How much does an e-commerce website cost in India?

The price is driven by how many products you sell, whether the design is a ready-made theme or custom, the payment and shipping gateways you integrate, and whether you need inventory sync, GST invoicing, multi-vendor support, or an ERP connection. A simple catalogue with a few dozen products and Razorpay checkout is far cheaper than a store with complex variants, subscriptions, and warehouse integration.

Shopify and custom differ mainly in where you spend. Shopify is cheaper to launch (roughly ₹40,000–₹1,00,000 to design and set up) but adds a monthly plan from about $29 (~₹2,000) plus a per-sale transaction fee, since Shopify Payments isn't available in India and you'll use a third-party gateway. A custom store (for example on Next.js with a headless backend) costs more upfront — usually ₹1.5 lakh and up — but removes the platform's per-sale cut, which matters as volume grows.

Can AI build it cheaply? AI tools genuinely speed up parts of the work — scaffolding pages, drafting product copy, generating images — and that can lower cost. But a store that takes real payments still needs secure checkout, proper testing, SEO-friendly URLs, and someone accountable when an order fails. AI is a useful accelerator, not a replacement for a tested, owned build, so treat 'fully AI-built store for ₹5,000' claims with caution.