Migrating to Shopify: what breaks and how to plan for it

A migration to Shopify rarely fails at the import. Products arrive, the theme looks right, the store launches. The damage shows up later: search traffic that doesn’t come back, customers who can’t log in, a discount rule the old platform applied that nobody wrote down. Those breaks are predictable, which means they can be planned for.

URLs change, whatever you do

Shopify’s URL structure is fixed. Its subdirectories, such as /collections, /products and /pages, can’t be renamed on any domain. A product at /product/blue-chair or /blue-chair.html on the old platform becomes /products/blue-chair on Shopify. For most stores coming from WooCommerce, Magento or a custom platform, that means nearly every product, category and content URL changes.

Google treats this as a site move with URL changes. Its guidance is to build a mapping from every old URL to its new equivalent, starting from your most important URLs in sitemaps, server logs and analytics, then redirect each one with a permanent redirect such as 301.

Keeping product and collection handles identical to the old slugs makes the mapping mechanical and easy to check. Where the old platform had several URLs for one product, such as a category path and a flat path, each variant needs its own redirect.

How Shopify redirects behave

Shopify has built-in URL redirects, created one by one or imported from a CSV file. They start working immediately. Their rules shape the plan:

• Only from broken URLs. A redirect works only when the old URL shows a “Page not found” error on Shopify. If a page exists at the old path, the redirect never fires.
• Limits. Up to 100,000 redirects on most plans, and up to 20,000,000 on Plus. Large catalogs with many old URL variants can reach the lower limit.
• Query strings. Old URLs with query strings, such as ?id=123 product links, might not redirect as expected. Check how the old platform built its URLs early.
• Reserved paths. URLs that begin with /shop, /cart, /orders, /apps or /services, and paths such as /collections/all, /collections/vendors, /collections/types and /a/, can’t be redirected from. If the old store kept products under /shop/, check those URLs first.
• Market subfolders. A redirect applies to the store’s language and market subfolders too, so /en-ca/old-page follows the redirect made for /old-page. A subfolder needs its own redirect only when it should go somewhere different, such as from one locale to another.
• Caching. 301 redirects are cached by browsers and search engines, so a wrong redirect is slow to correct.

Google adds three points. Keep redirects for as long as possible, generally at least one year. Avoid chains: fewer than five hops, ideally no more than three, which matters when the old site already had redirects. And update internal links, canonical tags, hreflang annotations and the sitemap to the new URLs rather than relying on redirects. If the domain changes too, use Search Console’s Change of Address tool; it is needed only for domain or subdomain moves.

Expect a delay. Google says a medium-sized site can take a few weeks or more before the new URLs replace the old ones in results, longer for large sites. Shopify’s own checklist notes that new pages can take 48 to 72 hours to be indexed and not all pages are guaranteed to be.

Data: order and gaps

Shopify’s guidance is to import products first, then customers, then historical orders, so orders connect to the right products and customers. The methods range from copy and paste to CSV files, migration apps, a Shopify Partner, or a custom solution on the Shopify API. Shopify’s Store Migration app is in early access, available only for certain stores and on desktop.

Some data doesn’t survive the trip:

• Customer passwords. Passwords are encrypted, so only customer records are imported. Customers have to sign up again, which needs a planned email, not a surprise at login.
• Product options. When migrating from WooCommerce with the Store Migration app, products with more than 3 options won’t have their options imported. Products built around many attributes need remodelling.
• Anything the old platform stored its own way: custom fields, wishlists or loyalty points have no standard import. Reviews and gift card balances can be moved with apps or the API, but only if someone plans it. Each needs a decision: import into metafields or an app, rebuild, or drop.

Custom features have to be rebuilt

Plugins and custom code don’t move. Every behaviour the old store had, such as a pricing rule, a checkout restriction, a feed to a warehouse or an ERP, has to be listed and matched to a Shopify equivalent: a built-in setting, an App Store app, theme code, a custom app or a Shopify Function. Checkout rules are a common gap; our articles on moving checkout logic to Functions and checkout validation show how those map. Stock feeds to other systems are covered in keeping inventory in sync. The quickest way to build that list is to look at the old store’s active plugins, its scheduled jobs and its checkout on a few real carts, then ask each team what they would miss if it disappeared.

Small things that break at launch

• The myshopify.com name can be changed only once. Choose it carefully at setup.
• Email authentication. Without SPF and DKIM records for your domain, order emails can land in spam.
• Shipping, taxes and payments have to be set up and tested with test orders before launch.
• Bookmarked and linked pages. Shopify recommends setting up redirects in advance for any page customers might have bookmarked.

The first weeks after launch

The launch is the start of the risky period, not the end. Watch for three signals. Not-found errors on old URLs mean the mapping missed something: add redirects as they appear. Customer support messages about logins mean the account invitation needs a reminder. And orders or totals that look different from the old platform point to a rule nobody listed. Keep the old store’s data export until those weeks are over, so any question can be checked against the original.

A sensible order of work

1. Inventory the old store: URLs from the sitemap, logs and analytics; data types; plugins, custom code and integrations.
2. Map each old URL to a Shopify URL, and each feature to its Shopify equivalent.
3. Import products, then customers, then orders, into a store that isn’t live yet, and check them.
4. Build the redirect file, test it on the new store, and check for chains, query strings and market subfolders.
5. Launch with the redirects live, update the sitemap, and use Change of Address if the domain changes.
6. Send customers the account invitation, then watch Search Console for 404s and add redirects as they appear.