BigCommerce Headless Capabilities: Advantages and Drawbacks

Customer experience is the key differentiator for your business. Choosing a headless solution gives you freedom from the technical constraints that may be affecting the functionality of your website. 

In simplest words, headless commerce is a framework where the frontend presentation layer is decoupled from the backend engine interacting via APIs. It empowers businesses to build flexible commerce capabilities with integrated tools and services to deliver a personalized user experience.  

Going headless on BigCommerce means using an approach where the platform allows you to connect to any frontend network, enabling you to build your headless storefront for your business, while BigCommerce works as the backend, connected with APIs. 

Why Should You Opt For Headless BigCommerce? 

Here are some reasons for going headless with BigCommerce and why you should consider going for it. 

Increased Site Speed 

Increased load of integrated plugins and apps can slow down site performance, which is a major concern for businesses. Going headless with BigCommerce takes off the load on the backend, minimizing the site loading time and ultimately creating a positive customer experience. 

Also Read: 7 Key Ways To Speed Up Your WordPress Site and Improve Performance

Comprehensive API Coverage 

BigCommerce’s robust API support, including REST and GraphQL options, makes it well-suited for businesses looking to implement a headless commerce approach. Developers can leverage these APIs to create custom front-end experiences while benefiting from the high-performance capabilities offered by BigCommerce.

Pick Your Own Third-Party CMS

Going headless with BigCommerce gives you the freedom to pick any CMS, including WordPress, Prismic, Contentful, and more, alongside BigCommerce’s eCommerce services to tailor your online store content management to suit your preferences and requirements. 

Freedom From Using Standard BigCommerce Themes

You can choose to create a custom frontend using frameworks like React.js or Vue.js using the BigCommerce platform as the engine for your website. 

Unified Management From One Place

In a headless setup, you are able to synchronize product information, ensuring consistency and accuracy of product data across all sales channels. This allows for enhancing operational efficiency, allowing to process greater volumes of orders in the same time frame. 

Custom Integrations 

Unlike the limited integration options of the BigCommerce platform, the flexibility of the headless framework in BigCommerce allows you to integrate a wide range of custom plugins and applications via bigcommerce headless APIs that are tailored to meet your business needs. 

PWA Functionality

Adopting a headless approach transforms your store into a PWA offering a range of benefits, including speed, mobile optimization, accessibility, push notifications, and an improved shopping experience, all of which can help you better engage with and retain your customers in the competitive e-commerce landscape.

Ability to Use WordPress Integration for BigCommerce

BigCommerce is excellent for e-commerce but lacks strong blogging features. Going headless with BigCommerce lets you use WordPress for blogging. This improves the reading experience and can boost your website’s SEO.

The Shortcomings of Headless BigCommerce Platform

Managing Multiple Platforms

Going headless offers flexibility by connecting various eCommerce functions through APIs, but it also means you’ll need to manage more integrated platforms to run your headless store efficiently. 

A Complicated Tech Stack

Designing a custom frontend may further complicate your tech stack. It means you may need an expert’s help to implement apps and integrations to your Headless BigCommerce store for the smooth running of eCommerce functions. 

Incompatibility of Apps and Plugins with the Headless System

A complicated tech stack can also lead to incompatible apps and plugins with headless features. It can become challenging to find an alternate solution and manage the workaround. 

Rebuilding of a New Analytics Setup

BigCommerce analytics isn’t compatible with the headless system. It means users need to build a new analytics system to measure the performance of your eCommerce brand. 

Headless Checkout Uses BigCommerce Domain

In a headless setup, the checkout process can be challenging due to the separation of domains between the frontend and BigCommerce’s backend. While BigCommerce hosting the checkout is advantageous for security and payment compliance, it requires customers to re-enter their details when checking out, which can disrupt the user experience that headless setups aim to provide. 

Need Professional Assitance of Developers

To make the most of going headless with BigCommerce, you’ll need help from a web designer and Bigcommerce developement professionals to build the website and integrate tools and systems effectively.

It is More Expensive

When you decide to hire developers and designers for a headless BigCommerce store, you should expect a significant initial setup cost. The upfront investment may be high, but the benefits make it worthwhile. 

How to Get the BigCommerce Headless Store to Customize? 

With BigCommerce headless technology, businesses can create highly personalized shopping experiences using a powerful commerce platform in the background. If you’re ready to embrace BigCommerce Headless Commerce, all you need is the right expertise.

Codup provides top-notch headless solutions that prioritize speed and flexibility. As certified BigCommerce tech partners, we specialize in deploying BigCommerce’s headless capabilities to meet your unique needs. Our approach emphasizes transparent communication, unwavering commitment to excellence, and a proven track record of delivering results, making us the ideal partner for your next headless BigCommerce project. 

Contact us to tap into our eCommerce expertise in digital strategy and transformation to help your business grow.