Magento 2 appeared on the market in 2015 and has been standing firm ever since. Thanks to the extensive Magento features and flexibility, it is one of the best eCommerce platforms to consider for businesses.
But what exactly makes it so special? That's what you'll discover today.
We'll review the most important Magento 2 features you must be aware of if you want your store to be successful. They cover everything from categories and products to marketing, customer management, and SEO.
So, we've got a lot to explore!
But before that, we should make one more thing clear.
What is Magento 2?
Magento is an open-source eCommerce platform with a vast number of features and a highly customizable nature. Many store owners choose Magento since it is scalable and easily integrates third-party applications to create the best version of your website.
When speaking of Magento, we should distinguish Magento Open Source and Adobe Commerce. The latter is the paid version of Magento with additional features and tools.
It's the Adobe Cloud branch, which also offers the hosting part, saving you from the trouble of doing it yourself.
Nonetheless, Magento Open Source has enough features to cover all crucial areas that help your business grow. We'll review the Magento features list in close detail to define exactly what you have in your arsenal.
Key Magento Features
All Magento 2 features can be divided into the key areas they cover. These are website management, catalog, orders, customers, marketing, reporting, SEO, payment/shipping methods, and security.
Let's cover each of them in detail.
Website Management
Before you create a catalog and start selling, you need to set up your environment. This is a core step that defines your website architecture for the time to come.
Magento has all the tools to adjust the environment to your needs.
1. Multi-website support
Firstly, Magento allows you to create and manage multiple websites within a single admin panel. It has a hierarchy of websites, stores, and store views which maintain the parent/child relations.
Each level has its own place in this system. However, they are still flexible enough to create the desired store structure.
2. Multi-language and multi-currency support
Then, there's also the multi-currency and multi-language functionality. This allows you to implement as many languages and currencies as needed. No limitations here.
Currency settings in Magento 2
Define languages and currencies, upload currency rates automatically, and provide the best experience for your customers.
3. Admin roles and permissions
To get your store up and running, you need different admin agents to work with different backend areas. Yet, not all of them need to have access to all of your resources.
Admin user role resources
Magento allows you to create different admin users, assign their roles, and define available resources via the access control list. This contributes to a clearer distribution of tasks and overall better store management.
4. Content management system
Magento comes with an extensive content management system. It allows you to create CMS pages, blocks, and widgets to distribute content evenly across your store.
The handy page builder doesn't require any in-depth technical knowledge. You just drag and drop the elements to create a unique content structure.
Creating content with the Magento 2 page builder
The best part here is you can save all entities you create as templates to optimize content management in the future.
5. Regular backups
To prevent any unexpected data loss, you should regularly back up your files. Magento offers you a couple of options for that.
Firstly, you can create and schedule backups in the admin panel, and then monitor the process. Besides, there's an option to create backups manually or via the command line.
In any case, rest assured that your store data is safe.
Catalog Management
The catalog is the key aspect of any online store. Not only should it be versatile, but intuitive and convenient to browse through. This ensures that customers can find the right product easily without getting lost between the pages.
Magento provides numerous assets to create an engaging catalog and manage it effectively. Let's see what we've got here.
1. Multiple product types
Magento 2 supports multiple product types, making your catalog more diverse. That said, you can create simple, configurable, group, bundle, virtual, and downloadable products.
Example of a bundle product
Each of them allows you to create a unique offer, sell products individually, or create bundles to spark customers' interest. Besides, you can sell not only physical products but also services.
2. Stock management
Next up on our Magento features list, we have product stock management. The "In Stock" and "Out of Stock" statuses are crucial for both store managers and customers.
Magento product stock settings
You can manage stock on a global level or apply specific changes to individual items. The settings allow you to adjust the stock behaviour and make it fit into your strategy.
3. Multi-source inventory
If you manage not one but multiple inventory sources, Magento 2 has a solution for you as well. It is the Magento multi-source inventory functionality that allows you to operate multiple sources and stocks.
Assigning a product to multiple sources
Thus, you can create new sources, assign them to stocks and products, and monitor salable quantity. This is a must-have solution for effective inventory management.
4. Product attributes and attribute sets
Magento product attributes define specific features of your items. They are used for promotions, advanced search, and layered navigation. The best part? You can create as many attributes as needed. Magento doesn't limit you in that regard.
