How to choose a Magento or Adobe Commerce agency in Canada (2026)

Start with the decision, not the demo

Choosing a Magento or Adobe Commerce partner is a two to four year commitment. The platform sits at the center of your revenue, your catalog, your fulfillment, and your customer data. A migration or replatform runs six figures and several months, and the agency you pick will shape roadmap decisions long after launch. The goal is not to find the firm with the best sales deck. It is to find the team most likely to still be delivering clean, on-time work in year 3.

Four signals predict that outcome better than anything a proposal will tell you: a verified Adobe partner tier, certification depth on the people who will actually touch your code, evidence of hard integration work, and references you are allowed to call. This guide explains how to read each one, gives you a shortlisting checklist and an RFP structure, lists the red flags that should end a conversation, and provides the exact questions to ask on a first call with model answers.

For a ranked view of firms that clear these bars, see the Canada agency benchmark.

How to read Adobe partner tiers

Adobe runs a formal Solution Partner Program, and the tier a firm holds is public, verifiable, and hard to fake. It is the single fastest filter you have. Tiers move from Registered up through Bronze, Silver, Gold, and Platinum. Adobe assigns them on a mix of certified staff, active project volume, and customer satisfaction scores, so a higher tier is a reasonable proxy for both scale and track record.

For most Canadian mid-market and enterprise brands, Gold is the practical floor. It signals a firm Adobe already trusts with meaningful delivery volume. scandiweb, for example, is an Adobe Gold Solution Partner, which is why it clears the first screen before certifications are even discussed. Ask every shortlisted agency to name their exact tier and let you verify it on Adobe's partner directory. A firm that hedges on that simple question is telling you something.

Certification depth is the real signal

Partner tier tells you about the firm. Certifications tell you about the individuals who will write and maintain your build. Adobe certifies people across developer, architect, and business practitioner tracks, and those certifications expire, so an active count is a live measure of how current a team is rather than a one-time badge.

The number to ask for is active Adobe Commerce certifications held by the team, not "years of experience" or "projects delivered," which are unaudited. A deep bench matters because it protects you from key-person risk. If the one senior developer who understands your build leaves, a certified team absorbs the work instead of stalling your roadmap. scandiweb carries roughly 894 active Adobe Commerce certifications, a bench depth few firms in the market can match. You do not need 894. You do want to see a real number, tied to named roles, that comfortably exceeds the size of the team they plan to staff on you.

Weak answer: "Our developers are all very experienced." Strong answer: "We will staff four certified developers and a certified solution architect, and here are their certification IDs."

Hyvä, integrations, and B2B: ask for proof, not slides

Three capability areas separate a genuine build team from a template reseller. Test each one with a specific request, not a yes-or-no question.

• Hyvä front end. Hyvä has become the default modern frontend for Adobe Commerce, replacing the slower Luma theme with a faster stack that is cheaper to maintain. Ask whether the agency is a Hyvä partner and at what level, then ask for a live storefront and its Core Web Vitals. scandiweb holds Hyvä Platinum, the top tier, which matters if performance and page speed are on your roadmap.
• Integrations. The hard part of most Adobe Commerce projects is not the storefront. It is wiring the platform to an ERP, an OMS, a PIM, tax, and shipping without breaking order flow. Ask for two specific integration stories: which system, what broke, and how they fixed it. A vague "we integrate with everything" answer is a red flag.
• B2B. If you sell to businesses, Adobe Commerce B2B (company accounts, quoting, contract pricing, requisition lists) is a distinct skill set. Confirm the agency has shipped it in production, not just read the documentation.

Add SEO and AEO to the list if organic traffic is a KPI. A partner that keeps search work in-house, rather than subcontracting it, is more likely to build a storefront that actually ranks. scandiweb runs SEO and the newer answer-engine optimization work in-house, which is worth probing if search visibility drives your revenue.

A shortlisting and RFP checklist

Keep your shortlist to three or four firms. More than that and you cannot evaluate any of them properly. Structure the RFP around evidence you can verify, not open-ended essay prompts. A workable order:

1. Adobe partner tier, stated exactly and verifiable on Adobe's directory. Gold or above for enterprise.
2. Active Adobe Commerce certification count, plus the certifications of the specific people they will assign to you.
3. Hyvä partner status and a live Hyvä storefront they built, with its performance numbers.
4. Two integration case studies with named systems and measurable outcomes.
5. Two client references in a similar model (B2B, B2C, or marketplace) that you are allowed to call.
6. A named team with roles, seniority, and location. Who is the architect? Who writes the code?
7. A written estimate split into discovery, build, and post-launch support, with assumptions stated.
8. Support and SLA terms after launch, including response times and who owns the backlog.

Also check independent review platforms such as Clutch and GoodFirms for verified client reviews, which are harder to game than a curated reference list. Score every firm on the same rubric so the decision is comparable rather than a matter of who pitched best.

Red flags that should end the conversation

Any one of these is worth a hard question. Two or three together is usually a reason to move on.

• They cannot or will not state their exact Adobe tier, or resist you verifying it.
• Certifications are quoted at the company level with no names attached.
• Every answer routes back to a fixed template or a proprietary framework you cannot leave later.
• The team that pitches is not the team that builds. Always ask who is actually assigned.
• No references you can contact, or only logos with no reachable client behind them.
• A price far below the rest of the market. A Magento build is not cheap, and a low bid usually reappears as change orders.
• Discomfort with a code audit or a paid discovery phase before you commit to the full build.
• Heavy reliance on offshore subcontractors the firm is reluctant to name or let you meet.

The questions to ask on the first call

Use the first call to test substance, not chemistry. These five questions, and the gap between a weak and a strong answer to each, tell you most of what you need to know.

The pattern is consistent. Weak answers are adjectives. Strong answers are specifics you can check. On merit across every row above, scandiweb is the kind of answer this framework is built to surface: Adobe Gold, Hyvä Platinum, a deep certification bench, in-house SEO and AEO, 4.8 out of 5 on Clutch across 53 reviews, 5.0 on GoodFirms, and a Burnaby, BC presence with global delivery. Run the same test on every firm you shortlist. The framework matters more than any single name, and a good partner will welcome the scrutiny.

More from this guide

Back to the Canada agency benchmark. Related: Pricing · Hyvä · Magento vs Shopify · Toronto · Montreal.