This article is part of a blog series dedicated to the best .NET e-commerce platforms out there - nopCommerce , Virto Commerce , DNN , Umbraco , Kentico , Sitecore , and Sitefinity .
So far, we have discussed nopCommerce , Virto Commerce , and DNN . We discussed each platform's architecture, features, capabilities, marketplace, ecosystem, and pricing.
In this blog post, we will talk about Umbraco.
Umbraco is not a .NET e-commеrce platform but rather an open-source CMS (content management system) based on ASP.NET.
Unlike other CMS platforms like Kentico, Sitecore, and Sitefinity, Umbraco doesn’t offer e-commerce features out-of-the-box .
Thus, if you want to run an e-commerce website on Umbraco, you will need to find a third-party e-commerce solution that integrates with Umbraco. Such solutions are Ucommerce and Merchello , for example.
But before we dive into the different features, let’s take a closer look into the history of Umbraco.
The first prototype of Umbraco was built in 1999 by founder and CEO Niels Hartvig.
4 years later, in 2003, the first version of Umbraco was released.
In February 2005 the open-source version of the platform, Umbraco 2.0, was released. The same year the first annual Umbraco conference (Codegarden) took place in Copenhagen, Denmark.
In 2007 the Umbraco PRO version was released and in 2008 Umbraco launched its training program.
In 2009 Umbraco Courier 1.0 (a tool that enables you to move digital assets between Umbraco environments) and Umbraco Contour (a tool that enables you to build and design forms in Umbraco) were released. The same year Umbraco was recognized as one of the leading open-source CMS systems based on ASP.NET (by CMS Wire ) and was listed as one of the top 10 CMS systems (by Version 2 , a Danish magazine).
One year later, in 2010 Umbraco was refactored and its performance was significantly improved. In January 2012 a rewrite of the framework (Version 5) was published. It was built using ASP.NET MVC. However, 5 months later, Version 5 was dropped due to performance problems. The next version of Umbraco, Version 6, was released in the beginning of 2013. It provided additional support for MVC4.
In November 2013, Umbraco released Version 7. The last stable version of Umbraco, Umbraco 7.10.2, was released in April 2018.
Note: If you want to know more about Umbraco’s background, you can check their ‘ About us ’ page.
Ucommerce for Umbraco can run on Umbraco CMS (an open-source free version of Umbraco) and Umbraco Cloud (a cloud version of Umbraco that enables you to host your website in Microsoft Azure).
Ucommerce was built specifically for Umbraco. Thus, it is the most sophisticated e-commerce solution for Umbraco.
Some of the more significant e-commerce features Ucommerce for Umbraco offers include:
Merchello is an open-source e-commerce package for Umbraco.
Some of the more significant features Merchello offers out-of-the-box include:
If you’re just starting out, you can use FastTrack - the Merchello Starter Kit that enables you to configure your e-commerce website in a few clicks.
Umbraco doesn’t offer themes. Instead, you will have to work with a third-party expert that develops themes for Umbraco. Some of the more popular options include uSkinned and BindTuning .
Uskinned, for example, offers 9 responsive Umbraco themes and 1 starter kit. If you want to get a better idea of the themes and the features they sport, click here .
BindTuning offers 21 commercial themes. Click here to see their cost (all themes cost $49), number of downloads, a preview, and more.
Ultimately, there isn’t a wide variety of e-commerce themes for Umbraco. However, since the platform is open-source, you can build a custom theme for your store. Everything (design, features, and capabilities) can be tailored to your specific needs. If you cannot develop a theme in-house, you can outsource it to a certified Umbraco expert or a .NET developer. In any case, additional costs are inevitable.
Umbraco offers a wide variety of plugins - there are more than 1,200 extensions (or packages) on Our Umbraco (the Umbraco marketplace and community website).
They are divided into 7 categories:
Umbraco partners with more than 150 companies. The partner companies are classified as:
You can filter the partners based on their skills (API development, architecture, content creation, e-commerce, etc.), sector (finance, healthcare, retail, etc.), and location.
You can mark the checkboxes for as many sectors, skills, and locations, as you want.
This enables you to easily find a suitable partner to work with.
For example, if you need help with anything e-commerce related, you can mark the ‘E-commerce’ checkbox. Then, you will see a list of all 27 partner companies that have listed ‘e-commerce’ as one of their skills .
In addition, if you sell sports gear, for example, you can click on the ‘Sector’ button and mark the ‘Sport’ checkbox. Then, you will see a list of the companies that have specified they can work on sports-related e-commerce projects.
Aside from having a well-structured partners directory, Umbraco sports an extremely active online community - there are more than 200K members who are highly active on the Umbraco forum . Dozens of new posts appear every day. At the time of this writing, 10 posts have been published within the last hour alone.
If you’re just starting out, you can get the free version of Ucommerce for Umbraco and upgrade to a paid version once your business scales.
There are two paid versions of Ucommerce for Umbraco that sport more advanced features - Umbraco Pro and Umbraco Enterprise. If you need more information you can check the official Ucommerce website .
Being an open-source e-commerce engine, Merchello is free. However, if you want to contribute to the project and its development, you can purchase a Gratitude Licence for $100.
* If you want to add e-commerce features to your Umbraco website, you will need to integrate it with a third-party e-commerce solution. Ucommerce and Merchello, for example, are such solutions.
We hope this article gives you a better idea of what Umbraco can offer!
Stay tuned for our article on Kentico - the next blog post from the series dedicated to the best .NET e-commerce platforms!