The New Shopify Checkout Extensibility

The checkout process is the most crucial aspect of your online store, as it’s where potential buyers transform from window shoppers into actual customers. Shopify Checkout is already optimized for conversions with built-in features such as auto-fill, express checkouts like Shop Pay and PayPal, and local payment methods that enable customers to complete their purchases effortlessly.

Despite Shopify Checkout’s leading position in conversion rate optimization, brands may wish to further tailor their checkout experience to better represent their brand and address specific business requirements. This could involve enhancing conversions for specific customer segments, increasing average order value, fostering loyalty, or adhering to local regulations. Customizing Shopify Checkout has now become more straightforward than ever.

With the new Shopify Checkout Extensibility, brands can utilize a range of powerful apps and branding tools to make code-free customizations to their checkout process, rather than modifying and maintaining code in their previous checkout.liquid theme file. Moreover, unlike the traditional method of customizing Shopify Checkout, adjustments made with checkout extensibility are upgrade-safe, enabling brands to access new checkout features as soon as they become available.

Shopify has transformed the way merchants customize their checkout by enabling the addition of app blocks and offering more opportunities for developers to create custom solutions. However, this still does not fully address the primary need for single-page checkout experiences and the ability to split test crucial aspects of the conversion process.

Instead of modifying code as in the past, Shopify now offers apps and branding tools, phasing out the checkout.liquid file.

Checkout Extensibility allows Shopify Plus brands to customize their checkouts effortlessly and without coding. This app-based solution is easy to upgrade and integrates seamlessly with Shop Pay. It also provides the flexibility to create tailored experiences by developing custom apps using a set of components. While this offers some scope for Shopify developers, it might not entirely meet the demands of merchants. It appears that Shopify is focusing on monetizing the checkout rather than delivering the precise solutions that users require.

How to Enable Checkout Extensibility? 

In the first stages, Shopify is enabling developers to implement checkout customizations through custom apps or public apps on the Shopify App Store.

Checkout UI extensions allow the addition of custom content, fields, product offers, loyalty programs, and more to Shopify checkout. These extensions are available in guest checkout and Shop Pay, providing a consistent brand experience for buyers wherever they choose to check out. Checkout UI also automatically adapts to various checkout flows. However, most of these customizations could previously be achieved quickly with custom code.

Another feature of Shopify Extensibility is Functions, which manage server-side business logic for customizing discounts on orders, products, or shipping. It’s unclear, though, how this differs from the existing scripts app. You can also develop dedicated apps for Shopify checkout.

The new checkout extensibility offers advanced customization options for those who prefer not to work with Shopify developers. Brands can tailor their checkout to match their website by adjusting colors, fonts, adding favicons, customizing button corner radius, or including components like upsells without a Shopify developer. However, this doesn’t necessarily mean greater control; depending on your needs, it could actually be less. 

What about Shopify Checkout Liquid?

Checkout Extensibility is set to replace checkout.liquid eventually. It offers the potential for a quicker checkout experience, although the actual impact on page speed will depend on the apps being used. Built with cutting-edge platform technology, the user interface components and APIs operate in a secure, sandboxed environment. This offers brands enhanced security compared to the previous method of customizing a Shopify checkout, which could be less secure and potentially lead to customer data leakage (though not payment data).

Currently, Checkout Extensibility is available for in-checkout pages, encompassing the information, shipping, and payment stages of the checkout process. As a more secure and innovative method for customizing Shopify checkouts, checkout.liquid will become obsolete and cease to function for in-checkout pages after August 13th, 2024.

All Shopify Plus brands using checkout.liquid will need to transition to Checkout Extensibility following this date. Plans for new checkout flows tailored to our Shopify Plus customers are actively underway.

Is Shopify Checkout Extensibility an Improvement over the Previous Shopify Checkout?

While the previous Shopify Checkout experience delivers impressive speed and performance, it falls short in terms of easy customization options with apps. The benefits of Checkout Extensibility may not be immediately apparent, but we hope this is merely the first step in a series of updates aimed at providing greater control over the checkout process.

Shopify claims that Checkout Extensibility simplifies customization for in-house teams or developers, without the need for complex work, as opposed to directly modifying the checkout code, which can be time-consuming and costly. However, when using Checkout Extensibility, one may find that advanced branding requires the expertise of a Shopify Plus Expert. We are currently conducting split tests with the Shopify Checkout Extensibility functionality, and remain unconvinced of its benefits thus far.

Who is Eligible for Shopify Checkout Extensibility?

At the moment, Shopify Checkout Extensibility is exclusively available to those with Shopify Plus accounts.

Interested in Learning More or Updating Your Checkout to Checkout Extensibility?

If you’d like to know more or begin customizing your checkout, feel free to reach out to our Shopify experts team.