Migrating from Shopify: what you can take with you
What leaves Shopify cleanly, what does not, and how to plan an exit without losing customers, history or rankings.
The short answer
Leaving Shopify is a project, not a trap. Products with variants and metadata, customers with tags and consents, orders with their history, content, discounts and images all export through the admin and the API in usable form, and the domain is yours to point wherever you like. Four things do not leave cleanly, and they are the same four on every platform: customer passwords, which cannot be transferred; the theme’s code, which is written for this system; data held by third-party apps, which belongs to those vendors; and the checkout with its saved payment methods and subscription contracts. Search equity leaves only through complete redirects, which requires keeping the domain and building the map. Plan the exit the way a good entry is planned: inventory, map, rehearse, reconcile, cut over, watch.
What leaves and what does not
| Asset | Leaves cleanly? | How |
|---|---|---|
| Products, variants, metafields | Yes | Export and API |
| Images | Yes | Download from the export or API; re-host |
| Customers, tags, consents | Yes | Export and API |
| Customer passwords | No | Reset flow on the new platform |
| Orders and history | Yes, for records | Export and API |
| Content: pages, blog | Yes | Export and API; formatting review |
| Discounts | Mostly | Export; recreate rules |
| Theme | No, as a theme | Design and assets reused; code rebuilt for the new platform |
| App data: reviews, loyalty, subscriptions, wishlists | Depends on the app | Vendor by vendor |
| Saved payment methods | No | Customers re-enter |
| Subscription contracts | No | Recreate and re-authorise |
| Domain | Yes | It was always yours |
| Search equity | Only through redirects | Complete redirect map |
Planning the exit
- Make the exit inventory and get exports from every app vendor; note which cannot.
- Choose the destination on evidence, with its own exit terms checked.
- Map data to the new platform’s model; decide what is archived.
- Build the redirect map from a crawl and the traffic-bearing addresses.
- Plan communications: password reset, subscription re-authorisation, saved payment details.
- Rehearse the migration on a staging environment of the new platform; reconcile counts and totals.
- Cut over in a quiet window; keep the old store readable for a period for support.
- Watch redirects, rankings, conversion and support contact for weeks.
Why this matters even if you stay
Knowing what leaves and what does not is knowledge about your own business: which data is yours in practice, which apps hold assets you cannot recover, and what the platform relationship actually costs to end. It changes which apps you install, how you store data that matters, and how you negotiate. A store that could leave in a planned project is a store whose platform and vendors keep earning it.
What this means for you
Your store’s core data, images, content and domain are portable; passwords, theme code, app-held data and payment contracts are the friction, as on any platform. Make the exit inventory now, ask every app for its export, keep the domain yours, and if you do leave, run it as a rehearsed project with a complete redirect map. The ability to leave is the strongest position to run a store from, whether or not you ever use it.
Frequently asked questions
Is it hard to leave Shopify?
No harder than leaving any platform, and easier than most: the data exports are complete and the API allows everything to be read. The friction is in what any platform change involves: passwords that cannot move, app data that belongs to app vendors, a theme built for one system, and the redirect work to keep rankings. None of it is a lock; all of it is a project.
What happens to customers' saved payment details?
They stay with the payment provider and Shopify's checkout and do not transfer. On the new platform customers enter payment details again. Subscriptions billed through the platform need particular care: the subscription contracts must be recreated and customers asked to re-authorise, which is where planning and communication matter most.
Can we take our app data?
Only what each app exports. Reviews, loyalty points, subscription histories and wishlists live in app vendors' systems; some export well, some poorly, some not at all. Before choosing an app, this is one of the six exit questions; before leaving, it is the list to work through vendor by vendor.
Sources
- Shopify Help Center: Exporting data (accessed 2026-09-12)