Shopify development agency
Where the platform ends and custom work begins is the only decision that matters.
We build and optimise Shopify stores: custom themes on Online Store 2.0, checkout extensions on Plus, Hydrogen storefronts where the front-end genuinely has to be bespoke, and migrations from WooCommerce or Magento with the URLs and the rankings intact. Also the unglamorous work: removing four apps that do the same thing.
What is Shopify best at, and where are its limits?
Shopify is hosted ecommerce. It runs the storefront, the checkout, payments, PCI compliance, hosting and updates, and you pay a subscription plus transaction fees. For most merchants that is a straightforwardly good trade. Nobody is paying an agency to patch a server the week before Black Friday, and the checkout, the highest-stakes page in the business, is maintained by a company whose entire revenue depends on it converting.
What you give up is control. The checkout cannot be rewritten. On standard plans it extends only through supported extension points, and full customisation means Plus. Complex B2B pricing, unusual tax situations and deeply custom catalogue logic run into platform limits you work around rather than through. Knowing exactly where those limits sit before you commit is the most valuable thing an agency contributes to a Shopify project.
The technical picture is better than the platform's old reputation suggests. Online Store 2.0 themes give merchandisers real sectional control without touching code. Metafields and metaobjects allow properly structured content. Shopify Functions moved discount and shipping logic into the platform itself, and checkout extensibility replaced the old scripts. Where the storefront must be bespoke, Hydrogen puts a React front-end on the same commerce APIs.
One thing we will raise early, because it is the most common cause of a slow store: app sprawl. Every app adds JavaScript to every page and a line to your monthly bill. We audit what is installed, remove the duplicates, and build the rest into the theme where that is cheaper across a year. Then the conversion work and ecommerce SEO have something solid to sit on.
What we build with Shopify
Custom themes
Built for your brand on Online Store 2.0, with sections merchandisers rearrange themselves instead of raising a ticket every campaign.
Explore →Shopify Plus builds
Checkout extensions, Shopify Functions for discount and shipping logic, B2B catalogues with account pricing, and multi-store setups.
Migrations to Shopify
From WooCommerce, Magento or something bespoke, with products, customers, orders and every indexed URL mapped before cut-over.
Explore →Private apps and integrations
ERP, warehouse, subscription, loyalty and marketplace connections built against the Admin API rather than rented from another vendor.
Conversion rate work
Product and collection page structure, filtering, cart and checkout friction, tested against real sessions rather than argued about in a meeting.
Explore →Ecommerce SEO
Collection architecture, faceted navigation that does not spawn duplicate URLs, structured data, and content that earns category rankings.
Explore →Our Shopify stack, by layer
Shopify compared with the alternatives
Shopify vs WooCommerce
Shopify takes the operational burden away: hosting, PCI, updates and the checkout are someone else's problem at 3 a.m. WooCommerce gives total control and no transaction fee, in exchange for maintaining all of it. If the store is the business, Shopify usually wins. If the store is one section of a content-heavy WordPress site, WooCommerce often does.
Shopify vs Adobe Commerce
Adobe Commerce handles complex B2B rules, multi-warehouse inventory and customisation Shopify will not allow. It also costs considerably more to run and to staff, every year, forever. Unless you have hit a specific Shopify limit you can name, Shopify is the cheaper route to the same revenue.
A Shopify theme vs a Hydrogen headless build
A well-built Liquid theme is fast, cheap to maintain, and sufficient for the large majority of stores. Hydrogen earns its extra cost when the storefront needs interfaces the theme system cannot express, or when commerce is one component of a bigger custom application.
Shopify, answered
Do we need Shopify Plus?
Only if you need checkout customisation, B2B catalogues with account-specific pricing, several linked stores, or the higher API limits. Plenty of stores turning over several million a year run perfectly well on the standard plan. We look at your requirements before anyone suggests an upgrade.
Can you migrate our store to Shopify without losing rankings?
Yes. Products, variants, customers and order history all transfer. The SEO work is the URL map: we inventory every indexed URL, redirect each to its match, rebuild collection structure and structured data, and watch Search Console on both sides of the cut-over rather than declaring victory on launch day.
Why is our Shopify store slow?
Almost always apps and theme scripts. Every app injects JavaScript into every page, and a store carrying fifteen of them is running a lot of code on a shopper's phone. We audit what is installed, remove the overlaps, defer what stays, and rebuild the two or three features worth owning into the theme.
How much does a Shopify build cost?
A custom theme on an existing catalogue typically runs $6,000 to $18,000. Migrations from another platform run $8,000 to $30,000 depending on catalogue size and integrations. Hydrogen headless builds start around $25,000. Plus licensing is Shopify's fee and never appears on our invoice.
Can you build a custom app instead of paying app subscriptions?
Often that is the cheaper answer. Three apps at $80 a month is close to $3,000 a year for something that might be a week of work against the Admin API. We compare both over three years, and sometimes the subscription wins, which we will also tell you.
Can we hire a Shopify developer from you?
Yes. Dedicated Shopify engineers are $20/hour or $2,600/month, with a 15-day trial and profiles within 48 hours. They work in a development store and ship through Git, not through the theme editor on a live shop.
Shopify build, migration or clean-up?
Send the store URL. You get a written read on speed, conversion and what your apps are costing you. No charge, no pitch deck.