Magento product attribute properties
On top of that, you can create attribute sets, which are collections of attributes. This simplifies product creation and contributes to better product management in your store.
5. Product import/export
As easy as creating products in Magento is, it's still quite a time-consuming process if you'd like to add a large batch of items. Thus, Magento allows you to import products and product options in a CSV file.
Similarly, you can export products using various filters. It's specifically useful if you want to edit multiple products at once and doing it one by one is not an option. So, you export your items, edit them, and import them back.
6. Product alerts
Magento 2 product alerts are an interactive means of communicating with your customers. They can be related to price or stock changes. So shoppers subscribe to the alerts and return to your store once the price drops or an item is back in stock.
Example of product alerts on the storefront
This is an efficient strategy to retain customers even if you can't fulfil their requirements at this very point.
7. Backorders
The out-of-stock cases are rarely pleasant. Yet, Magento 2 allows you to enable backorders and turn them into an advantage.
When backorders are enabled, customers can order a specific item even if it's not available at the moment.
Then, once you restock, the item will be shipped to the customer. Still, it's good to have the low-stock notifications on to keep a closer eye on the inventory.
8. Reviews and ratings
Magento reviews and ratings have a direct impact on the purchasing decisions of your shoppers. As informative as the product description is, other customers' reviews usually have a final say.
Managing product reviews in the admin panel
In Magento, you can configure reviews and ratings, manage them from the admin panel, and create a more credible image for your products. Moreover, this is a great way to learn what people think about your services and improve your offers.
Order Processing
Every order goes through many stages before it's completed and delivered. Thus, it must go smoothly from one stage to the other.
Magento features cover all crucial areas of order processing and provide effective tools for their management.
1. Order statuses
By default, you get a list of pre-made Magento order statuses. At the same time, you can create custom statuses and tailor them to your workflow.
A list of default Magento order statuses
Sometimes, you may need to change order statuses, so Magento provides you with that option, too.
2. Invoices and packing slips
Surely, you should be able to create invoices to have a comprehensive order management approach. Magento allows you to do that easily in a few clicks.
Order invoice details
Besides, you can configure the invoice and packing slip designs to make them more recognizable. A logo is what your customers usually identify you by. So adding them to the invoices is certainly a good idea.
3. Order details editing
Mistakes in order details can be disastrous. Not only may customers receive the wrong item, but not receive anything at all. To prevent such cases, you should edit orders before they reach the "Complete" status.
Editing billing and shipping address of the order
Magento allows you to edit the billing and shipping addresses out of the box.
Surely, these are not the only sections you may need to edit. Thanks to the flexibility of Magento, you can integrate other tools and edit all order details in Magento without having to cancel the order.
4. Order cancellation
As much as you'd like to avoid refunds, they are rather inevitable. That's why you need to have an easy way to refund Magento orders since this also impacts the customer experience.
Creating a new credit memo
Magento allows you to refund orders in a few clicks from the admin panel. It implements credit memos and is overall quite simple. So, it shouldn't be too hard to grasp.
Customers Management
Effective customer management is key for every type of business. Correspondingly, you need to have the proper tools to make the customer journey as comfortable as possible.
Magento covers this aspect out of the box and supplies you with the necessary features.
1. Customer accounts
Magento offers a vast functionality for customer accounts. They are easily managed from the frontend and include separate sections for customers' billing and shipping addresses, orders, reviews, and more.
Magento customer account on the storefront
You can configure customer accounts from the admin panel and have a clear view of your customer base. Work with customer records in the backend or export them in the CSV/XML file if you wish. Magento has you covered.
2. Order history
Order history is what both customers and admins can review. It features all orders a customer has ever placed in your store, as well as all order-associated details.
Customer order history
This is a great feature for you, but it's equally important for your customers. It helps them see their history with your store and easily reorder the items they purchased before.
3. Wishlists and compare products
Sometimes, customers aren't ready to purchase immediately and need some time to make the final decision. In Magento, they can benefit from wishlists and save some products in their accounts for later.
Wishlist in a customer's account
Another useful Magento feature is the compare products functionality. It allows shoppers to compare key features of various items and choose the best-matching product.
4. Login as a customer
In many cases, customers require assistance with placing orders, preparing shopping carts, or resolving some inconsistencies. You can easily log in as a customer and provide the necessary assistance promptly and efficiently.
