I'm working on a side-project... And I have 2 questions for you

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I spent all weekend working on a side project. A simplified version of something I was working on last year - That I gave up because it was too much work.

Here I my questions:

  1. Where do you go for extension or theme reviews/opinions before you purchase?
  2. What other research/considerations do you do before making the final purchase?

Many thanks

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I am new to Magento even e-commerce… Because i am more of a DevOps/sys admin guy. However here is my input:

  1. First of all, whatever extension I need. I search for the free ones, read the reviews whether on blogs or Github, make sure that it works with the version I am using e.g. Magento 2.3.5. I then compare the top extensions and use the one which is good, if it does not deliver then I try the 2nd top.
  1. Right now, I am and/or will be investing in a theme. Therefore, I have searched and reviewed a lot of themes and its support with other extensions on Themeforest market in terms of sales,reviews,popularity,coding technologies used, mobile usage and its response on Page Insight and gtmetrix.

Also, I contact the extension/theme developers to see their response rate, because i believe support is very important. So if a theme/extension developer replies me back with lets say 1 week later, definitely a NO.

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Themes
I try to avoid using themes. Themes are presented as “do everything” with one theme solutions. I find that themes are usually not a lot of help, create performance problems and compatibility problems. So I will get started with the standard Luma theme.

Extensions
I look for reputable Magento extension vendors first. Even though these extensions are usually more expensive, I expect these extensions to be better supported in future M2 versions, therefore have less issues with new M2 versions. For any given installation, I try to use extensions from the same vendor, if available. Again, expecting that extensions from the same vendor will have less compatibility errors.

I will argue that the cost of upgrading an M2 (M2.x to M2.x+1) installation is in the neighborhood of 20 hours (as an example, I’m using 20 hours). The cost of upgrading with incompatible extensions could easily double or more. This is a main concern to me.

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