Opinion on CS cart

It’s a very good solution with many strengths and a few weaknesses and annoyances. Download the free trial version, add some data, and take it for a spin. I accidentally found CS-Cart in the Fall of 2009 when I was looking to switch from another cart that seemed stuck in the past. I had pretty much decided to go with Interspire, but in the nick of time came across CS-Cart. It gave me the functionality I was looking for. It was equivalent to Interspire but about a tenth of the price. CS-Cart was on version 2 at that time. My store is now on version 3 and I hope to upgrade to version 4 perhaps next Spring. I sell around 330 products.



Also there are some really great addons that extend the functionality greatly, like Mailchimp integration, Google rich snippets, social media integration, etc.

It has not. 14 months after I've started to develop my CS-Cart websites I still am not live. CS-Cart 3 never made it past 3.0.6 many bugs remained unfixed and 3 was quickly followed by the news that there would be a rewrite with many essential stuff coming. So we could throw everything we had developed overboard and wait for 4 instead of going live with CS-Cart 3. Why invest in developing a dead product when a new one is coming? Many moons later there still is no usable product and not a single site has gone live. In hindsight I wish I had just forgotten about CSC4 or never touched CSC at all.



Thats how CS-Cart worked out for me. Some others that I know have a similar experience.

Hopefully the future is much better. As soon as CSC4 is stable with an importer, I will be able to continue development and go live.

After two years of work moving to cs-cart the are some plus and some minuses. Sadly the minuses are all in the areas that affect us running a store without stress and these are not being addressed as all cs-cart are interested in is developing a painting box to allow people to paint a pretty site.



Faced with more waiting we won't be ungrading. I would say if your company suits the way cs-cart works - few products in the cart at once, no need for detailed backend information, you've got simple shipping & payment ends then cs-cart is a great cart. For others it just flatters to deseive as the more complex feature simply don't work or too difficult to employ and is very expensive when it doesn't do what you expect it will.

I've been running 3.06 for about 6 months after coming from another cart. I have had 3 small bugs that support fixed within 3 days. Compared to my old cart there is much much more functionality and options. Sales are up which is the main thing and its simple to use once you get used to it.



Once I see and test a stable version of 4 I will probably switch. There will always be bugs in ALL carts. Its a fact of life with software. As a live store owner of version 3 I would be happy to use this version for at least another couple of years. At the end of the day if it works ok there is no real need to upgrade right this moment just because a new version is available.

Yes there are a few annoying aspects but overall it's a very

good cart for the money.

I am using 3.0.6 and it's a solid little performer.

If you can get hold of 3.0.6 then go with it.

If you have no choice but to use 4.0+ then DON'T until 4.0.2

is released ( or maybe wait longer again ).

I have moved my 3.0.6 to a legacy server running PHP 5.2

rather than having to move to a PHP 5.4 server and being forced

to upgrade my cart to 4.0+

If you are in Australia I can recommend a VERY good host.

I don't wish to put you off because CS Cart IS a good cart

but if you have the money then definitely buy some support.

A lot of basic questions at the forums go unanswered.

And don't rely on the instruction set too heavily.

It sounds like I am running it down but I am not.

Volusion, Shopify, Bigcommerce, Cube Cart, Squirrel

are just a few of the carts I have used over the years.

CS Cart is still the best value for money around.

We use CS-Cart and develop add-ons from the 1.3.4 version.

I can't say that there were no problems, but overall is a good cart for the money.

I have had my complaints but overall, I am happy with it. I started at 1. something, upgraded to 2.something, then 3.something, and am now doing a fresh install of 4.0.2 (the fresh install route is my own choice). I am having some issues, but as it was said previously, that will happen with software.



My only complaint right now is Cs-cart support. It's taking a lot longer than 3 days to get help, and the help you do get is inefficient in that it leaves unfinished, requiring more back-and-forth and thus more waiting. Cs-cart can easily solve this by hiring more support staff, preferably around-the-clock so us wee folk in the US don't have to wait 24 hours while support staff sleep (because it's their night time).



All that said, it's taken my site to a level of professionalism that I wasn't able to get from the carts I used previously and that's very important to me.