What "hosting" means for a shop
For a normal website, hosting is a place to keep the pages so people can open them. A shop also has moving parts that have to keep working every day:
- The shop software: products, variants, stock counts, a basket and a checkout.
- Payments: a connection to a provider like Yoco or PayGate, and a reliable way to mark an order as paid.
- Security: an SSL certificate so the padlock shows, and updates when something needs fixing.
- Email: order confirmations to your customer and new-order notices to you.
- Backups: a copy of your orders and customers somewhere other than the server itself.
Who looks after each of those is the real difference between the options below.
The three ways to host a shop
1. Web hosting plus WooCommerce, done yourself
You rent hosting from a South African host, install WordPress and the free WooCommerce plugin, pick a theme, and add a payment plugin for Yoco, PayFast or PayGate. The hosting fee is low. The work is yours: plugin updates, security, backups, and fixing it when an update breaks the checkout. It suits someone who enjoys that, or pays a developer to look after it.
2. An international shop platform
Platforms like Shopify or Wix host everything for you. They are well built and have large app stores. For South African shops the catch is usually the currency and the payment fee: plans are billed in US dollars, and Shopify adds a fee on each sale taken through a local provider because its own payments service is not offered here. We compared this in rands on our Shopify alternative page.
3. A South African hosted shop platform
One monthly fee in rands covers the software, hosting, checkout, certificate and backups, and the payment options are the ones South African customers use. Storeforge is one of these.
What Storeforge includes for R299 a month
- Hosting on a server in South Africa, behind Cloudflare, with an SSL certificate on your shop
- An encrypted backup of your shop every night
- Products with photos, variants and stock that counts down as orders come in
- Card payments into your own Yoco, PayGate or PayPal account, plus EFT, pay on delivery and selling on account
- Delivery options and fees, with free delivery over an amount you choose
- Discount codes, order emails, packing slips and invoices with your VAT number
- Meta Pixel and Google tag, plus built-in sales and visitor numbers
- Your own domain, and CSV export of your products, orders and customers at any time
There is no setup fee and no cut of your sales. The first 14 days are free and you do not need a card to start.
What it does not do
Storeforge has no app store, so if you need something unusual it may not be there. Courier booking from the dashboard, weight-based delivery rates, gift cards, and PayFast or Ozow payments are not built yet. If one of those is a deal-breaker, tell us before you start.
Common questions
What does online shop hosting cost in South Africa?
It depends on the route. Plain web hosting for a self-managed WooCommerce shop is a monthly hosting fee plus your own time for plugins, updates and security. A hosted shop platform charges one monthly fee that covers the software, checkout, security certificate and backups. Storeforge by ForgeLab is R299 a month with no fee per sale.
Is Storeforge hosted in South Africa?
Yes. Shops run on a server in South Africa, behind Cloudflare, with an encrypted backup taken every night.
Do I need separate hosting if I use Storeforge?
No. Hosting, the security certificate, checkout and backups are part of the R299 a month. You only need a domain if you want your own address, and you can keep the one you have.
Can I bring my own domain?
Yes. Your domain stays registered where it is, in your name. You point it at your shop and we connect it.