The two platforms a Canadian brand most often weighs are both mature. Wikipedia describes Magento as an open source eCommerce platform written in PHP, first released on 31 March 2008 and bought by Adobe on 19 June 2018 for $1.68 billion, and sold as Magento Open Source and the paid Adobe Commerce. It describes Shopify as a Canadian company headquartered in Ottawa, founded in 2006 by Tobias Lütke, Daniel Weinand, and Scott Lake, that operates a cloud commerce platform. This guide does not crown one. It sets out what the pages read for this site state and lets the shape of your business pick.
Where Shopify fits
Wikipedia describes Shopify as a cloud eCommerce platform, so the merchant does not run servers or apply version upgrades; those are the platform's jobs. It also places the company in Ottawa, which some Canadian brands weigh. This edition read no Shopify B2B documentation, so it makes no claim about Shopify's B2B features; check them on Shopify's own pages against the Adobe list below.
Where Magento and Adobe Commerce fit
Magento Open Source is code the merchant or its agency owns and extends, and Adobe Commerce adds a paid feature set on the same core. Adobe's documentation lists the B2B module's features: company accounts that join multiple buyers into one account with divisions, subdivisions, roles, and permissions; shared catalogs with custom prices per product for different companies; negotiable quotes that open a price negotiation between buyer and seller; purchase orders created automatically with approval rules; payment on account with credit the merchant allocates to a company; requisition lists; and quick order by product name or SKU. Those are the features a distributor or manufacturer is usually paying for.
Side by side, on what the vendors state
| Factor | Shopify | Magento Open Source / Adobe Commerce |
|---|---|---|
| Hosting and upgrades | Run by Shopify | Run by the merchant or its agency |
| Code ownership | Platform-owned; extended through apps | Open source core; the merchant owns its code |
| Company accounts | Not read for this edition | Company accounts with divisions, roles, and permissions |
| Customer-specific pricing | Not read for this edition | Shared catalogs with custom prices per company |
| Quotes | Not read for this edition | Negotiable quotes |
| Purchase orders and credit | Not read for this edition | Purchase orders with approval rules; payment on account with allocated credit |
| Storefront | Themes on the platform | Hyvä, stated free and open source by hyva.io in 2026 |
| Vendor headquarters | Ottawa, Canada | Adobe; Magento first released by Varien in 2008 |
Five questions that decide it
- Do you need negotiated quotes or purchase-on-account credit? Adobe's documentation lists both as Adobe Commerce B2B features
- Do you need to own the code, or would you rather not run the platform at all?
- How many systems must the store talk to, and does anyone in-house own those integrations?
- Do you sell into Quebec, which needs a full French store view either way?
- Do you have an agency and a budget for upgrades, or do you want the vendor to ship them?
Which agencies on this site build on both
Kinex Media states both an Adobe Silver Solution Partner and a Shopify Plus Partner badge on its site, and Clutch splits its eCommerce work 70% Magento and 30% Shopify. OptiWeb Marketing lists Shopify, Magento, WooCommerce, and WordPress, with Clutch at 35% Magento, 35% Shopify, and 30% WooCommerce. MageMontreal shows Magento at 70% and Shopify at 10% on Clutch, and DesignRush lists both platforms. Bellwood's Clutch split is 40% Shopify, 30% Magento, and 30% WooCommerce. scandiweb describes itself as building Magento, Hyvä, Shopify, and BigCommerce stores, and its published Canadian cases are Magento ones: JYSK Canada, PUMA, and Wainbee. Kodershop's Clutch split puts Magento at 10% and Shopify at 5%.
The platform sets the ceiling and the build sets the result, on either side. A brand that lands on Magento should read the ranking and the four checks before shortlisting; a brand that lands on Shopify should run the same checks against Shopify's partner directory and the agency's Clutch split.