Features
This page lists major BigCommerce platform features and how far Catalyst supports each one. Catalyst is built on the GraphQL Storefront API rather than the REST Management API, so features that the GraphQL Storefront API doesn’t expose aren’t supported out of the box. You can still build them yourself with the REST Management API.
The list isn’t a feature-parity comparison with Stencil, but it’s a useful overview when comparing the two.
Feature support
- 🟢 Green: Natively supported in Catalyst
- 🟡 Yellow: Partially supported but might be missing functionality
- 🔴 Red: Not supported
Because you own your Catalyst code, you can build custom implementations of yellow and red features.
| Feature | Supported | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| ADA Compliance | 🟢 | The Catalyst design system was developed with continuous Lighthouse testing for accessibility. |
| Cookie Consent for GDPR/CCPA | 🟢 | Added in Catalyst 1.3 |
| Universal Commerce Protocol (UCP) | 🟢 | Added in Catalyst 1.12. Catalyst proxies /.well-known/ucp and /api/ucp/* to BigCommerce, so AI agents can discover and call UCP on your storefront’s own domain. See With UCP proxy. |
| Product Reviews | 🟢 | Added in Catalyst 1.4 |
| Customer Groups | 🟢 | Support for customer group product visibility and pricing, powered by our GraphQL API. |
| Gift Certificates | 🟢 | Added in Catalyst 1.3 |
| Google Analytics (GA4) | 🟢 | Built in through Catalyst’s analytics provider, using the GA4 tag ID configured in the store’s web analytics settings. The provider interface can be extended for other analytics providers. |
| Multi-storefront | 🟢 | Catalyst is structured as a single-domain Next.js application, so it can only serve one domain per project out of the box. However, you can deploy multiple projects to serve multiple domains (similar to one-theme-per-domain on Stencil), and you can also wire up subpaths of the domain on Catalyst to serve either multi-language or separate channels. As a result, Catalyst supports more Multi-Storefront (MSF) scenarios than Stencil. Next.js supports multi-domain deployments, so you can customize Catalyst to serve several domains from one project. To learn more, see the Catalyst Multi-Storefront guide. |
| My Account / Orders | 🟢 | Supports profiles, addresses, and order history, including shipment tracking links. Downloadable product links are not supported. |
| Native Analytics | 🟢 | Catalyst sends two server-side BigCommerce analytics events from its proxy chain: visitStartedEvent and productViewedEvent. Visit tracking respects the shopper’s measurement consent. |
| Newsletter Subscription | 🟢 | Added in Catalyst 1.4 |
| Secure payment handling (for PCI DSS compliance) | 🟢 | No payment information touches the Next.js application, because Catalyst uses redirected checkout. This keeps the Next.js layer out of PCI scope for the most part. |
| Persistent Cart | 🟢 | When a shopper signs in, their guest cart is merged into their customer cart. |
| Promotions | 🟢 | Promotional logic works in cart. Featured promotion callouts appear on product pages and product listing pages (added in Catalyst 1.9) and on homepage product cards (added in Catalyst 1.10). |
| Single Storefront Multi-currency | 🟢 | Added with the header currency selector (#1912). Only supports transactional currencies for now, not display-only currencies. |
| Single Storefront Multi-geo | 🟢 | |
| Single Storefront Multi-Lang | 🟢 | Supports: static string translation via language files, translated product catalog (either within a single channel, or across channels) via localized subpaths, uses next-intl as localization framework, localization of content pages when built with Makeswift using Makeswift’s existing localization capabilities. To learn more, see the Catalyst Multi-Language guide. |
| Synchronized login state between storefront and checkout; global logout | 🟢 | Enabled through Customer Access Token (CAT) used in Catalyst by default. |
| Visual Editing (Page Builder equivalent) | 🟢 | Since Catalyst 1.0, Makeswift is integrated into a distributable version of Catalyst, and you can choose a version with or without the editor. See Makeswift. |
| Wishlists | 🟢 | Wishlist Catalyst documentation |
| Out of Stock Messages | 🟢 | Added in Catalyst 1.4 |
| Product Videos | 🟢 | |
| Express Wallet Buttons | 🟢 | Wallet buttons on the cart page were added in Catalyst 1.11. Express wallet buttons also work on Checkout, which is rendered by Stencil rather than Catalyst. |
| B2B Open Source Buyer Portal | 🟡 | There is an experimental integration available. See the Catalyst + B2B Buyer Portal guide for more information. |
| App Support | 🟡 | Back-office apps focused on backend and control panel functionality are supported in Catalyst, and any app that exposes APIs can be integrated with custom code. Storefront apps that modify frontend storefront behavior generally don’t work with Catalyst. To learn more about app compatibility, see the Building Catalyst compatible apps guide. |
| Masquerading / Login as Customer | 🟡 | Supported by Catalyst Customer Login app but not natively supported |
| Order Downloads | 🟡 | Use a custom digital product fulfillment pipeline, as agencies do for Stencil. |
| Order Tracking Links | 🟢 | Shipment tracking numbers and links appear on the order details page in My Account. |
| Saved Payment Methods | 🟡 | Stored payment methods can be used at checkout, which BigCommerce renders, but shoppers can’t view or manage them from the My Account area in Catalyst. |
| Sitemap | 🟡 | Catalyst does generate a sitemap for you, but it does not factor in routes that are not managed by BigCommerce. For example, it does not include routes that are created in Makeswift |
| In-app search | 🟡 | Catalyst does support search for BigCommerce products, but it does not factor in content that is not managed by BigCommerce. For example, it does not include content that is created in Makeswift |
| Session Syncing | 🟢 | Sessions sync in both directions: from Catalyst to the BigCommerce checkout, and from checkout back to Catalyst when a shopper signs in or out during checkout (Catalyst 1.0 and later). See Session Sync for the required checkout settings. |
| Script Manager | 🟡 | For most integrations, Server Components are a better fit than frontend script injection. Scripts are available in the GraphQL Storefront API, so Catalyst renders them where they make sense, such as analytics pixels. Scripts with Handlebars expressions built for Stencil don’t work in Catalyst. See Installing Scripts in Catalyst. |
| Hosting by BigCommerce | 🟡 | Native Hosting deploys Catalyst to BigCommerce’s own hosting infrastructure through the Catalyst CLI, and is the recommended way to host Catalyst. It’s currently in closed beta; see the overview for how to request access. |
| Banners | 🔴 | Use Makeswift (or an alternative) instead. |
| Meta Pixel | 🔴 | |
| Draft Orders | 🔴 | Specifically, the ability for Catalyst to take a customer-facing Draft Order URL and apply it to the Catalyst session is not supported. |
| Order Messages | 🔴 | Specfically, the ability for a customer to add additional messages on the order details page after checkout is not supported. |
| Promotional Banners | 🔴 | Store-wide promotional banners aren’t rendered. Product-level featured promotion callouts are supported; see Promotions above. |
| Returns / RMA | 🔴 | Use a partner solution, for example Happy Returns, Returnly, Loop Returns, or AfterShip. |
| Abandoned Cart | 🔴 | Specifically, the ability for Catalyst to take a customer-facing Abandoned Cart URL and apply it to the Catalyst cart is not supported. |
| File Upload Product Option Type | 🔴 | |
| Gift Wrapping | 🔴 | Can be built using the GraphQL Storefront API by querying gift wrapping options (example here) and passing them to the Get a cart query |