payments. Plus, customers know they can always contact these payment providers in case a problem arises with their order.

Third-Party Integrations and Applications

Your multi-vendor plugin is just one part of your entire e-commerce ecosystem. You’ll need other third-party applications such as inventory management systems, email marketing services, accounting software, and support plugins. For instance, adding various WooCommerce shipping plugins will likely be helpful so customers can calculate additional fees before checking out and track their orders after making a purchase.

WC Vendors offers integrations with UPS and FedEx shipping plugins, which is useful for getting accurate shipping costs and managing returns.

Navigation and Search

When customers land on a marketplace site, they expect a seamless shopping experience. A slow website or a lack of mobile responsiveness are some of the factors that could increase bounce rates. But beyond that, it’s helpful to have a search bar on your site along with a filter option. For instance, WC Vendors offers a sorting feature so users can easily sort products by rating, price, and popularity.

They also have an intuitive search function so shoppers can find the products they’re looking for without having to scroll through pages of product listings.

Documentation and Customer Support

When a problem arises, the top priority should be to fix the bug. That’s why it’s best to look for a multi-vendor plugin with a dedicated support team that you can easily contact. It should also provide a comprehensive knowledge base with documentation that shows how to perform each of the functions the platform offers. Ideally, there should also be a way to submit a support ticket or a live chat feature where you can speak to a customer service representative.

FAQs About WooCommerce Multi-Vendor Plugins

FAQs

What is the best multi-vendor plugin for WooCommerce?

Based on our experience and testing, WC Vendors is the best multi-vendor plugin for WooCommerce. Its combination of ease of use, customization, and diverse feature sets make it the most popular choice for building your own online marketplace.

Why create a multi-vendor marketplace?

Creating your own marketplace allows you to stand out from the crowd. You can create specialized multi-vendor platforms to serve specific audiences, like a marketplace for handmade products or an online booking system for contractors. The possibilities are endless. By creating a multi-vendor site, you can gain an additional revenue stream with commissions and cater to a specialized audience.

What are the best WooCommerce multi-vendor plugins for specific needs?

With all of this in mind, WC Vendors is the best multi-vendor plugin for WooCommerce since you can sell physical products, digital products, services, and subscriptions. That said, MultiVendorX offers multiple monetization methods like charging a subscription model, listing fees, or pay-per-action.

Hopefully, this article helped you find the best WooCommerce plugin for WordPress. You can also check out our list of the best WooCommerce plugins for your store and the best WooCommerce themes for WordPress.

If you’re interested in learning more about tech news, feel free to visit my website: www.naveedahmed.me.