Sellers of Shopify are more like sellers on Amazon than they know. Shopify controls what you can sell, what apps you can use, so is it really software for your business or you’re just a cog in its machine to become the next Amazon. I’ve seen so many DTC brands switch to Medusa and Woocommerce with a custom storefront.
gpm [3 hidden]5 mins ago
> Shopify controls what you can sell
In what ways? I'm sure there are businesses they refuse to support (like any company) but I have a family member running a Shopify store (selling things that you couldn't over Amazon due to logistics) and Shopify
- Doesn't have any pre approval process for products. We can add and edit products instantaneously with no process involving anyone else.
- Has never appeared to care, even when "products" are things like "we agreed on a delivery method over the phone".
I'd also point out that the store owns the brand with Shopify. We could switch out the backend for a different ones and the users wouldn't really notice. You couldn't do the same with Amazon.
theturtletalks [3 hidden]5 mins ago
Try selling used Apple products which you can on any website or marketplace online, except Apple will contact Shopify and they will unpublish products without even telling you.
You used to be able to install custom Shopify apps on your own store, now they make you jump through hoops. Their ideal situation is an Apple like walled garden where you can only install apps from their store. Had a friend trying to vibecode a custom Shopify app so he could replace one from the App Store that was running him $250/m. It was so confusing that he just gave up. I’m trying to get him to switch to an open-source alternative.
Try selling Vape products or adult products and you’ll see you don’t really control the software. Selling used Apple products, vapes, and adult products is completely legal. Yes Stripe and PayPal can stop you from accepting payments for those products. But why is my business software doing the same?
bhouston [3 hidden]5 mins ago
Is there a long-term Shopify status graph? How common is this lately?
I ask because with the major AI push at Shopify lately, I would like to know if it is affecting stability.
npiasecki [3 hidden]5 mins ago
I don't like how Shopify deletes events from https://www.shopifystatus.com/ shortly after they are resolved. Outages have to be inferred by waking up to a bunch of alerts and hoping someone else posted about it on the internet.
nailer [3 hidden]5 mins ago
X has always been a better source of outages than any official status site. It's either early, before there's anything official posted, or it's something the vendor doesn't consider worthy of an outage because it only affects a particular subset of customers.
detritus [3 hidden]5 mins ago
It's been a fun day for me today - my bank here in the UK suffered downtime which not only affected the app and online banking, but also online and possibly offline payments too.
I was glad when it finally came back on, after four hours off, so that I could order some material for a job... only to find that my supplier's site wasn't working. It's on shopify.
So too the two the other suppliers I use who offer the same thing I need, so I'm kinda stuffed as ordering from anytime now means I likely won't get my stuff in before the weekend, which is when I was planning on working with it.
Wonderful.
mtoner23 [3 hidden]5 mins ago
just take the day off mate, this shit happens in every field of work
tgtweak [3 hidden]5 mins ago
Critically, it was the webhook/sync that was down which really messed with a lot of external systems (nosto, klaviyo, 3PLs...)
addedlovely [3 hidden]5 mins ago
Total outage by the looks of it, all clients stores not accessible, isn't local.
nilirl [3 hidden]5 mins ago
Oh, that's funny. Just an hour ago I decided I'd make a Shopify app and see if there was any money to be made there. Now this.
kab0b [3 hidden]5 mins ago
So this is your fault.
butterlesstoast [3 hidden]5 mins ago
I really like the Ruby on Rails ecosystem and have deeply considered working at Shopify.
This has to be one of the hardest parts of working there. A bug takes down other peoples businesses.
harrouet [3 hidden]5 mins ago
Massive incident at Shopify since Jun 03, 2026 - 09:27 EDT.
All my sites are affected, I guess this is general.
"Employees must explain why AI can’t be used before asking for additional resources, like more staff or time. [...] Shopify is now factoring AI usage into performance reviews and peer evaluations."
josefritzishere [3 hidden]5 mins ago
Is it premature to blame AI Slop?
marcosdumay [3 hidden]5 mins ago
Yes. We need statistics before that, not a single anecdote.
And even then we won't be able to tell if it's because of the AI or because they fired everybody that knows what they are doing.
lelanthran [3 hidden]5 mins ago
> Is it premature to blame AI Slop?
You will never know. Lots of pretty important people publicly laid down the law that AI must be used; any indication that it produces crap will be hidden.
rs_rs_rs_rs_rs [3 hidden]5 mins ago
Nah, they used to go down like this before AI too.
wmeredith [3 hidden]5 mins ago
If you're asking the question, most likely yes. If you have evidence of the problem being AI slop, no.
ClarityJones [3 hidden]5 mins ago
The scientific method is generally to ask a question, and test it, before randomly collected evidence makes the obvious undeniable.
warmwaffles [3 hidden]5 mins ago
And even if it _was_ related to AI, they would not admit it. First course of action is to blame user/programmer error and then QA process error. You shall not blame the golden calf. I am half serious and half not. But I do recommend reading the book "The Field Guide to Understanding 'Human Error'" in conjunction with my hyperbole.
chadgpt3 [3 hidden]5 mins ago
Remember: when AI succeeds, it's because AI is great. When AI fails, you're prompting it wrong.
HN.zip
In what ways? I'm sure there are businesses they refuse to support (like any company) but I have a family member running a Shopify store (selling things that you couldn't over Amazon due to logistics) and Shopify
- Doesn't have any pre approval process for products. We can add and edit products instantaneously with no process involving anyone else.
- Has never appeared to care, even when "products" are things like "we agreed on a delivery method over the phone".
I'd also point out that the store owns the brand with Shopify. We could switch out the backend for a different ones and the users wouldn't really notice. You couldn't do the same with Amazon.
You used to be able to install custom Shopify apps on your own store, now they make you jump through hoops. Their ideal situation is an Apple like walled garden where you can only install apps from their store. Had a friend trying to vibecode a custom Shopify app so he could replace one from the App Store that was running him $250/m. It was so confusing that he just gave up. I’m trying to get him to switch to an open-source alternative.
Try selling Vape products or adult products and you’ll see you don’t really control the software. Selling used Apple products, vapes, and adult products is completely legal. Yes Stripe and PayPal can stop you from accepting payments for those products. But why is my business software doing the same?
I ask because with the major AI push at Shopify lately, I would like to know if it is affecting stability.
I was glad when it finally came back on, after four hours off, so that I could order some material for a job... only to find that my supplier's site wasn't working. It's on shopify.
So too the two the other suppliers I use who offer the same thing I need, so I'm kinda stuffed as ordering from anytime now means I likely won't get my stuff in before the weekend, which is when I was planning on working with it.
Wonderful.
This has to be one of the hardest parts of working there. A bug takes down other peoples businesses.
All my sites are affected, I guess this is general.
https://x.com/tobi/status/2053121182044451016
Apparently not
have found Shopify's AI implementation to be sane and really useful ( building flows and surfacing documentation correctly ).
"Employees must explain why AI can’t be used before asking for additional resources, like more staff or time. [...] Shopify is now factoring AI usage into performance reviews and peer evaluations."
And even then we won't be able to tell if it's because of the AI or because they fired everybody that knows what they are doing.
You will never know. Lots of pretty important people publicly laid down the law that AI must be used; any indication that it produces crap will be hidden.