ShipBob is best known for fulfilment, but it also sells warehouse software. ShipBob WMS is a warehouse management system for brands running their own warehouse, and Powered by ShipBob is a white-labelled add-on for 3PLs. If you’re comparing ShipBob’s software with other WMS options, this guide is for you.
We compare the warehouse management software worth shortlisting instead of ShipBob WMS, with a UK operation in mind.
| Software | Built for | Multi-client 3PL features | Pricing published? |
|---|---|---|---|
| Clarus WMS | UK 3PLs, distributors and brands running their own warehouses | Yes: client stock segregation, client portal, client billing | Ja |
| ShipBob WMS | Ecommerce brands with their own warehouse | Separate 3PL add-on (Powered by ShipBob) | No, quote on request |
| Mintsoft | Ecommerce brands and 3PLs | Yes: 3PL client portal | Ja |
| Peoplevox | High-growth ecommerce brands | No 3PL focus | Starting price published |
| ShipHero | US ecommerce brands and 3PLs | Ja | Nej |
| Omfattande | 3PLs, mainly in the US | Yes, with a separate billing module | Nej |
| Deposco | Ecommerce, retail, wholesale and 3PL | Yes: 3PL client portal | Nej |
What software does ShipBob sell?
ShipBob’s main business is outsourced fulfilment, and its software grew out of the system that runs its own warehouses. It sells that software in two forms.
ShipBob WMS is for brands with their own warehouse. It covers warehouse, inventory and order management, transport management, pick and pack, reporting, an app store and an open API. It also offers what ShipBob calls blended fulfilment, where you run your own warehouse on ShipBob WMS and send some stock to ShipBob’s network when you need extra capacity. When it launched in 2022, FreightWaves reported it as a product for ecommerce brands that own or lease warehouse space. ShipBob’s own warehouse automation guide says brands can use ShipBob WMS in their own US warehouses.
Powered by ShipBob is for 3PLs. It isn’t a full WMS. ShipBob describes it as an extension to your existing WMS that adds its scanning, order-level tracking and logistics network, with your clients seeing stock, tracking and billing under your brand.
How much does ShipBob WMS cost?
ShipBob doesn’t publish prices for either product. The WMS page asks you to request pricing, and the 3PL page asks for a quote. That isn’t unusual in warehouse software, but it does mean you can’t compare total cost until you’ve been through a sales process. For how WMS costs usually build up (licence, users, implementation and integrations), see our guide to vad ett WMS kostar.
Why look for an alternative to ShipBob’s software?
ShipBob WMS is a serious product, and for a US ecommerce brand running its own warehouse it makes sense. These are the reasons buyers, particularly in the UK, look elsewhere.
You’re running a UK operation. ShipBob’s own material talks about using ShipBob WMS in US warehouses. If your warehouse is in the UK, check which UK and European carriers it connects to, and where support is based and what hours it covers. A WMS built and supported in the UK starts with those answered.
You’re a 3PL and need multi-client control in the WMS itself. Running a 3PL means keeping each client’s stock, reporting, service levels and charges separate in one warehouse, and billing them accurately every month. ShipBob WMS is aimed at brands running their own stock, and its 3PL offer is an add-on to someone else’s WMS. ShipBob also sells fulfilment to the same ecommerce brands a 3PL wants as clients. If multi-client work is the core of your business, it belongs in the core of your software.
You want to see the price before the demo. With no published pricing, every comparison starts with a quote. Several of the alternatives below publish prices, which makes an early shortlist much quicker to build.
The best ShipBob WMS alternatives
A warehouse management system is software that controls how stock is received, stored, picked, packed and despatched in your warehouse. All of the options below do that. Where they differ is who they’re built for, how they charge and how well they handle more than one client.
1. Clarus WMS
Clarus is a cloud WMS built for 3PL and multi-client operations, and for distributors and ecommerce businesses running their own warehouses in the UK and Europe. It’s cloud-native, so there are no servers to maintain. Each client’s stock, reporting and billing are kept separate within one system, and clients can see their own stock, orders and tracking through a branded portal. Client billing is built into the WMS rather than bolted on, so storage, handling and value-added services are charged from the same records the warehouse works from.
Förvaring i St John’s Hall cut its invoicing time by 90%. Its managing director used to spend around four days at the end of every month checking invoices by hand, and stopped once the Clarus data proved consistently accurate. realtidstrategispel, a 3PL running its own warehouse network across Ireland, the UK and mainland Europe, reached 99% stock accuracy on Clarus.
