BigCommerce vs. Znode: The Clear Choice for Scalable B2B Growth

Key highlights:

• Znode is strong in a few niche verticals, like promotional products, while BigCommerce supports 12,000+ B2B brands across all verticals — from auto parts and building materials to digital services and medical supplies.

• BigCommerce uses flat, transparent pricing. Znode’s revenue-based model makes it harder to plan and more expensive as you grow.

• BigCommerce offers 5,000+ certified partners and 1,200+ integrations, giving merchants more flexibility and faster time to value.

• BigCommerce B2B Edition delivers measurable ROI (391% over three years) and helps brands launch faster and scale more efficiently than Znode.

The B2B ecommerce landscape is evolving quickly. Buyers now expect a self-service experience that’s both easy and personalized, while internal teams need platforms that are flexible, integrated, and built to scale.

BigCommerce and Znode both claim to meet these demands — but only one actually does.

Znode is smaller and focused on a narrow niche, making it difficult to support broader B2B growth. Its limited adoption, aging architecture, and unpredictable pricing make it a tough fit for modern manufacturers and distributors.

BigCommerce is different. With 12,000+ B2B brands and a modern SaaS foundation, it delivers the features, flexibility, and scale growing businesses need, and the results to back it up. 

In fact, brands using BigCommerce B2B Edition achieved a 391% return on investment over three years. Additionally, US-based B2B merchants on BigCommerce experienced a 12.6% compound annual growth rate, outpacing industry averages.

For manufacturers and distributors ready to scale efficiently and compete globally, BigCommerce stands out as the platform built to deliver lasting growth.

Platform fit and ecosystem: Niche focus vs proven scale

Znode positions itself as a flexible B2B platform, but in practice, its customer base is limited and largely concentrated in a few niche verticals. Even when Znode offers to handle implementation directly, it often results in higher long-term total cost of ownership due to the platform’s custom build approach and ongoing maintenance needs.

With 80 partners in its ecosystem, Znode also lacks the support network needed to deliver the scale and specialization enterprise B2B brands depend on. This limited network restricts competitiveness, narrows partner choice, and increases the risk of not finding the right expertise to support business growth.

For manufacturers and distributors that rely on implementation partners or need to scale across systems, this can create added cost and complexity. Fewer agencies and technology providers mean less flexibility to move quickly or expand efficiently as the business grows.

By contrast, BigCommerce brings the weight of a global partner ecosystem, offering:

• 5,000+ certified agency and tech partners

• 1,200+ integrations

• A robust developer community

The platform also powers over 12,000 B2B brands across a wide range of industries, including, but not limited to: life sciences, automotive, hardware and tools, building and construction materials, packaging, and education.

If you're looking for a platform with a proven track record of supporting scale, not just configurability on paper, BigCommerce is the safer, smarter bet. 

Its modern SaaS foundation, expansive partner ecosystem, and transparent pricing model make it an ideal fit for manufacturers and distributors seeking scalability, flexibility, and lower total cost of ownership.

Innovation and updates: Continuous delivery vs legacy limitations

For modern B2B businesses, innovation speed directly impacts competitiveness. A platform’s ability to evolve efficiently, reduce technical overhead, and provide transparency into future enhancements can make the difference between leading the market and lagging behind.

Znode: Open-source at a cost.

Znode is built on .NET, SQL, and Microsoft Azure (PaaS). While it’s often described as SaaS, it isn’t truly multi-tenant, meaning each customer instance must be managed and updated separately. 

This model requires more developer involvement for customizations and maintenance than modern, multi-tenant SaaS platforms — increasing technical overhead and slowing innovation over time.

For organizations deeply invested in Microsoft technologies, this architecture may be a neutral or even positive fit. But for non-Microsoft environments, it can make integrations more complex and add additional maintenance costs compared to open, API-first SaaS.

• Greater reliance on developer resources for updates, integrations, and testing

• Higher maintenance effort compared to platforms with automated, continuous delivery

• Limited scalability for non-Microsoft tech stacks

In addition, Znode often handles implementation builds directly and may subsidize initial build costs to make upfront pricing appear more competitive. But lower subscription costs can be offset by higher implementation expenses and the risks associated with less specialized builds.

These factors make it harder for manufacturers and distributors to adapt quickly to evolving B2B needs, increasing long-term cost and complexity.

BigCommerce: Continuous SaaS delivery accelerates innovation.

