How to add a Shopify store to ShipStation, what features are available, other need-to-know details, and troubleshooting tips.
Shopify is a hosted-shopping-cart system which means you don’t have to have your own server. Shopify’s large network of partners and its application store offer additional features for your ecommerce store. ShipStation's Shopify integration supports order and product imports, custom fields, as well as customer-requested shipping services and customizable options for email confirmations.
Connection Requirements:
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An active Shopify account.
Need an account? Sign up for a free 14-day Shopify trial!
Your Shopify store domain.
Order Import Requirements:
The order has been created within 90 days of the current date.
Orders must contain at least one physical product.
Orders will not import if certain fields are missing in the feed (e.g., address line 1, postal code, etc)
Include a Ship To address.
To connect your Shopify store to your ShipStation account, follow the steps below:
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Select the Shopify tile.
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Enter your Shopify Domain, then click Test Connection to ensure that you correctly entered the URL.
To find your Shopify Domain, log in to your Shopify account and go to your dashboard. Copy the part of the URL after https:// but before /admin:
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If Test Connection is successful, click Connect.
After you click Connect, you'll be redirected to Shopify and the ShipStation Application will be added to your Shopify account. If you're already logged in to Shopify, no additional action is needed. If you're not logged in to ShipStation, you'll be prompted to log in now.
Once the application installs, you'll be redirected back to your ShipStation account, where you can update the store-specific settings in ShipStation.
ShipStation's integration with Shopify supports these standard features:
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Common ShipStation Features |
Status Mappings
Sent with Shipment Update
|
Additional Features
ShipStation's integration with Shopify allows for these additional features:
Feature |
Description |
|---|---|
Connects to Shopify's Inventory features |
ShipStation can display Shopify's inventory stock count, and will reduce stock from the appropriate inventory location when ShipStation sends the shipment update to Shopify. See Shopify Inventory for more information. |
Supports Partial Shipping |
If you split a Shopify order in ShipStation, the shipment update we'll send to Shopify will only include the products within the shipped order. |
Supports Shopify POS |
ShipStation will import Shopify POS orders as long as they are for a physical product and as long as they require shipping. |
Support-Enabled Features
In addition to those features we already listed, you can request the ShipStation User Success team to enable these settings for your Shopify store.
Feature |
Description |
|---|---|
Custom Fields |
ShipStation can map up to three custom fields for a Shopify store. Available custom fields are:
|
Shopify Discount Codes In Notes |
If a customer used a discount code with their order, ShipStation will list the discount code in the Internal Notes for that order. |
Exclude Third-Party Fulfillment |
ShipStation will only import products in an order if the fulfillment type is set to Manual or Shopify. This feature is primarily used if you have a fulfillment provider (like Fulfillment by Amazon) connected to your Shopify account. |
Map "partially_paid" To Awaiting Payment |
ShipStation will import Shopify orders in the Partially Paid status as Awaiting Payment orders in ShipStation. If this setting is not enabled, Partially Paid orders will not import into ShipStation until they enter a supported status. |
Map "authorized" to Awaiting Payment |
ShipStation will import Shopify orders in the Authorized status as Awaiting Payment orders in ShipStation. If this setting is not enabled, Authorized orders are imported as Awaiting Shipment. |
Import Closed Orders |
ShipStation will import orders in the Closed or Archived status from Shopify. |
Use Fulfillable Quantity |
By default, ShipStation will import the line items and quantities from when a Shopify order was originally placed. If this setting is enabled, ShipStation will instead refer to the fulfillable quantity value from Shopify. The fulfillable quantity value in Shopify updates whenever orders are fulfilled within Shopify, updates when orders are partially cancelled, or updates when the order's line items are edited within Shopify. Enable this setting to allow the line items in ShipStation to update based on the actions taken in Shopify. |
ShipStation can import Shopify's Fraud Risk Assessment into one of your ShipStation Custom Fields. This feature helps you identify at-risk orders for you to review before you ship them. Contact ShipStation support to enable this option and let them know to which Custom Field they should map the risk assessment.
