A Magento to Shopify migration moves your catalogue, customers, order history, integrations and search rankings from Magento or Adobe Commerce onto Shopify or Shopify Plus. It follows a clear sequence: audit what you have, map every piece of data and every URL, replace extensions with apps or custom work, rehearse the cutover, then monitor closely after launch. This checklist walks through each phase and the places where migrations most often go wrong.
Why brands are leaving Magento and Adobe Commerce
Most brands we speak to are not unhappy with what Magento can do. They are tired of what it costs to keep it running. A self-hosted Magento store needs hosting, security patching, version upgrades and developer time for routine changes. Every upgrade has to be tested against the theme and every extension.
Version support is a real deadline. Adobe's software lifecycle policy gives each Adobe Commerce release a fixed standard support window. At the time of writing (October 2026), Adobe lists the end of standard support for 2.4.6 as 11 August 2026, for 2.4.7 as 31 May 2027, for 2.4.8 as 31 May 2028 and for 2.4.9 as 31 May 2029. Staying on an unsupported version means no further security fixes from Adobe, so many teams treat the next forced upgrade as the moment to compare it with a re-platform.
Shopify takes hosting, checkout, security patching and platform upgrades away from your team. The trade-off is less control over the server and some fixed conventions, such as URL structure, which is why the planning below matters.
Phase 1: audit what you have
Before mapping anything, write down what the current store actually does. Magento stores accumulate years of customisation, and some of it is invisible until it breaks.
- Catalogue: product types (simple, configurable, bundle, grouped), attribute sets, number of SKUs and variants, and any products with more options than a typical Shopify product holds.
- Extensions: every installed module, what it does, and whether anyone still uses it.
- Integrations: ERP, OMS, 3PL, PIM, payment, tax, email marketing, reviews and loyalty.
- Store views: languages, currencies and regional stores, and how they map to Shopify Markets or separate stores.
- Traffic and rankings: export top landing pages, backlinks and search queries so you know which URLs matter most.
A structured ecommerce audit at this stage usually removes a surprising amount of scope, because some extensions and integrations turn out to be unused.
Phase 2: map products, customers and orders
Products
Magento's configurable products usually become Shopify products with variants. Attributes that drive filtering or display often become metafields. Bundles and grouped products need a decision: an app, a custom build, or a simpler structure. Map categories to collections, and decide which category assignments become manual collections and which become automated collections based on rules.
Customers
Customer records, addresses and marketing consent can be imported. Shopify's customer import guide asks you to set each consent column (email, SMS, WhatsApp) separately, based on that channel's history on your old platform. Treat consent mapping as a compliance task, not a formatting one.
Orders
Historical orders are useful for customer service and for customers viewing their order history. Decide how far back you need to go, which statuses you bring across, and how refunds and partial shipments should appear. Shopify's migration guide lists migration apps and the Order and Transaction APIs as the routes for historical orders; there is no standard CSV import for them.
Customer passwords: what Shopify supports
Passwords do not come across. Shopify states that you cannot migrate customer passwords from another store using a CSV, because they are encrypted outside Shopify. Customers need to set up access again.
How that feels to customers depends on which account type you use. With Shopify's new customer accounts, customers sign in by entering their email address and receiving a one-time six-digit code, so there is no password to reset. With legacy accounts, customers need an account invite to create a new password. Either way, plan a clear email to existing customers at launch so the change does not feel like a security problem.
Phase 3: replace extensions and connect integrations
Go through the extension list from your audit and give each one an outcome: native Shopify feature, Shopify app, custom app, or retire. Many Magento extensions exist to add things Shopify includes as standard, so the list usually shrinks.
Integrations need more care. An ERP, OMS or 3PL connection often relies on Magento-specific order states, SKU formats or custom fields. Confirm with each provider whether a Shopify connector exists, what it syncs (stock, orders, fulfilment, refunds) and how often. Then test the full order lifecycle: placed, paid, picked, shipped, part-refunded, returned.
Phase 4: map every URL and plan redirects
Shopify uses fixed paths: products live at /products/handle, categories become /collections/handle, CMS pages sit under /pages/ and blog posts under /blogs/blog-name/. Your Magento URLs will almost certainly look different, so every indexed URL needs a 301 redirect to its new equivalent.
The .html suffix
Magento lets you add a suffix such as .html to product and category URLs, as described in Adobe's catalogue URL documentation. Shopify handles do not use suffixes, so /silver-ring.html must redirect to /products/silver-ring. Magento can also include the category path in product URLs (it is off by default), so check whether your store exposes /rings/silver-ring.html as well as /silver-ring.html, because each version that Google has indexed needs its own redirect.