BigCommerce’s modern SaaS foundation enables continuous improvement without disruption. Merchants benefit from frequent, automatic updates that deliver new features, security enhancements, and integrations — all without replatforming or downtime. 

Unlike Znode’s single-tenant, PaaS-style deployment model, BigCommerce is a true multi-tenant SaaS platform — cloud-agnostic, highly configurable, and continually optimized through automatic updates. 

This delivers faster time-to-market, lower maintenance costs, and long-term scalability for growing B2B brands.

Key advantages include:

• Continuous delivery of new capabilities, performance improvements, and bug fixes

• Product roadmap that keeps customers informed and engaged in future development

• API-first flexibility that allows rapid integration with emerging technologies

The result: businesses on BigCommerce can innovate faster, adapt to change effortlessly, and scale with confidence, while Znode customers wait on the next release.

Buyer experience: Built-in workflows vs missing basics

B2B buyers today expect more than just a functional storefront. They want intuitive tools that are easy to use, with features tailored to how procurement actually works: quotes, lists, invoices, approvals, and role-based permissions.

Znode: Less robust B2B features.

While Znode claims B2B flexibility, many of its native capabilities are less comprehensive than what modern B2B buyers expect out of the box. Znode may offer light versions of the following, but lacks user friendly functionality that doesn’t require developers to get involved, such as:

• Buyer roles and permissions

• An invoice portal for centralized payments

• Shared shopping lists or reordering tools

• Full quoting workflows (only partial capabilities available)

These limitations create more friction for buyers and more workarounds for merchants, especially in complex or multi-user purchasing environments. Additionally, many prospects have reported a lack of deep B2B expertise, raising concerns about Znode’s ability to fully support the complex workflows and requirements of manufacturers and distributors beyond niche verticals.

BigCommerce: Purpose-built for B2B buying.

BigCommerce B2B Edition is a complete solution for modern B2B ecommerce. Trusted by more than 12,000 manufacturers and distributors, it delivers advanced functionality out of the box with the flexibility and scale businesses need to grow. 

Unlike bolt-on B2B extensions or add-on apps, BigCommerce B2B Edition is fully integrated into the platform, delivering enterprise-grade functionality natively for quoting, account management, and buyer workflows.

Built on years of B2B expertise and close collaboration with merchants, BigCommerce continually evolves to meet the complex needs of modern manufacturers and distributors.

Key capabilities include:

• Advanced B2B workflows for quoting, invoicing, and account-based purchasing

• Custom buyer roles and permissions for multi-user organizations

• Invoice portal for account-level payment and credit management

• Shared shopping lists, quick order tools, and reordering features for efficiency

• Access to Buyer Portal source code for full UX customization

Beyond the feature set, BigCommerce’s B2B experience is backed by a mature product roadmap, extensive partner expertise, and open APIs that enable brands to tailor workflows to their unique sales processes.

This combination of usability and extensibility helps B2B sellers shorten procurement cycles, improve conversion, and deliver a modern self-service experience buyers actually enjoy. For manufacturers and distributors, it translates into faster sales cycles, streamlined operations, and a scalable foundation that supports growth across channels and regions.

The result is a powerful, end-to-end B2B buying experience that meets modern expectations and drives measurable business outcomes.

Pricing model: Predictable costs vs growth penalties

For B2B businesses investing in digital transformation, pricing isn’t just a budget concern. It’s a scalability concern. The wrong pricing model can turn platform success into a liability.

Znode: Unpredictable pricing that penalizes growth.

With Znode, the more successful your digital channel becomes, the more you pay — both in fees and maintenance — regardless of efficiency or ROI. There are also no independent ROI benchmarks for Znode, making it difficult for businesses to gauge real-world value or long-term return on investment.

Znode starts with a monthly licensing fee, but that’s just the baseline. In addition to licensing fees, the platform applies revenue-based pricing, meaning your total cost increases as your business grows.

That model may work for niche brands with flat revenue, but for manufacturers and distributors scaling across channels or storefronts, it creates serious downsides:

• Unpredictable total cost of ownership

• Penalties for revenue growth

• Difficult long-term budgeting for finance teams

Beyond its pricing model, Znode’s heavily customized implementation approach compounds these challenges. 

Because each instance requires unique builds and ongoing developer support, merchants face higher maintenance and overhead costs after go-live, especially in year two and beyond. 

This results in a total cost of ownership similar to that of a custom-built solution rather than a true SaaS platform.

BigCommerce: Flat, transparent, and growth-friendly.

