How to Choose a Shopify Promotions App

A neutral scorecard for comparing Shopify promotions apps on discount mechanics, theme impact, billing, data, plan limits and reporting. No vendors named.

Most comparison pages are written by one of the vendors being compared. This one names no apps. It is a scorecard you can copy and fill in for every app on your shortlist, including ours, with the questions weighted by what can go wrong on a live store. Each row says where the answer should come from: Shopify's own documentation, a test on a development store, or the vendor in writing.

The scorecard

Area	The question	Where the answer comes from
Discount mechanics	Does the app create the discount through Shopify Functions, the Admin API, or code that edits the cart in the browser?	Shopify.dev, then a demo on a test store
Combinations	Which discount classes does each offer belong to, and does it combine with your codes and free shipping?	Help Center, then a test cart with a code
Theme impact	Does the app add storefront elements through a theme app extension, or ask you to paste code into theme files?	Shopify.dev, then your own theme
Uninstall	What does it remove, and what stays?	A written list from the vendor, tested on a development store
Billing	Is the charge on your Shopify invoice, and what counts as usage?	Shopify billing docs, then the listing
Customer data	Which protected customer fields does it request, and why?	The app's access scopes and the Partner Dashboard request
Plan limits	Which features need a higher Shopify plan, or Shopify Plus?	Help Center, then the vendor's per-feature table
Reporting	Can you see orders and cost per offer, and does a test order show in Shopify's reports?	A test order

What Shopify documents for each row

Discount mechanics. Shopify's developer documentation describes discount Functions as a way to create discount functionality "that isn't offered out of the box," executed by Shopify when buyers add products to the cart. The same documentation says the Admin API can also create native discounts without a Function. The documentation does not rank the two, so the useful question is which one the app uses and what happens to the discount if the app is slow or unavailable.

Combinations. Shopify's Help Center says each discount has a class and that you choose which classes it may combine with. When two discounts conflict, only one applies. Limits apply per store and per order, and the Help Center says apps must be updated to work with the combinations API. Test with a code in the cart.

Theme impact. Shopify says theme app extensions let merchants add elements without editing Liquid, which lowers the chance of breaking a theme. Speed matters as well; see Promotion app site speed for how to measure what an app adds.

Billing and data. Shopify's billing documentation says apps on the Shopify App Store must use a Shopify-provided billing solution, with charges added to the merchant's Shopify invoice. Its protected customer data documentation says to process only the minimum personal data an app needs. A promotion rarely needs a customer's name or email.

Reporting. Shopify's Sales by discount codes report groups sales by discount name. The page notes that an order can appear once for each discount applied. Ask the vendor to show a test order in it.

How to score

Copy the table, one column per app.
Mark each answer as documented, demonstrated or claimed. Only the first two count.
Install your finalists on a development store and build the same offer in each.
Run four carts: below the line, at the line, over the line with a code, and back below the line.
Choose the app whose behavior you can explain to a shopper.

Offer-specific checklists

The scorecard is general. For the details of one offer type, start with How to choose a Shopify free gift app. For the offer types themselves, see the use cases and the templates on the features page.

Score us too

Put Freebies Engine by Log Studio Lab through the same table. A good place to start is the Custom gift offer template, described as "Choose your own trigger, rules and gifts from scratch." Build the same offer you built in the others and fill in the same column.

About this page

This page is a framework, not a ranking. It names no competitor and quotes no price because neither can be stated here without a source we would keep current. Product-by-product comparisons will be added only where each claim has a dated, primary source.