Many aspiring entrepreneurs think that starting a business means selling products you’ve created and have on hand in your warehouse (or garage). You make a bunch of inventory and hope you can sell it all. When the inventory’s gone? You make some more.
Inevitably, this means spending a lot of money up front and either having way too much of an item or not nearly enough to meet demand. It’s a never-ending game of trial and error.
But with WooCommerce print on demand integrations, online business owners can sell products without any inventory at all.
The best advantage of the print on demand business model is exactly that — you don’t need to purchase or store inventory. You don’t even need to fulfill orders or deal with shipping. The print manufacturer does all of that.
All you do is develop product ideas like t-shirts, custom merchandise, and posters that can be created on demand at manufacturing facilities, and then sell those from your WooCommerce store. With far lower startup costs, print on demand enables more online business owners to get started and try their hand at running and scaling a business.
Omnisend makes it even easier to succeed with print on demand because you can automate much of your marketing communication with customers and use it to turn one-time buyers into repeat customers. Omnisend is intuitive for beginners, but provides numerous tools for advanced users and large brands. From smart email automation to global SMS marketing, Omnisend has your back.
Try Omnisend and gain full access to all ecommerce-focused features even with the free plan
Print on demand is a distinctive approach to business because it allows you to sell products without holding any inventory. However, it’s also distinct from dropshipping, because with that, the products aren’t designed by you and are typically already made and sitting in a giant warehouse.
Print on demand allows you to sell your own product creations and designs, but without having to risk taking on all the costs of inventory and shipping fulfillment. You can also create personalized designs for each individual customer.
T-shirts offer a simple example. You find a t-shirt manufacturer who offers print on demand services. You create art that goes on the t-shirt and create a listing on your WooCommerce site. Customers order the shirt with the design of their choice. The t-shirt manufacturer gets the order, prints the design on a blank shirt, and ships it to them. You collect the payment, and pay a portion of it to the manufacturer, keeping the rest as profit.
You can use this same approach to sell all sorts of products like mugs, tote bags, hats, sweatshirts and other clothing, office supplies, towels, phone cases, and more.
How WooCommerce facilitates print on demand stores
WooCommerce is the world’s most popular platform for starting an online store. It provides the framework you need to build a custom website, list products, facilitate payments, and fulfill orders.
Unlike third-party listing sites like Etsy or eBay, when you build a store with WooCommerce, you own all of your work. WooCommerce can’t delist you or take down your hard work based on some arbitrary policy.
The core WooCommerce software is free to use and you can build and customize your site completely on your own, hire a developer to help, or use free or premium extensions to add specific functionality. Major print on demand suppliers have their own extensions for quick integration with WooCommerce.
How to set up a print on demand WooCommerce store
Once you’ve decided what you’re going to sell, but before you can start marketing to your audience, you need to build out your digital storefront.
Then, your first step is to install WooCommerce and choose a theme. If you’ve already done this, you can skip to Step 2 below.
Step 1: Install WooCommerce and choose a theme
In your WordPress dashboard, navigate to Plugins > Add new plugin. Search for “WooCommerce,” then select Install now > Activate.
The WooCommerce onboarding wizard will open automatically to walk you through all the steps to get started. Here’s what you’ll see:
Answer the questions that appear about your business and location, choose any free extensions you want to install, and connect your site to Jetpack if you’d like. Then WooCommerce will handle the rest of the setup process.
You’ll also need to choose a WooCommerce theme for your online store, which plays a role in both the design and functionality of your site. There are a variety of factors to consider when picking a theme, from budget and functionality to ease of use. It’s also important that your chosen theme has excellent reviews, is regularly updated, and integrates seamlessly with WooCommerce.
While there are a variety of places you can download WordPress themes, the WordPress.org theme library and the WooCommerce marketplace are two excellent options. You can trust that your theme is high-quality, and you can filter based on everything from WooCommerce integrations to type of store. Here’s a snapshot of the WooCommerce theme library:
Once you’ve made your selection, go to Appearance > Themes in your WordPress dashboard. Click Add new theme and either search for your preferred theme in the WordPress.org repository or upload your theme file.
