Setting up subscriptions

After you set up subscriptions, your customers can make scheduled purchases in a repeating frequency. To review information about your subscriptions, you must be using a subscription app from the Shopify App Store. If you have a subscription app installed, then subscription information becomes available in the following areas of your Shopify admin:

Eligibility requirements

To use third-party subscription apps, your store must meet the following requirements:

Using subscriptions in the Shopify admin

Before you complete any of the set up steps in the Shopify admin, you need to complete the setup in the subscription app from the Shopify App Store you installed in your Shopify admin.

If you have completed the setup in your subscription app, then there are some steps to take in your Shopify admin to complete your subscriptions app setup.

Adding a subscription policy

If you have set up a subscription, then a new purchase options cancellation policy is added to your store. This policy is linked in the checkout footer as a subscription policy. If the policy in the Shopify admin settings is blank, then a generated template is displayed to customers. Add or edit your store policies to update the subscription policy that's displayed to your customers.

Subscription products

If you use a subscription app to offer subscription products, then you can view a product's subscription details on the product page in your Shopify admin.

If a product or any of its variants have a subscription applied to it, then its subscription details are shown in the Subscriptions section of the product page.

You can limit your subscription products to being sold only as a subscription, or you can enable both subscription and one-time purchases.

Steps:

  1. From your Shopify admin, click Products.
  2. Click the product that you want to manage the subscription of.
  3. Select whether to sell the product as a subscription only:
    • To sell the product as a subscription only, check Sell product as a subscription only.
    • To sell the product as one-time purchases as well as subscriptions, uncheck Sell product as a subscription only.

Subscription discounts

If you offer subscription products, then there are more options when creating fixed-amount, percentage, or free shipping discounts.

The Purchase type section appears on the Create discount code page. You can choose if a discount applies to subscription purchases, one-time purchases, or both.

Change a discount's purchase type

When you create a discount code you can choose to limit the use of your discount to specific purchase types. If you select Subscription in the Purchase type section of the Create discount code page, then you can choose to apply the discount to All subscription products, All subscription products in a specific collection, or Specific subscription products.

If you have an existing discount code that you want to update, then you can edit your discount code to include subscription-based rules.

Steps:

  1. From your Shopify admin, go to Discounts.

  2. Click the discount that you want to edit.

  3. In the Purchase type section, choose the purchase type that you would like to limit your discount code to:

    • If you select Subscription as the purchase type for your discount code, then you can choose which subscription products to apply your discount to. You can limit the use of your discount code to specific subscription products, or a specific collection.
    • If you choose to limit your discount to a specific subscription product, or collection, then search for your product or collection using Browse button that appears.

Change usage limits on Free shipping discount

If you offer a free shipping discount that applies to subscription products, then you can specify for how long the discount applies. You can choose to limit your free shipping discount to the first payment, to limit your free shipping to a certain number of payments, or to enable free shipping on all future subscription payments.

If you have an existing free shipping discount that you want to update, then you can edit your discount code to include subscription-based rules.

Steps:

  1. From your Shopify admin, go to Discounts.

  2. Click the free shipping discount you want to edit.

  3. Update the purchase type to Subscription in the Purchase type section of the discount editor.

  4. In the Usage limits section, select the limitations that you want to apply to your discount under Recurring payments for subscriptions.

Customer checkout experience

Subscription apps show subscription information to customers in the checkout. For example, when buying a subscription product, the order frequency is shown in the order summary.

During the Information step of the checkout and when pick up in store is enabled, your customer can choose the Pick up option to pick up the order from one of your locations.

During the Shipping step of the checkout, your customer is shown the shipping costs per delivery and the frequency of the subscription in the Shipping method section. If your customer is buying more than one subscription product, then the shipping cost, and frequency of their subscription is shown under each line item in the order.

During the Payment step of the checkout, your customer needs to confirm that they understand that they are purchasing a subscription. They can't complete their purchase without agreeing to this.

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