Headless eCommerce vs Decoupled eCommerce

Understanding Headless eCommerce Platforms

In general, headless eCommerce as a concept is all about eCommerce functionality and exposing those APIs that can be used without NTA or any user interface being defined. You can think of it as a very unopinionated set of functionalities. What this means is that it has the capability to do some functions, but it doesn't rely on any particular user interface in order to utilize its functions.

Headless eCommerce vs Traditional eCommerce

Typically, you can compare headless eCommerce with the more traditional eCommerce, where the functionality is heavily integrated into the user experience. Decoupled eCommerce is the best of both worlds and can even allow working with mobile applications.

For example, inventory management can use a rudimentary user interface and incorporate the headless eCommerce API end points for the internal-facing portion of the inventory management system. However, you might want to use the kind of incorporated user interface that's found with decoupled eCommerce; this is easily possible and you can end up with a very nice “off-the-shelf” turnkey solution. It enables you to change the branding, colors, logos, and other simple styling. It essentially provides you with a default that is instructional, because you're provided with examples on how to implement the user experience with the API, APIs that are making up the headless portion of the decoupled eCommerce. Essentially you can think of decoupled eCommerce as Headless with the availability of a head or user interface.

Headless and Decoupled eCommerce Both Offer Strong Capabilities

The benefits of decoupled eCommerce are that you get all the benefits of a headless eCommerce along with gaining access to additional benefits from decoupled eCommerce. One such extra benefit is that, with decoupled eCommerce, you get access to a good instructional layer — especially when it comes to integrating headless eCommerce APIs along with implementation. Decoupled eCommerce generally has more to offer.

There can, however, be some technical issues. If you are using a decoupled eCommerce platform, you might want to use what's already there instead of using the capabilities of the system to create something that leans more towards what you really need for your market. This is why we encourage you to review all of the options and capabilities between decoupled and headless eCommerce solutionsIn the end, it will be decoupled eCommerce that's going to offer you the most options and capabilities to do more.

In general, both headless and decoupled offer a lot of capabilities because of their architecture. They both tend to be well made and are built around the concept of making it easier for the end-user. it's also designed to make life easier on the front-end developer to utilize the API end points, and to be able to intelligently design those API end points so that the data can handle anything that might happen on the end-user side.

When you're looking at headless eCommerce, it's very important that you not only look at the capabilities. It's also vital to look at what the actual performance and security are like. When you are taking a closer look at the detailed facets and configurations of the headless eCommerce and the decoupled eCommerce systems, we highly recommend that you make sure that the system meets all of your criteria for the industry that you're in.