This functionality is a part of the Magento 2.4.x core and server as a powerful tool for boosting your customer support service.
Marketing and Promotions
At some point, you'll need to use some marketing tools to increase Magento sales, promote your store, and win more customers.
Before you get to some fancy tools and services, try considering what the Magento 2 features list has to offer.
1. Special prices and coupons
In the process of running your store, you will definitely offer discounts and special coupons. Magento allows you to set up advanced pricing and apply discounts to various items in your catalog.
Setting up a special price for an item
At the same time, you can create coupons to complement your sales campaigns. Shoppers can then easily apply them to their shopping carts and get a special discount.
2. Cart price rules
To optimize the process, you can create cart price rules. They help you to define the conditions a shopping cart has to meet to qualify for a discount.
Example of cart price rule conditions
It's specifically convenient for sales periods since you can set the beginning and end date for the rule.
It means you won't have to monitor it manually and stay up late to enable or disable it. Just choose the preferred dates, and Magento will do the rest.
3. Related, cross- and upsell products
By showing customers product recommendations, you increase the chances of people buying more from you. Thus, Magento allows you to display cross- and upsells to give customers more options and offer to buy something complementary.
Upsells on the storefront
At the same time, you can also show related products. So, if customers aren't fully satisfied with the current product, they can always review the related options. Perhaps they will fit their requirements better.
4. Customer groups
Marketing strategies are most effective when aimed at the right audience. Thus, Magento allows you to create customer groups and assign customers to them.
Default Magento customer groups
With this approach, you can offer targeted solutions, apply tier pricing, and customize your campaigns to specific target audiences. This is what makes any marketing effort much more substantial.
5. Email marketing
Email marketing is the best option for long-term communication with your customers. It helps you stay in touch with shoppers and keep them updated on your latest offers.
Customizing Magento email template
Magento comes with a default set of email templates which you can customize or create new ones if needed. What's more, you can translate your email templates to reach out to your global audience.
SEO
The Magento features list wouldn't be complete without SEO tools and instruments. Indeed, this is one of the key aspects to consider since you certainly want your store to be discovered.
The out-of-the-box features follow the best Magento SEO guide, so you shouldn't leave this chapter without attention.
1. SEO-friendly URLs
URLs are crucial for SEO. So Magento gives you the tools to make them concise and up-to-the-point. You can edit product and category URL suffixes, as well as define prefixes and suffixes for page titles.
Setting up product and category URL suffixes
Moreover, it allows you to benefit from the automatic redirects or create URL rewrites to ensure nobody stumbles upon an unexpected 404 page. All of these features are managed in the admin panel, so you won't have to edit code.
2. Meta tags
Meta tags are invisible to customers on your storefront. Yet, they provide crucial details for search crawlers and help them index your pages more effectively.
Setting up meta tags for a Magento 2 product
That said, each Magento category, product, and CMS page has a Search Engine Optimization section. That's where you can define meta title, description, and keywords for a corresponding entity.
3. XML Sitemap
XML sitemap is a roadmap for search engines and crawlers. It helps them understand the structure of your website and determine the pages that have to be indexed.
Magento 2 XML sitemap settings
You can configure the Magento XML sitemap, set its frequency, submit it to Google Search Console, and rest assured that Google fetches your updates.
4. Image optimization
Even though Magento doesn't have in-depth tools for image optimization, it has another no less important feature. It allows you to add alt tags for all product and content images, as well as website logos.
Adding an alt tag to a product image
This helps search crawlers better understand your content and increases your chances of ranking higher in the Google Image Search.
5. Canonical tags
Content duplication is one of the key SEO issues lots of websites face. If there are multiple variations of the same page, search engines simply don't know which one should be indexed. Quite often they wouldn't index any in such cases.
Canonical tag settings for product and category pages
Canonical tags help you define the main version of the page and avoid duplicate content. Magento allows you to add canonical tags to product and category pages automatically. So, these entities are safe from the issue.
Payment Shipping Methods
If your customers reach the checkout stage, it doesn't guarantee that they will proceed with the purchase. All because your checkout has immense importance and can both encourage and discourage people.
Magento offers effective solutions to make the checkout experience as smooth as it gets.