Step 2: Install a print on demand plugin
While WooCommerce includes a ton of great functionality by default, you’ll need an extension to set up a print on demand store. There are several extensions that you can choose from, depending on your print on demand provider:
We’ll compare each of these in just a bit. But once you’ve made a choice, download the extension, then navigate to Plugins > Add new plugin in the WordPress dashboard. Click Upload Plugin at the top and add the file that you downloaded.
The setup process will vary based on the extension you choose, so check the documentation for specifics.
Step 3: Set up products and customize the product template
This part of the process will vary dramatically based on the print on demand provider you choose to work with, and the extension that you use.
For example, if you go with Printful, once you’ve created your designs on the Printful site, you can just click Submit to store and all of your items will be imported into WooCommerce. Then, you can edit them either in the WordPress dashboard or in your Printful account. Here are some more details about importing products from Printful, which you can see in the screenshot below:
The process is very similar for the other providers we explore here, including Printify and CustomCat.
Want to change the layout and design of your product pages? If you’re using a block theme, simply go to Appearance > Editor. This will open up the WordPress Site Editor, where you can edit the product page template using drag-and-drop elements called “blocks.”
Click on Templates > WooCommerce > Single Product.
There, you’ll see the standard blocks that make up a product page, including the product title, images, price, description, CTA button, and more.
To edit any of these, select it and a panel will open to the right side of the page as shown below:
Here, you can customize the look and feel of each element, like the color, size, spacing, and more. This will vary based on each individual block.
You can also add blocks to the template, and they’ll show up automatically on each of your product pages. Perhaps you want to add a video that showcases your products in action. Simply click the blue + icon at the top left to open the block inserter. There, search for “video” and drag the video block to the right place on the page. Here’s an example:
Select Upload to add a file from your computer. Or, you can insert a video from the Media Library or from an external URL. And that’s it! A video on every product page. Once you’re done making all of your changes, click the blue Save button at the top right.
Now, you’ll need to choose a payment gateway, which will allow your store to accept payments securely. There are a few key questions to ask yourself when choosing a payment gateway, including:
Do you want to offer specialty options like Tap to Pay or digital wallets?
Do you need to accept multiple currencies?
Do you want to keep customers on the site to pay?
For more considerations, read WooCommerce’s guide on how to choose a payment gateway from WooCommerce. Popular options include WooPayments, Stripe, and PayPal.
To install your payment gateway, simply go to Plugins > Add New Plugin and follow the documentation for your specific provider.
Shipping will also look different depending on the print on demand company you decide to use. Make sure to reference the provider’s documentation before proceeding. Let’s take a quick look at how to set up shipping options with Printful.
In your WordPress dashboard, go to WooCommerce > Settings > Shipping. Click on Printful Shipping, followed by Enable this shipping method. Then, choose Save changes as shown below:
To choose the shipping options available to customers, go to Printful > Settings in the WordPress dashboard. There, you can check all of the options you want to offer, including Economy, Standard, Express, and Overnight. And Printful will handle everything from there!
Step 5: Test and launch your store
There are, of course, some additional steps you want to take before launching your store, like creating the pages, securing your site, and calculating tax rates. For a complete look, read this guide on how to start an online business.
Before you launch your site, take the time to test everything. See how it looks on mobile devices and desktops. Make sure all the links work. Test the checkout process. And ask colleagues and people in your target audience to do the same.
Now, congratulations — your store is live!
Best WooCommerce print on demand plugins for 2025
WooCommerce has tons of plugins for all sorts of online business purposes, including print on demand integration. The WooCommerce site uses the term “extensions” instead of “plugins,” but it’s the same idea. The plugin integrates the service it offers within your WooCommerce store.
Here are seven of the most popular print on demand plugins for WooCommerce:
1. Printful
Printful is considered, by some, to be the gold standard of print on demand services. It operates around the world and offers hundreds of products. You can customize just about everything — including the packaging and labeling. And, the products are generally of very high quality.
All this comes at a price, and there are less expensive options than Printful. But if you want the assurance of knowing you’re dealing with a solid partner for your print on demand WooCommerce business, Printful is a great choice.
