Magento 2 Community Edition vs Magento 2 Enterprise Edition

This is a great comparison of M2 open source vs M2 commerce or sometimes known as Magento 2 Community Edition vs Magento 2 Enterprise Edition

New Magento 2 Features included for both Magento 2 CE and EE

FeatureM2 Community Edition (CE)M2 Enterprise Edition (EE)
Search Engine OptimizationYesYes
Site ManagementYesYes
Catalog ManagementYesYes
Catalog BrowsingYesYes
Product BrowsingYesYes
Checkout, Payment and ShippingYesYes
Order ManagementYesYes
Customer AccountsYesYes
Customer ServiceYesYes
International SupportYesYes
Analytics and ReportingYesYes
Mobile CommerceYesYes
Native Device ApplicationsYesYes
Marketing, Promotions and Conversion ToolsYesYes

New Extension Processes for Magento 2

When Magento 2  launched, Magento also revamped how merchants access extensions. Merchants can go to the Magento Marketplace for access to hundreds of extensions. Extensions are grouped in the following categories: Accounting & Finance, Marketing, Content & Customization, Customer Support, Payments & Security, Reporting & Analytics, Sales, Shipping & Fulfillment, and Site Optimization.

Many of the extensions are free but some can cost hundreds, even thousands of dollars. The important things to consider is the quality, reliability and available support for any extension. A benefit of the Marketplace is that all the extensions have been reviewed and tested through the Extension Quality Program.

What Enterprise can offer over Community in Magento 2.

To the right set of merchants, we recommend Magento 2 Enterprise Edition over Magento 1 Enterprise Edition. In Magento 1, there was little incentive for merchants to purchase EE. There were not enough additional features over Community to make Enterprise worth the investment. Notably, we saw many merchants on CE utilizing extensions to get the power of EE without the price tag. That worked for some, but it can be tricky to manage and maintain a healthy website. Those M1 Frankenapp sites can create some seriously expensive headaches.

However, that is not the case for Magento 2 Enterprise. Magento has packed the latest Enterprise Edition with a multitude of exciting out-of-the-box features – no complicated extensions (or Frankenapps) required!

Magento 2 EE features vs CE versions
FeatureM2 Community Edition (CE) aka Open SourceM2 Enterprise Edition (EE) aka Commerce
Customer Segmentation, Targeted Promotions & MerchandisingNoYes
Dynamic Rule Based Product RelationsNoYes
Persistent ShoppingNoYes
Automated Email Marketing ReminderNoYes
Private SalesNoYes
Gift RegistryNoYes
Gifting OptionsNoYes
Rewards PointsNoYes
Store CreditsNoYes
Multiple Wish ListsNoYes
Add to Cart by SKUNoYes
Return Management Authorization (RMA)NoYes
Content Management SystemNoYes
Scheduled Import/Export FunctionalityNoYes
Backup and RollbackNoYes
Staging, Merging and Rollback of ContentNoYes
Customer Attribute ManagementNoYes
Administrator Permission Roles on Website and Store LevelsNoYes
Price and Promotion PermissionNoYes
Logging of Administrator ActionsNoYes
Category View and Purchase Permissions per Customer Group (Limited Catalog Access)NoYes
Order ArchivingNoYes
Solr SearchNoYes
Full Page CachingNoYes
Optimized IndexingNoYes
Configurable Order Tracking WidgetNoYes
Support for Alternate Media Storage – CDN and DatabaseNoYes
PA-DSS Certification/Payment BridgeNoYes
Strong Data Encryption, Hashing and Key ManagementNoYes
In addition to the extensive features detailed above for M2 EE, merchants receive 24/7 technical support. This includes a dedicated Account Manager who is focused on helping to get the best results from your Magento store.

What About Costs?

Community Edition is a free option for Magento – there is no additional cost to use the platform.

Enterprise Edition is a paid option for Magento – total costs vary depending on merchant revenue.

Specifically for EE, the higher gross merchandise sales value (GMV) of a store, the higher the annual fees will be. With that in mind, larger merchants usually determine that the benefits of EE are worth the investment. Smaller merchants often start by utilizing the free Community Edition, until they can grow their sales to justify the investment of Enterprise.

However, when considering CE over EE, it’s important to also calculate the costs of extensions into your investment. Consider not just the overall cost of the extension, but also the time it will take to install, set-up and configure which includes ensuring that all extensions play nicely together. There is also ongoing expenses for updating and maintaining extensions over time.

While it might be more economical to start with CE and a few extensions, it’s important to think about the long term game plan. If over the next couple of years, dozens of extensions will need to be installed to get the right features needed, then it very well could be worth it to invest in EE from the get-go.

What Version of Magento is Best for You?

This brief overview on M2 EE and CE is to help merchants in the early steps of their research and planning phases. We really like to talk with merchants and get to know their individual needs and goals for the future. Particularly when they’re considering a major M2 upgrade or investment like Enterprise. We want to help ensure merchants make decisions they feel confident about and won’t regret down the road. Magento is a smart business investment and when done appropriately can be extremely rewarding.

Contact us for more information on Magento 2 CE and EE and we’ll schedule a time to answer all your questions.