You can use this imported risk assessment to automatically tag at-risk orders and perform other actions necessary for your workflow.
Tip
Be sure to review Shopify's Fraud Analysis help page if you are unfamiliar with how Shopify handles fraud risk or if you have not yet enabled this feature on your Shopify store.
This section explains how to create an automation rule in ShipStation to automatically tag at-risk orders when they import. This automation rule will then move those at-risk orders to the On Hold status in ShipStation for further review. However, you can use an automation rule to perform any action you require, not just adding tags and moving orders to On Hold status.
To use automation to tag an order, you must first create the tag in ShipStation. If necessary, review the instructions for creating tags in ShipStation first.
Shopify has three levels of fraud alerts: low, medium, and high. Here is how each assessment will appear in ShipStation:
Low risk = Accept
Medium risk = Investigate
High risk = Cancel
For example, a Shopify order considered to be high risk will show the word Cancel in your Custom Field, located in your order notes.
Create a tag for one or all of these options? You decide. After you create your tags, they will be available when you create your automation rules.
Next, you'll create an automation rule that uses the imported Custom Field from Shopify as the rule criteria, and set the rule actions to add a tag and move the order to On Hold.
If you don't know how to create an automation rule, please review the Automation Rules article for instructions.
This example rule uses Custom Field 1 as the criteria and will apply to an order that is medium risk.
This rule states: For any order that contains the text "Investigate" in Custom Field 1, ShipStation will apply the Shopify - Investigate tag and move the order to the On Hold status for 10 days.
You could add another action that sends an email to your warehouse manager, that assigns the order to a specific account user, or that does any number of other actions.
Create a rule for each fraud risk status you'd like to tag. ShipStation will apply the actions when the orders import.
Tip
To apply the rule to orders that have imported already, click the Reprocess Automation Rules button in the Settings > Automation > Automation Rules screen.
Here are some things to know about ShipStation's integration with Shopify:
Shopify will only import orders with physical products into ShipStation.
By default, ShipStation will ignore Shopify orders in the Closed or Archived status.
ShipStation cannot import orders while they are in the Draft status.
Updating On Hold orders: ShipStation will update orders in the On Hold status if changes are made to the order on Shopify. If expected changes do not appear in ShipStation after you have refreshed the store, contact ShipStation support to request they set your refresh date back to the date the change occurred and refresh the store again.
If you are using Shopify's Inventory features, link the Ship From Location to a Shopify Inventory source so you can view your stock counts in ShipStation. See Shopify Inventory for more information.
Automatic Discounts: An automatic discount is applied at checkout and does not require the customer to put in any code at checkout. ‘Automatic Discounts’ from Shopify do not import into ShipStation. These discounts are a different type of discount than the ‘Discount Codes’ that would import as a line item. This difference may be why you see a discrepancy between Order Total and Amount Paid.
Here are some common issues experienced by users, potential causes, and available troubleshooting tips.
Issue |
How to troubleshoot or resolve |
|---|---|
Why isn't this Shopify order importing into ShipStation? |
There are multiple reasons why a Shopify order would not import into ShipStation, but here are the most common:
In these cases, your best option is to update the order in Shopify, if possible. If you cannot update the order, ShipStation will be unable to import the order. In addition, ShipStation by default does not import orders that are Closed or Archived. If you need to import Closed and Archived orders, please contact ShipStation support and we will enable this option. |
After creating a label, ShipStation updated my Shopify order but only left a note with the tracking information. Why wasn't this order updated as fulfilled? |
This happens when ShipStation tries to create a fulfillment update for the Shopify order, but we receive an error from Shopify that the fulfillment could not be created for one of the following reasons:
If this occurs, ShipStation will not be able to update the order as fulfilled. You may be able to update the order directly on Shopify. |