In short
For a custom Shopify store, expect 5,000 to 15,000 € with a specialized freelancer and 15,000 to 50,000 € at an agency (French market, 2026). Out of 147 Shopify agency projects tracked by La Fabrique du Net, 37 % land between 5,000 and 25,000 € and 29 % go past 100,000 €, mostly on Shopify Plus.
Pick a freelancer for a targeted technical job, like speed, a migration or a custom feature: you talk directly to the person who codes. Pick an agency when your project needs several disciplines at once (design, ads, content, dev) or a capacity guarantee written into the contract.
"Should we hire an agency or a freelancer for our Shopify store?" It's one of the first questions that comes up when a project kicks off.
I'm a freelance developer, so I'll say that upfront. I'll still try to be fair to both sides, numbers included.
Freelancer or Shopify agency: the comparison in one table
| Shopify freelancer | Shopify agency | |
|---|---|---|
| Custom store | 5,000 to 15,000 € | 15,000 to 50,000 € |
| Custom redesign | 8,000 to 25,000 € | 20,000 to 50,000 € |
| Who you talk to | the person who codes | a project manager who relays |
| Capacity | one person, few projects in parallel | several people available |
| Disciplines covered | mostly the technical side | design, ads, content and dev |
| Main risk | their availability | turnover on your account |
| Right choice for | a targeted technical job | a project that needs several disciplines |
The amounts are ballpark figures from the French market in 2026. On the agency side, they match the tiers La Fabrique du Net published from 147 Shopify projects, around 15,000 € for a custom store, 25,000 to 50,000 € with integrations or a migration, 100,000 € and up for Shopify Plus. Your catalog, your integrations (ERP, B2B) and the level of finish move them around. The breakdown by type of project is in how much does a Shopify store cost.
Why does a Shopify agency cost more than a freelancer?
An agency bills its structure: offices, salespeople, project managers, sometimes a layer of subcontracting. Part of your budget pays for that organization before it pays for the work on your store. That's the price of being able to absorb big projects and several disciplines at once.
A freelancer mostly bills time and expertise. Fewer middlemen, so a more direct share of your budget goes into the code and the technical decisions.
The trade-off is limited capacity. A freelancer can't run ten projects in parallel.
Who do you talk to, with a freelancer and with an agency?
With a freelancer, the person answering your messages is the one writing the code. You explain your need once, to someone who understands the technical impact of every request. The back-and-forth stays short.
With an agency, you often go through a project manager who relays to the people doing the work. That's comfortable when you want a single point of contact orchestrating several disciplines. It also adds a translation layer between what you ask for and what gets coded, and sometimes junior profiles do the work behind the scenes.
Who knows Shopify's technical side best?
This is where most of a Shopify project plays out. A fast store, a migration that keeps your SEO, custom Shopify Functions, a theme that holds up on INP: these are sharp topics.
A specialized Shopify freelancer lives in that space all day. They know the platform's specific traps.
A generalist agency covers a wider range (design, ads, content, dev) with resources for everything. Deep technical expertise on one precise point then depends on who gets assigned to your account. If your number-one stake is technical, ask who codes, on top of checking the name on the quote. I've covered this kind of topic in my guides on Shopify store speed and migrating to Shopify.
What are the risks with a freelancer, and with an agency?
On the freelance side, the risk fits in one word: availability. One person means that if they're sick or already booked, you wait. An agency offers continuity of service and several pairs of hands, which is reassuring on long projects.
Agencies have turnover too. The person who knew your store can leave, and you explain everything again to the next one. A freelancer you work with over time keeps the full memory of your project.
Both models have a weak spot, in different places. Ask plainly on the first call: who picks up the account if that person is gone?
When should you choose a Shopify agency?
When your project needs several disciplines coordinated at once: a full redesign with design, strategy, advertising and development under one roof.
Same if you need a capacity guarantee (several people available right away) or a heavy contractual framework with service-level commitments. For a large account that wants a single point of contact, it's often the right format.
When should you choose a Shopify freelancer?
When the stake is mostly technical and targeted: speeding up the store, pulling off a migration, coding a custom feature, taking over a badly built theme.
Same if you want to talk directly to the person who codes, keep the budget under control, and move fast without layers of middlemen. Plenty of brands even work with both: the agency for acquisition and branding, a freelance dev for the technical side of the store.
How I set my prices
I'm the developer who shows the code. My ground is the technical side of Shopify: speed, migration, custom features, finishing touches that build trust. I work direct, with no project manager between us, and I also work alongside your agency on the purely technical side.
| Offer | How the price is set | What it's for |
|---|---|---|
| Shopify audit | after a 30-minute call, based on the size of your store and the scope | a full review of your store and a prioritized list of fixes with effort estimates, delivered within 5 business days, the price credited against the invoice if you hire me for the fixes |
| Development | a fixed price for a scoped project, or the time actually spent | one-off needs and scoped projects, with a low and high estimate after the scoping call, and the time tracked task by task in your client space |
| Dedicated Shopify Tech Lead | monthly, unlimited requests, with the length and price agreed together | a steady flow of requests, a single point of contact, response within 4 business hours, a quarterly strategy review |
On an estimate range, I commit to staying under the high end.
The best starting point to know where your store stands is the audit: I go through everything and hand you a concrete, costed action plan, app by app and page by page. You can also see the kind of projects I deliver in my portfolio section.