Key features
Printing, packaging, and shipping — including real-time shipping rates
More than 340 product options
Fulfillment centers on five continents enable global shipping
White labeling, which enables custom branding
Customized packaging and labeling
Automated fulfillment
Built-in product design tools
13 supported currencies
Pros
The products are high-quality — confirmed by a 0.24% return rate
You have the ability to ship around the world in two to five days
It’s easy to import products designed on your Printful dashboard straight into your store
Orders are automatically routed to the facility nearest the location of the buyer
Printful provides in-house customer service
Cons
Printful’s prices tend to be a bit higher than other print on demand providers
Pricing
Printful offers a free plan where you only pay once an order has been placed, and you can still use all of its basic design and product generation services, plus the resource hub and customer support.
With the paid version, you get access to additional branding options, custom packaging, and photo and video shoots of your products. You can save 30% by joining the Printful Growth membership.
Printful is an ideal choice for apparel and lifestyle product stores.
2. Printify
Printify’s business model differs in that it doesn’t manufacture any products in-house. It has contracts with over 140 vetted companies around the world which perform the actual product printing and order fulfillment.
This approach has several unique advantages as well as disadvantages. The biggest benefit is greater product variety. You can sell products using Printify you might not be able to sell anywhere else. The disadvantage is that there’s more uncertainty with product quality, and no centralized customer service center that can speak for all the manufacturers.
Key features
More than 1000 different products on offer
A large network of independent print providers — no in-house printing
The ability to run multiple online stores from a single Printify account
24/7 merchant support
Automated order processing
Printify Choice, which automatically decides which provider to use if selling from the U.S.
Pros
It has an easy-to-use product design editor
There are many more unique products available because of the variety of providers
Each product you sell is associated with one Printify provider location, which means longer wait times for customers in countries far from that location
Product quality can vary
Customer service can be harder due to the variety of providers
Non-U.S. merchants can’t access customized labels or packaging
Pricing
Printify offers a free version that allows for unlimited product designs. You can also use the paid version, which charges $29/month. That buys you a 20% discount on all products, plus up to 10 online stores you can run from the same account. So if you’re selling 15-20 items per month, you’ll recover the cost of the paid version and have access to more features.
There is also an enterprise version with custom pricing that comes with a dedicated account manager and branded customer support, so your customers can call them directly and they will answer using your company’s name. See more on Printify’s pricing.
Best for
Stores that want maximum flexibility in their product options.
3. CustomCat
CustomCat is another solid choice for print on demand integration with your WooCommerce store. It specializes in bulk production for common products like apparel, home goods, and accessories. If you’re looking for one of the lowest-priced options, CustomCat is a great choice.
With print on demand, nearly all the cost comes from production and fulfillment. So, if you’re starting a t-shirt business, and a shirt costs $10 at one company and $12 at another, and you’re selling 500 shirts, that $2 difference adds up to $1,000 in lost profit.
While there are other factors to consider besides price when working with a print on demand company, price certainly matters. And if that’s your primary concern, give CustomCat a look.
Key features
More than 300 product options
An easy product design interface that connects to your online store
Order fulfillment and shipping
A branded merchandise option
Pros
Fast fulfillment speeds average 1.5 days
Lower prices than most companies
Customer support included at all levels
An established business with more than 20 years of experience
CustomCat offers a free service and a paid one. The free one includes customer support and access to all products. The paid version, at $30/month, provides 20-40% lower prices for products. So, like Printify, if you’re selling more than 15-20 products per month, you’ll recover the cost of the paid service and save money from that point on.
CustomCat also has an enterprise version with a dedicated account representative and customized pricing. You also get 30% off all products since you’ll be selling larger volumes.
Best for
Stores selling apparel and home décor who are looking for the lowest prices.
4. Acutrack
Acutrack is the leading print on demand company for booksellers such as self-published authors as well as businesses with books, media, or other educational materials.
Acutrack is actually distinct from typical print on demand booksellers in that it prints more than just one book at a time. Instead, it prints a small inventory. This enables Acutrack to fulfill and ship orders the same day they come on. A typical POD service for books takes several days to fulfill each order because printing doesn’t begin until the order is received.
This speeds up the fulfillment time, which is a major advantage for authors who want their books shipped as fast as possible. Acutrack also uses higher quality printing and binding than other services. For booksellers, Acutrack is the best option for print on demand services.