BigCommerce offers predictable SaaS pricing designed to support, not penalize, your growth. Plans are based on product and support tier, not revenue share or GMV, making budgeting straightforward and scalable over time.

That means you get:

• No revenue-based pricing or surprise fees

• Enterprise-grade features without custom quotes

• Lower TCO compared to legacy or license-heavy platforms

And the return on that investment is clear. According to a study by IDC, brands using BigCommerce B2B Edition:

• Achieved a 391% ROI over three years

• Saw payback on their investment in just under seven months

• Increased sales team productivity by 24%

BigCommerce also drives measurable revenue growth. From 2022 to 2024, US-based B2B merchants on the platform achieved a 12.6% compound annual growth rate (CAGR) — significantly above the industry average.

For manufacturers and distributors looking to scale, BigCommerce offers clarity, efficiency, and proven ROI, while Znode introduces cost risk without the same track record of performance.

Summary table: BigCommerce vs Znode

The final word

Znode may work for promotional products, but its limited adoption, missing features, and growth-based pricing make it a risky choice for manufacturers and distributors with more complex needs.

BigCommerce is different. Trusted by over 12,000 B2B brands, it delivers the infrastructure, extensibility, and native buyer tools modern businesses require — without penalizing growth.

If you’re building for scale, BigCommerce is the clear choice.

Ready to explore the platform? Request a demo today.

FAQS about BigCommerce vs Znode

How does BigCommerce help manufacturers and distributors scale faster than Znode?

Znode’s .NET, SQL, and Azure (PaaS) architecture often requires extensive developer involvement and custom coding for integrations. It’s also not a true multi-tenant SaaS environment, which increases maintenance overhead over time.

BigCommerce, on the other hand, offers a true multi-tenant SaaS foundation and API-first design that connects seamlessly with ERP, PIM, and OMS systems.

This means faster launches, easier maintenance, and smoother expansion across new channels, without the heavy dev lift that slows Znode deployments.

What makes BigCommerce a better fit for complex B2B workflows?

While Znode markets B2B flexibility, many essential workflows — such as full quoting, invoicing, and multi-user account management — require manual setup or third-party customization.

BigCommerce B2B Edition is fully integrated into the platform, not a bolt-on app, and includes these capabilities natively. This allows teams to deliver a complete, easy-to-use buying experience with enterprise-level functionality right out of the box.

How do pricing and total cost of ownership compare between BigCommerce and Znode?

Znode uses a revenue-based pricing model, meaning costs increase as your business grows. In addition, Znode’s custom implementation model often results in higher maintenance and overhead costs after go-live, similar to a traditional, custom-built platform.

BigCommerce takes a different approach: flat, transparent SaaS pricing based on features and support tiers. This ensures predictable budgets and a lower total cost of ownership, so your success doesn’t result in higher platform fees or technical debt.

Why do enterprise brands choose BigCommerce over Znode?

BigCommerce combines flexibility and proven scale, powering 12,000+ B2B brands across industries from manufacturing and life sciences to automotive and packaging.

Znode serves a much narrower customer base, with fewer partners and limited adoption in complex enterprise use cases.

BigCommerce’s true SaaS architecture, robust ecosystem, and transparent pricing make it the safer, smarter choice for sustainable growth.

Does Znode offer the same level of ecosystem support as BigCommerce?

No. Znode has only 80 partners, which limits the range of integrations and implementation options available to merchants. In contrast, BigCommerce offers an ecosystem of 5,000+ certified partners and 1,200+ integrations, giving businesses far greater flexibility to customize and extend their platform as they grow.

How does BigCommerce support innovation and long-term scalability?

BigCommerce’s multi-tenant SaaS architecture combines the flexibility of APIs with the reliability of automated updates. Merchants benefit from continuous innovation, transparent product roadmaps, and easy extensibility across systems, all without downtime.

Znode’s PaaS-based, single-tenant model requires more developer resources for customizations and updates, which can slow innovation and make scalability more complex, especially for non-Microsoft environments.

Which platform offers a lower-risk path for digital transformation?

BigCommerce’s transparent pricing, proven ROI, and strong partner ecosystem reduce both cost and implementation risk. Its true SaaS foundation eliminates the need for costly upgrades, custom maintenance, or replatforming over time.

Znode’s revenue-based pricing, custom build model, and smaller ecosystem introduce higher long-term costs and dependencies, making it a less predictable choice for growth-focused manufacturers and distributors.