WPC Fly Cart for WooCommerce: worth it for a simple side cart

What WPC Fly Cart does

WPC Fly Cart adds a floating mini-cart or slide-out cart to WooCommerce. Customers can see products, quantities, subtotals, and cart actions without leaving the page. Depending on the configuration, they can continue shopping, view the cart, or proceed toward checkout from the overlay. The plugin works with both AJAX and standard Add to Cart buttons, and it can be positioned as a floating bubble or added to selected WordPress menus.

The free version is more capable than many basic side-cart plugins. It includes multiple cart skins, more than 16 bubble icon styles, color and background controls, RTL support, remove and undo actions, suggested products, and settings for the cart heading and buttons. It also includes the shortcode [woofc_cart_link], added in a previous release, for displaying a cart icon with an item count.

Where it is genuinely strong

The main strength is value. A small store can add a familiar drawer-cart experience without paying for a complete funnel or checkout suite. The cart is useful for product catalogs where shoppers compare several items before checking out, and the option to keep customers on the current page removes an unnecessary trip through the traditional cart page.

It is also relatively flexible for a free plugin. You can choose whether the cart opens automatically, whether the bubble appears on particular pages, where the bubble sits, and which cart details are visible. The developer continues to update the plugin for current WordPress and WooCommerce releases, and the WordPress.org listing shows more than 10,000 active installations with a 4.7-star rating from 61 reviews. That is a healthy signal, although ratings do not remove the need to test it on your own store.

Where it falls short

The biggest catch is that WPC Fly Cart is not the whole AJAX shopping experience by itself. The developer specifically recommends installing WPC AJAX Add to Cart to show the popup on single-product pages without reloading. That means a supposedly simple feature can become a two-plugin setup, with more opportunities for conflicts involving themes, caching, variations, or other cart extensions.

Customization is another weak point. One WordPress.org reviewer found that the free version offered too little theme integration and required custom CSS even for a basic branded appearance. The same report mentioned problems with variable products not opening the drawer on product pages. Support threads also document incorrect totals involving dynamic pricing or flexible-shipping plugins, delayed updates, quantity problems, menu-link issues, and the cart failing to open in Facebook’s in-app browser. These are not universal failures, but they are specific warning signs for stores with a complicated WooCommerce stack.

Premium features and alternatives

The premium version is listed at $29 for one site, $59 for up to five sites, and $99 for unlimited sites. It adds instant checkout inside the popup, coupon filling, shipping-cost calculation, and dedicated support. Those features make the upgrade reasonable for a simple store that wants a faster purchasing flow, but they do not turn WPC Fly Cart into a full conversion platform.

Compared with FunnelKit Cart, WPC Fly Cart is cheaper and more focused, while FunnelKit is the stronger option for cart rewards, upsells, checkout optimization, and analytics. WooCommerce Mini Cart is a sensible alternative if you want an official extension with a simpler feature set and less visual experimentation. CartFlows makes more sense when the real requirement is a complete funnel rather than a floating cart.

Verdict

Use WPC Fly Cart if your priority is a straightforward, inexpensive side cart and you are willing to test AJAX behavior with your theme and extensions. The free version is worth trying; the premium version is worth paying for only when its instant checkout and cart-level extras solve a specific problem. Stores demanding polished no-code branding, complex product compatibility, or deep conversion features should choose FunnelKit instead.