Key features
On-demand book printing and fulfillment services
Individual or bulk orders
A variety of binding options, from hardbound to spiral
The ability to review a book before printing and get a preview copy for final confirmation
Scalable inventory management
Pros
Personalized customer support is available 24/7
Orders are fulfilled and shipped the same or the next day
High-quality printing and binding
You have control over book pricing
You have access to customer data
Cons
You need to manage your inventory or Acutrack might run out of books which would lengthen the wait time for customers
It requires minimum orders and Acutrack stores your physical inventory
As for the actual company, pricing depends on various factors and is customized to each project. Your pricing will depend on things like binding and printing options, any additional collateral you want to ship with each book, and packaging preferences. Custom quotes are created for each customer.
Best for
Online stores that sell books, educational materials, or other media.
5. Zakeke
What sets Zakeke apart is its use of 3D visualization for advanced product design and visualization. Sellers can design products and create uniquely customized creations with details far beyond typical print on demand services.
And customers can view products using augmented reality and 3D visuals, giving them an enhanced buying experience and the ability to see the products in “real” settings. The technological innovations of Zakeke are the reason to try this print on demand service, if that fits your business. It works best for apparel, furniture, and accessories.
Key features
A product visualizer, so customers can see the product in different settings or on their face for things like hats and glasses
There’s no free option, so you’re paying monthly and per product
Higher learning curve to use it effectively
Some usability challenges
Pricing
Zakeke has a free trial, but no free version.
Their lowest level charges $13.93/month and allows up to 10 customizable products. That’s enough to give you an idea if you like the service. If it works well for you, you can move up to higher priced levels that expand your product volume and reduce other fees.
Best for
Zakeke is best for online stores that want to offer high levels of customization and a technologically rich customer experience.
6. Spreadconnect
Spreadconnect is part of Spreadshop, and has undergone some brand name changes. It’s an expanding print on demand service that emphasizes speed in fulfillment, with the goal of fulfilling orders within 48 hours. Often, orders are out the door the same day.
It offers many of the same products as the other services such as apparel, tote bags, mugs, and pillows, and has a very user-friendly design service. Spreadconnect integrates with WooCommerce, enabling you to use this as your go-to print on demand service.
Key features
Fast product fulfillment
Custom product design tools
Competitive pricing
An array of product options
Pros
You can fulfill orders in the U.S. and Europe
High-quality products and printing
There are branding options available
Cons
There aren’t as many product choices as some other services
Doesn’t serve as many countries as some of the other print on demand services
Pricing
Spreadconnect has no paid version. The service is free to use, and you’ll pay only the fulfillment costs for each item.
Best for
If you want fast fulfillment and order delivery, Spreadconnect may be your best choice, especially considering it also has lower prices than some of the others.
7. Gooten
Gooten uses a similar model as Printify, leveraging a global network of print providers which enables them to offer a greater variety of products, plus far more international shipping options.
Good reputation for customer service responsiveness
High-quality order fulfillment
More product selection than with most other tools
Prioritizes sustainability by localizing fulfillment of each order
Cons
Customer support is only available via email, lengthening the time to resolve issues
No expedited shipping option
Fewer mockup photos make it harder to ensure details are correct
Pricing
Gooten has no paid plan. It has only a free version, and charges a price per order fulfilled.
Best for
Gooten is one of the best print on demand plugin choices for online stores with an international audience.
Benefits of using WooCommerce for print on demand
Running a business isn’t all sunshine and rainbows, but finding the right tools makes all the difference. Using WooCommerce for your print on demand business enables you to grow and expand your business without limitations of any kind and while maintaining full ownership of your hard work.
With WooCommerce, you can leverage all the benefits of a print on demand business with even fewer barriers to starting and growing.
Low startup costs
With a print on demand business, all the startup processes happen online. Your products are in the form of graphic designs. Whatever you’ll be printing on products and selling to customers, you can create it within your print on demand platform of choice. And if you don’t like something about one of your designs, or you get complaints from customers, it’s easy to change it without having to throw out a lot of inventory.
WooCommerce software is free to use. If you have a DIY spirit and some patience, you can build everything yourself. When you’re first getting started, this will help your investment last longer.
