Before you wade through all the details of how you’d like your online store to look and function, you’ll want to figure out what the best web hosting experience looks like for you and your business. Hosted eCommerce is an all-inclusive package that comes with preinstalled software on a server you can’t access. The hosting provider takes care of all the technical details and maintenance, but you sacrifice some control. Self-hosted eCommerce gives site owners the opportunity and server access to set up and run their online store however they see fit. You are in charge of choosing, installing, and updating the software programs and scripts for your business. Ultimately, self-hosted eCommerce allows users to choose from more than 400 open-source scripts to build sites, while hosted eCommerce specializes in optimized runtime environments for a single platform. Even though hosted eCommerce customers won’t have as many software options, they can still customize their stores through premium templates or plugins to add the desired branding and functionality.