Moving from Shopify to WooCommerce: what to check before the rebuild

A Shopify to WooCommerce migration starts with a business question: what will the new store let you do that you cannot sensibly do today? Moving products is one part of the job. Keeping orders, customer access, stock and search traffic working is the part I would plan first.

If you are considering the move because of awkward trade pricing, an integration you cannot control or a stack of apps that no longer fits, there may be a good reason to change. If the problem is one slow page or a confusing delivery message, I would investigate that before committing you to another platform.

Write down the reason for moving before choosing a theme

I would want a short list of specific requirements. “More flexibility” is difficult to test. “Our warehouse needs paid orders sent automatically, with a reliable way to retry failures” is something we can design and verify.

Compare the whole operating cost: hosting, extensions, development, backups and ongoing maintenance, alongside the subscriptions you expect to remove. WooCommerce gives you control, but that control comes with responsibility for the installation. A lower platform bill does not automatically mean a lower total cost.

My WooCommerce development service includes migration work. The useful starting point is your current store and the restrictions you want to remove, rather than a promise to rebuild everything on a different system.

Inventory the things customers and staff actually use

A product count will not tell me enough to scope the work. A small catalogue with subscriptions, bundles and customer-specific prices can need more planning than a large catalogue of straightforward products.

• Catalogue: variants, SKUs, images, stock locations, product relationships and custom fields.
• Customers: account access, addresses, marketing preferences and which historical orders they need to see.
• Transactions: orders, refunds, discounts, gift balances and any recurring commitments.
• Operations: shipping rules, fulfilment, accounting, stock synchronisation and staff permissions.
• Discovery: product URLs, collections, articles, landing pages and shopping feeds.

For every item, I would record where it lives now, where it belongs in WooCommerce and how we will check it. An app's behaviour is not necessarily contained in the data exported from the store. Some features need a replacement extension; others need a small amount of custom development or a simpler process.

Prove the import with awkward examples

I would start with a protected test store and a representative sample. That sample should include the troublesome products: the item with many options, the discounted order, the customer with several addresses and the product with unusual delivery requirements.

Then compare the records and the buying experience. Does a variant retain the right SKU? Does the image belong to the correct option? Is the order total consistent, including its shipping and discount? Can staff find the information they need to fulfil it?

Customers also need a workable sign-in journey. WooCommerce's Shopify migration guidance explains that Shopify password hashes cannot be imported into WooCommerce, so customers need to reset their passwords. I would include the reset email, link and account page in testing, and plan a clear explanation for existing customers.

Payment credentials and subscriptions deserve their own investigation. I would confirm what the payment provider and chosen tools support before promising that repeat billing or saved payment methods will carry across.

Map the URLs before launch

Keeping your domain does not necessarily keep your product and category paths. I would gather the current URLs and agree their destinations while the new catalogue is being structured, including articles and useful landing pages.

Google's guidance on site moves recommends mapping old URLs to their new equivalents and using permanent server-side redirects. Sending every removed page to the homepage is not a substitute for that mapping.

The checks would cover redirects, internal links, canonical URLs, sitemaps and whether important pages can be indexed. Search visibility can fluctuate while a move is processed; I would not promise unchanged rankings. Record the baseline and monitor the important pages after launch so an unexpected problem has somewhere to start.

Test a complete order, not just the checkout screen

A payment confirmation is only one stage. I would trace a test order through the processes your business relies on and compare the results with the agreed requirements.

1. Add the relevant product and variation to the basket on mobile and desktop.
2. Check delivery choices, discounts and the displayed total for representative customer addresses.
3. Exercise successful and unsuccessful payment paths using the gateway's test environment.
4. Confirm the order, stock changes and customer emails are correct.
5. Follow the order into fulfilment, accounting or other connected systems.
6. Check cancellation and refund handling, including what happens to stock and external records.

Keep test activity away from live fulfilment and customer communications. The point is to demonstrate the whole workflow safely, including what staff do when an integration fails.

Agree how the final changeover will work

The first import becomes out of date while the existing store keeps trading. I would document how orders, customers and stock changes made during the build will be reconciled, who owns that process and when the final check happens.

The launch plan needs a clear trading window, the final data transfer, domain changes, payment configuration checks and someone responsible for reviewing the first orders. It should also explain what would trigger a pause and how any orders received on the new store would be handled if a rollback became necessary. Switching the domain back does not reconcile two sets of order records.

I would keep access to the old records until the business has verified what it needs for support and reporting. Closing the old platform should be a deliberate step after those checks.

What to send me for a useful migration conversation

Send your store URL, the reason you want to leave Shopify, an approximate product count and a list of the apps or integrations you depend on. Mention subscriptions, trade accounts, multiple stock locations or a deadline early. You do not need to send passwords or a customer export to start the conversation.

From there, I can help separate the migration essentials from optional redesign work and identify what needs a trial before a reliable scope is possible. That gives you a clearer decision about the move and a more useful basis for a quote.

Considering a move from Shopify to WooCommerce?Tell me what your current store cannot do and what needs to keep working. I will help you scope the migration, integrations and launch checks.
Plan your migration with Adam