Clarus prissättning is published: from £1,000 a month for the Core plan, plus a one-off implementation fee and tiered user licensing, with no per-order charges. Integrations cover the UK carriers you’d expect, including Postverket, DPD, Evri och DHL, alongside ecommerce platforms and marketplaces such as Shopify, WooCommerce, Amazon och eBay. An API covers anything custom, and the fullständig lista över integrationer är offentlig.
Den AI-assistent reads operational data and acts on it under guardrails: quarantining expired stock, generating stock transfer tasks from picking rates, and catching missed pallet charges across customer accounts. Clarus isn’t the answer for a small single-brand webshop. It’s for 3PLs, multi-client distributors and businesses running their own warehouses, often across several sites.
2. Mintsoft
Mintsoft, owned by the Access Group, is a UK cloud WMS for ecommerce brands and 3PLs. It covers warehouse, order and inventory management, mobile barcode scanning, a 3PL client portal and reporting, and it publishes its prices on its prissättningssida, with separate plans for brands and 3PLs. It’s a common first WMS for UK ecommerce businesses. Things to check: how it copes with complex multi-client B2B work and pallet-based storage if that’s where your business is heading. Our Mintsoft alternatives guide goes into more detail.
3. Peoplevox
Peoplevox, owned by Descartes, is a WMS for high-growth ecommerce brands, with strong roots in fashion, health and beauty and other direct-to-consumer sectors. It covers guided picking, returns, multi-warehouse inventory and an open API. It’s the closest like-for-like option to ShipBob WMS for a brand running its own warehouse. It doesn’t position itself for 3PLs, so if you hold stock for other businesses, it’s a weaker fit.
4. ShipHero
ShipHero describes its WMS as built for DTC brands and 3PL providers running their own warehouse and shipping operations. It’s a US platform and leans towards ecommerce shipping, with order and inventory management, picking and packing, returns, carrier rate shopping and labour tracking. Pricing isn’t published. If you’re in the UK, check how well it covers UK carriers and where support is based.
5. Extensiv
Omfattande, formerly 3PL Central, builds warehouse software for 3PLs. Its core product is 3PL Warehouse Manager, with Billing Manager, mobile scanning, a small parcel suite and an integration manager sold around it. Things to check: the products are sold separately and pricing isn’t published, so make sure your quote covers everything you need. It’s a US platform, so ask about UK support. Our 3PL Central alternatives guide covers the comparison for UK 3PLs.
6. Deposco
Deposco is a cloud platform covering WMS, order management, shipping and planning for ecommerce, retail, wholesale and 3PL businesses, with a client portal for 3PLs. Pricing is custom-quoted. Deposco’s website says implementation takes 90 days or less, so ask for that in writing against your own scope. Our Deposco alternatives guide compares it in more detail.
How to choose WMS software instead of ShipBob
Start with these questions. They’ll cut most shortlists down to two or three names.
- Whose stock is in the warehouse? If it’s only yours, an ecommerce-first WMS such as ShipBob WMS or Peoplevox may be enough. If you hold stock for other businesses, you need multi-client segregation, a client portal and client billing in the core product. Our guide to the Det bästa WMS-systemet för 3PL-företag covers that list in full.
- Where is your warehouse, and where are your customers? Ask every vendor which UK carriers and marketplaces they connect to natively, and where their support team is based.
- What will it really cost? Ask for the monthly licence, user charges, implementation fee and any per-order or per-module charges in writing. A vendor that publishes its pricing saves you a round of calls.
- How long until you’re live? Ask for an implementation timeline in writing against your own go-live date, and ask who on your side needs to be involved.
Your stock data also has to stay in step with the places you sell, which is a separate job from running the warehouse floor. Our guides to programvara för lagerhantering för e-handel och programvara för frakthantering cover those two sides.
Looking for outsourced fulfilment instead?
If you’d rather not run a warehouse at all, you need another 3PL, not WMS software. Names that come up often include ShipMonk, Shipfusion, Red Stag Fulfillment och GoBolt, all mainly North American, or Amazon Multi-Channel Fulfilment if you already sell on Amazon. For user reviews of ShipBob against its rivals, see G2 och Gartner Peer Insights.
Tala med en lagerarbetare
One thing worth asking any WMS vendor early is how long they’ll actually take to get you live, because that gap is where a lot of in-house projects lose their business case. Mat Buttar, Head of Solutions at Clarus, puts our own standard at 12 weeks, and he’s clear about why it isn’t shorter: “12 weeks is a good standard because you need to allow people time.” That assumes a standard project with the right support on both sides and no bespoke development.
If you’re weighing up your options and want to see how a purpose-built WMS works in practice, Clarus is worth a conversation. We work with 3PLs and distributors across the UK to implement warehouse management software that fits the way you operate.
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