No inventory
Because you’re fulfilling orders as they come in, there’s no inventory to manage or store. You never have to ask yourself “Where am I going to put all this stuff?” If a certain product doesn’t sell or has a defect, you’re not saddled with pallets full of useless products. The risk of loss is far lower with the print on demand business model.
The seamless WooCommerce integration offered by most print on demand tools makes this entire process work automatically in the background. You don’t have to take someone’s order, pass along the information to the printer, and then take information from the printer and pass that back to the customer. It all just happens for you.
Flexibility and scalability
The open source nature of WooCommerce enables you to customize and adjust your business, your online storefront, and your products as you scale.
If you grow quickly, you can produce more products to meet demand without changing anything in your process. If you grow slower, you’ll still be meeting each customer with a fulfilled order. And if you want to pivot to a new product line, enhance the options for your existing ones, or adjust certain features, you can do it all with minimal stress.
Automation and efficiency
Last, as already seen, print on demand integration tools in WooCommerce make it easy to automate all the steps in the sales process. Customers place orders, get email and SMS replies and confirmations from your system, and have their orders fulfilled and shipped — all without you having to go anywhere.
And Omnisend is one of the tools you can use to make sure the email and SMS communication happens, and that your automated replies like order and shipping confirmations are sent.
Best practices for running a WooCommerce print on demand store
What can you do to ensure your print on demand store excels and delivers a great experience for your customers? Here are a few tips to setting up and running your store:
Optimize product pages for conversions
Making sales still depends on writing good sales copy. Put more in the headline than just the product name. Or if you can’t do that, use subheadings. Include benefits-focused product descriptions, not just features. And, make sure you use keywords people will search for so you can draw more organic online traffic.
Include high-quality images. This is especially important for print on demand services. And if you have them, include customer reviews right on the product page, ideally ones that speak to that specific product or category.
Use automation to streamline order fulfillment
Automating your fulfillment and email communication will reduce returns and increase customer satisfaction. That means higher revenue.
With Omnisend, you can automate not just follow-up emails like order confirmations, but abandoned cart emails for shoppers who don’t complete their purchase. And you can continue communicating future product launches and special deals.
Try Omnisend and enhance your print on demand customer service and marketing
Social media can work well for both lead generation and attracting new customers. With campaigns targeted to particular demographics or other customer segments, you can focus your ads more on specific types of customers and then continue engaging and nurturing those customers with targeted email campaigns.
Offer limited-time promotions and discounts
First-time buyers respond to flash deals and special codes they might see in your other online marketing. This brings in more customers willing to try your products. And you can use email to continue offering special deals and discounts and convert first-time customers into repeat buyers.
Regularly update your catalog with trendy products
Customer preferences and tastes change. Sometimes they change over time and you need to shift with them in terms of styles, colors, and other product features. Other times, they change based on the season or time of year, and you want to adapt to expectations and needs throughout the calendar.
Have products ready for situations you can predict, and continue developing new ones to stay ahead of trends and have a continuous stream of new products. With print on demand, you don’t ever have to stop creating new designs, and customers are always looking for unique, customized, and individual products that no one else has.
Conclusion
You now know what you need to plan and launch a WooCommerce print on demand business. Your primary task will be to select which print on demand plugin seems like the best fit for your business.
Then, use the best practices discussed earlier, start creating and designing products, market them to your target audience, and deliver great customer service and timely, relevant, email and SMS communication.
Use Omnisend for email and SMS marketing for your print on demand business
Yes, print on demand businesses are highly compatible with the WordPress platform. An array of print on demand plugins make it easy to integrate your WordPress site with a print on demand service.
Is WooCommerce good for print on demand?
Yes, WooCommerce offers several powerful extensions that make it easy to integrate your online store with several of the top print on demand services.
Is Printful compatible with WooCommerce?
Yes, there is an extension built for WooCommerce that integrates with Printful and allows you to run your entire print on demand business using both platforms.
Bernard is the Sr. Director of Communications & Creative at Omnisend, with a passion for good research, helping ecommerce businesses with their marketing automation needs, and beating absolutely everyone in Mario Kart 64.
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