Layered navigation
Magento's layered navigation creates filtered URLs, usually with query strings such as ?color=blue. Shopify's URL redirect documentation warns that redirects for URLs with query strings might not work as expected. Rather than redirecting every filter combination, identify the filtered pages that genuinely earn traffic and decide whether each deserves its own collection. Leave the rest to resolve to the parent collection.
Bulk import
Redirects are managed under Content, then Menus, then View URL Redirects, and can be imported in bulk from a CSV. A redirect only works when the old URL no longer loads a page. At the time of writing (October 2026), Shopify's documentation gives a maximum of 100,000 redirects on standard plans and 20,000,000 on Shopify Plus.
Phase 5: design and build
A migration is a natural point to fix the things your customers complain about, but it also adds risk. Decide early whether you are rebuilding the current design on Shopify or redesigning. Keep page titles, headings and on-page copy for high-ranking pages broadly the same at launch, then test changes once rankings have settled. Our ecommerce website design work usually separates "must have at launch" from "improve after launch" for this reason.
Phase 6: testing and rehearsal
Run at least one full rehearsal of the data migration on a copy of live data. Compare product, customer and order counts, spot-check prices and variants, and place test orders through every payment method and shipping rule. Crawl the old site and test every redirect against the new store before launch. Check tax, discounts, gift cards and transactional emails.
Phase 7: the launch window
Pick a launch window based on your own order data, not a guess. The quietest hours vary by market and by audience. Freeze catalogue changes on Magento before the final data sync, run a delta import of new orders and customers, switch the domain, then re-test checkout and redirects on the live domain. Keep Magento available in read-only form for reference until you are confident nothing is missing.
Phase 8: post-launch monitoring
Watch Google Search Console for crawl errors and 404s, re-submit the sitemap, and compare rankings and organic traffic for your top pages against the pre-launch baseline. Monitor conversion rate, checkout errors, integration sync logs and customer service tickets daily for the first few weeks.
Magento to Shopify migration checklist
| Phase | Key tasks | Done when |
|---|---|---|
| Audit | List catalogue, extensions, integrations, store views, top URLs | Every item has an owner and an outcome |
| Data mapping | Products to variants and metafields, categories to collections, customers, consent, orders | Mapping signed off, test import matches counts |
| Extensions | Native, app, custom or retire for each | No extension left without a decision |
| Integrations | ERP, OMS, 3PL, payments, tax, email | Full order lifecycle tested end to end |
| URLs and redirects | Map .html URLs, category paths, valuable filter pages, CMS and blog | Every indexed URL tested against its redirect |
| Design | Rebuild or redesign, keep ranking content stable | Key templates approved on real data |
| Rehearsal | Full data run, test orders, redirect crawl | No open blocking issues |
| Launch | Freeze, delta sync, domain switch, live checks | Live orders flowing to all systems |
| Monitoring | Search Console, rankings, conversion, sync logs | Metrics stable against baseline |
What usually goes wrong
- Redirects built from a sitemap only. Sitemaps miss old URLs that still have backlinks. Use crawl data, analytics and Search Console exports too.
- Integrations tested on the happy path. Refunds, partial shipments and cancellations break more often than new orders.
- Variant limits discovered late. Products with many options need a structural decision before the import, not after.
- Customers surprised by the login change. A short, clear email avoids a wave of support tickets.
- Content changed at the same time as URLs. If rankings move, you cannot tell which change caused it.
How long does a Magento to Shopify migration take?
There is no honest single answer, because the timeline is driven by your store, not the platform. The biggest factors are the number of integrations, how custom your Magento build is, catalogue complexity, the number of store views and languages, whether you are redesigning, and how quickly decisions get made on your side. A scoping audit gives you a realistic plan based on your actual setup.
FAQs
Can I move from Adobe Commerce to Shopify Plus?
Yes. The process is the same as for Magento Open Source. Adobe Commerce stores often have more integrations and B2B features, so the audit and integration phases usually carry more weight.
Will my customers keep their passwords?
No. Shopify cannot import passwords. With new customer accounts, customers sign in with a one-time code sent to their email, so they do not need a new password.
Will I lose my Google rankings?
Some movement after any migration is normal. A complete redirect map, stable content at launch and close monitoring are what protect rankings.
Can I keep my order history?
Yes. Historical orders can be imported so customers and your service team can see them. Decide how many years you need before you start.
How Superior can help
We plan and run Magento and Adobe Commerce migrations to Shopify and Shopify Plus, including redirect mapping and 90 days of ranking monitoring after launch. If you would like a view on your own store, start with our Magento to Shopify migration page or ask for a free starter audit.