1. Shipping methods and carriers
In Magento, you have several built-in options to configure shipping methods and carriers. The list is pretty long so your customers have plenty of options to choose from.
A list of Magento shipping methods
At the same time, Magento is an open-source platform, so you can integrate other solutions, too. The more flexibility you offer, the easier it is for a customer to commit to a purchase.
2. Payment methods
Magento comes with a vast set of payment methods you can configure out of the box. There are purchase order, bank transfer, PayPal, and Braintree methods to name a few.
Bank transfer payment method settings
The setup is easy to follow and doesn't require too many steps. The main goal is to provide the most convenient options and encourage customers to proceed with the purchase.
Be sure that Magento gets the job done.
3. Shopping cart settings
Cart abandonment is a frustrating thing that keeps you wondering why customers decide to leave. Thus, you need to think your settings through to ensure they aren't discouraging shoppers.
Thus, you can configure a Magento shopping cart and make it as convenient as it can be. Set up the mini cart, my cart link, cart thumbnails, gift options, and other features to enhance your shopping cart.
Magento mini cart settings
4. Checkout settings
The fewer steps shoppers have to complete, the more likely they are to place an order. The checkout step is not an exception.
In Magento, you can set up a one-step checkout or opt for the default two-step one. Besides, there is a guest checkout option if you don't want to ask customers to create accounts first.
Magento checkout settings
Magento offers you enough flexibility to create the most convenient environment.
Reports and Analytics
Effective store development is impossible without reporting and analytics. Any critical decisions should be backed up by real data to bring fruitful results.
Magento 2 reports have you covered and provide insightful data on key aspects and metrics.
1. Sales reports
Sales reports provide insights into the purchasing tendencies in your store. This is where you can review the number of purchases, revenue, collected taxes, and shipping for a specified period.
Magento orders report
Similarly, you can review the coupon report and Braintree/PayPal settlement.
2. Marketing reports
With marketing reports, you can get even more valuable data. There are key details on products your customers add to their carts as well as the carts they abandon. And there's more.
The search terms report helps you identify the top queries and understand how effective the search results are. You can use this data to optimize your product pages and ensure they include all key info.
Example of search terms report
3. Product reports
To optimize your catalog, you should keep an eye on the products you sell and how they perform. It's a simple task with the product reports in Magento.
Here, you can review the best-selling products and the items your customers view. On top of that, Magento generates a low-stock report to show you the state of your inventory and ensure you restock on time.
Bestsellers report
Security
All the Magento 2 features we mentioned are crucial for effective store management. Yet, we shouldn't forget about the security part and protection against malicious actions.
Magento Open Source may not have advanced security tools, but you should still be aware of the options it offers.
To begin with, Magento allows you to enable Google reCAPTCHA for both the admin panel and the storefront. Besides, it's CSP compliant and implements the security.txt file.
Google reCAPTCHA settings
Certainly, you may need to use some other advanced solutions like login activity tracking and secure hosting. Still, the default Magento options are something you can start from.
Why Choose Magento for Your Business?
We've reviewed the key Magento features, and, honestly, this is quite a lot to grasp. You may need some time to evaluate the features and understand if they are enough.
To make the choice easier, let's summarize why Magento may be the right option for your business.
1. Open-source nature
Magento comes with 100% open code and offers you a myriad of possibilities. You can use the default functionality, integrate new services, or customize the platform completely.
You have complete freedom of action and can play around with the code to create the best version of your store.
2. Feature-rich setup
If the above Magento 2 features list is any indication, it shows just how many aspects this platform covers out of the box. It has the necessary set of options to get your store up and running.
Together with this, it gives you enough flexibility to integrate and enhance the default functionality.
3. Scalability
Magento is a long-term solution that grows as your business does. It doesn't limit you in the number of products you can manage, nor does it stand in the way of your development.
This platform is ever-growing and has proven to adapt well to changes. Thus, if you're starting small but planning to go big, Magento is exactly what you need.
4. Lively community
One of the most striking Magento features is probably its community. It has lots of movers and shakers who keep the discussions alive and functionality up to date.
If you cannot find answers in the Magento user guides, you'll certainly find them on various forums with lots of Magento developers ready to help. Be in no doubt: Magento community is one of the best you can ever find.
There's no better way to understand something than trying it yourself. So, don't wait for too long — create your Magento website and learn its peculiarities and benefits!
