Build vs. Buy on Shopify
Build, buy, customize, or wait — decided with numbers. Capability-by-capability verdicts with honest 3-year cost math.
Custom wins on 3-year cost or fit — with maintenance counted honestly.
The app wins your scenario — we say so plainly.
Buy the app, build the glue: very often the honest mid-market answer.
Shopify is shipping this natively. Don't spend yet; we'll tell you when it flips.
Latest Decisions
Merchant-Editable Checkout Rules: Flow, Functions, or Both?
CUSTOMIZEFlow writes a metafield and a Function reads it at checkout: an editable rule that still runs in the checkout path. Custom Function apps are Shopify Plus only.
AI & Automation
Should You Build or Buy Fulfillment Constraints on Shopify Plus?
BUILDRestricting which locations can fulfill a cart at checkout time needs the Plus-only Fulfillment Constraints Function; every app found routes orders after placement.
Shipping, Delivery & Fulfillment
Do Your Functions Run on POS and Draft Orders, or Need a Rebuild?
DEPENDSDiscounts reached Shopify POS at app version 9.10 in June 2024. Other function types carry no dated parity note, so test each channel before scoping a rebuild.
Retail & POS
Function Input Query Limits: Redesign the Data or Buy an App?
CUSTOMIZEShopify caps a Function input query at 3,000 bytes excluding comments and a calculated query cost of 30, and drops metafield values above 10,000 bytes entirely.
Platform & Architecture
App Metafield Namespaces: What Switching Off a Function Costs
DEPENDSA Function's configuration lives in metafields namespaced to the app that created it, so moving between a vendor's app and your own rebuilds every rule by hand.
Platform & Architecture
Live Fetch or Precomputed Metafields in a Shopify Function?
CUSTOMIZEShopify restricts function network access to four function types, gates it to Plus and Enterprise custom apps, and has to enable it for you.
Checkout & Conversion
Shopify Function Limits: When Rule Logic Outgrows One Function
DEPENDSOne Shopify Function gets 256 kB of compiled binary and 11 million instructions for carts up to 200 line items, and combinatorial rule sets outgrow that ceiling.
Platform & Architecture
Staged Rollout and Rollback for Shopify Functions: Build It?
CUSTOMIZEShopify releases and reverts whole app versions with no canary or percentage rollout, so gradual exposure for a Function is something you build inside it.
Platform & Architecture
Should You Build or Buy Gift Cards with the Plus API?
BUILDOn Plus, a custom app on the GiftCard GraphQL API issues native cards with no per-card fee. Skip the legacy REST endpoint; buy an app only for gifting UX.
Gift Cards & Store Credit
Should You Build or Buy Real-Time ERP Sync on Shopify Plus?
BUYPlus gives every app 1,000 GraphQL points per second, ten times Standard. Buy a reviewed connector when your ERP has one; build on GraphQL when it doesn't.
ERP, Accounting & Integrations