How-to · 6 min read
How to find out what platform any website is built on
Whether you're researching competitors, planning your own site, or just curious, one useful fact about any website is the platform it runs on. The platform shapes how a site is built, what it can do, and which tools you'd use to make something similar. Here's how to find out — quickly, and by hand if you want to understand the signals.
The fastest way: scan it
The quickest route is to let a detector read the site for you. Paste a URL into our tool: if it's a Shopify store you'll get the theme and apps, and if it isn't, the built-in platform detector identifies what it runs instead — WordPress, WooCommerce, Wix, Squarespace, Webflow, BigCommerce, and more. It only reads the public source every visitor already loads.
Check any site's platform
Scan a URL — if it's not Shopify, detect the platform instead.
The fingerprints each platform leaves
Every platform leaves recognisable traces in a page's public code. If you want to check by hand, view the page source (Ctrl/Cmd + U) and look for these:
- Shopify — references to
cdn.shopify.comor/cdn/shop/, and aShopifyobject in the source. - WordPress / WooCommerce — paths containing
wp-contentandwp-includes; WooCommerce addswoocommercein class names and scripts. - Wix — assets from
static.wixstatic.com. - Squarespace — references to
squarespace.comand its static CDN. - Webflow —
assets.website-files.comand adata-wf-pageattribute. - BigCommerce — assets loaded from a BigCommerce CDN.
Why the platform tells you something
Knowing the platform is more than trivia — it hints at how a site operates:
- Hosted platforms (Shopify, Wix, Squarespace, BigCommerce) point to owners who value simplicity and speed of setup.
- Self-hosted WordPress/WooCommerce points to those who wanted flexibility and control and are comfortable managing more themselves.
- It tells you which tools apply. If you admire a WordPress site's features, you'd look for plugins; for a Shopify store, you'd look at Shopify apps.
When you can't tell
Some sites — especially large custom or headless builds — deliberately hide these signals, so a scan may come back "unknown." That's not a failure; it usually signals a sophisticated, well-resourced site that built its front end custom. Treat "unknown" as information in itself.
Once you know the platform, the rest of your research falls into place. For the e-commerce angle specifically, see Shopify vs WooCommerce vs BigCommerce.