What is Shopware 5 used for?

Shopware 5 is the core of Shopware 5, a German open-source e-commerce platform on Symfony and PHP that is no longer actively maintained in this repository. It is a good fit for maintaining an existing Shopware 5 store and reviewing the legacy platform's codebase.

Is Shopware 5 open source?

Yes. Shopware 5 is open source under a custom licence. Its source code is on GitHub at shopware5/shopware and is written mainly in PHP.

Yes. Shopware 5 is open source, so the software itself is free to use under the terms of its own licence.

Can I self-host Shopware 5?

Yes. Shopware 5 can be self-hosted on your own server or infrastructure; there is no official hosted version.

What is Shopware 5 an alternative to?

Shopware 5 is an open-source alternative to BigCommerce and Salesforce Commerce Cloud. Other open-source alternatives to BigCommerce include Shopware, Magento Open Source and Aimeos.

Is Shopware 5 actively maintained?

Yes. The most recent commit to Shopware 5 was on 16 September 2026, and the latest release is v5.7.20, published on 5 June 2025. The project has 1.3k stars on GitHub.

Shopware 5: open-source alternative to BigCommerce

About Shopware 5

Shopware 5 is an open-source e-commerce software made in Germany, built on PHP with components such as Symfony 4, Doctrine 2 and Zend Framework. It offers an event-driven plugin system and an advanced hook system, which lets developers customize nearly every part of the platform.

The repository states that it is no longer actively monitored or maintained, and that updates may occur occasionally but cannot be guaranteed. It points to a Safefive-maintained version of Shopware 5 that continues to receive infrastructure compatibility updates. The README documents server requirements including PHP 7.4 or newer, Apache with mod_rewrite, MySQL 5.7 or newer and a list of PHP extensions, along with installation using Git.

The README says the licence is GPL v3, with some bundled parts under different licences, while the repository metadata lists it as other. Shops built on Shopware 5 run on your own hosting. Because the project is end of maintenance, newer projects would normally look at a current e-commerce platform, while existing shops may still rely on it with community-maintained patches.

Key features

Event-driven plugin system
Hook system for deep customization
Built on Symfony and Doctrine
Git-based installation
MySQL-backed shop data
Established German e-commerce ecosystem

Good fit for

→Maintaining an existing Shopware 5 store
→Reviewing the legacy platform's codebase

Built with: PHP; JavaScript
Tags: ecommerce; shopware; php; symfony; shop; legacy; plugins; self-hosted

Shopware 5: questions and answers

What is Shopware 5 used for?: Shopware 5 is the core of Shopware 5, a German open-source e-commerce platform on Symfony and PHP that is no longer actively maintained in this repository. It is a good fit for maintaining an existing Shopware 5 store and reviewing the legacy platform's codebase.
Is Shopware 5 open source?: Yes. Shopware 5 is open source under a custom licence. Its source code is on GitHub at shopware5/shopware and is written mainly in PHP.
Is Shopware 5 free?: Yes. Shopware 5 is open source, so the software itself is free to use under the terms of its own licence.
Can I self-host Shopware 5?: Yes. Shopware 5 can be self-hosted on your own server or infrastructure; there is no official hosted version.
What is Shopware 5 an alternative to?: Shopware 5 is an open-source alternative to BigCommerce and Salesforce Commerce Cloud. Other open-source alternatives to BigCommerce include Shopware, Magento Open Source and Aimeos.
Is Shopware 5 actively maintained?: Yes. The most recent commit to Shopware 5 was on 16 September 2026, and the latest release is v5.7.20, published on 5 June 2025. The project has 1.3k stars on GitHub.