Mobile Apps for Shopify Stores
Shopify mobile app development that leaves your store alone. Shopify stays your backend, your admin and your source of truth, and we build the app in front of it: your brand, your products, and a catalogue that loads instantly because it is mirrored rather than fetched screen by screen. Most first releases go live in about 30 days.
- Price
- Fixed upfront
- Launch date
- In writing
- First release
- About 30 days
- You get
- Source code & docs
The Shopify mobile app builder alternative.
Your store is fine. Your app should not be slow. Most Shopify apps are either a website in a wrapper or a template rented by the month. Both feel like what they are. A custom app with a synced catalogue behind it opens in the time it takes a shopper to change their mind, and it is yours rather than somebody else's product with your logo on it.
It opens instantly
The catalogue is mirrored in a database beside the app, so screens do not wait on an API call.
Nothing moves
Shopify stays your backend. Your admin, your orders and the apps you already run are untouched.
Your brand, not a template
Designed for your store rather than chosen from a theme gallery every other merchant also uses.
No monthly rent
A builder charges every month forever. A build is paid once and the code is yours.
A Shopify app builder
- Cost
- A monthly fee, for as long as you use it
- Design
- Their templates, your logo
- Speed
- Depends on their stack
- Features
- What their roadmap offers
- The code
- Theirs
- If you stop paying
- The app stops
A custom app
- Cost
- Fixed, once, before we start
- Design
- Your brand, your screens
- Speed
- A synced catalogue, built for speed
- Features
- What your store needs
- The code
- Yours, with documentation
- If you stop paying
- Nothing happens
Four pieces, and one of them is why it feels fast.
Custom shopify app development is two apps, a sync layer and the console you send push from. Pick one to see what goes into it.
App 01 of 04
iOS and Android apps
The shopping app your customers install. Built native where the store needs it and hybrid where one codebase serves both, with the decision made on your requirements rather than on ours.
- Theme-matched native UIYour colours, type and product photography, laid out for a phone rather than squeezed from a web page.
- Browse and searchCollections, filters and search that answer instantly, because the data is already on the device's doorstep.
- Product pagesVariants, options, stock, images and metafields, exactly as they are set in your Shopify admin.
- Wishlists and recently viewedThe two features that bring somebody back to an app rather than a browser.
- Account and ordersShopify customer accounts, past orders and reordering, all against the same records as your web store.
- Works on a bad signalCached catalogue and graceful states, so a train journey is still a browsing session.
App 02 of 04
The sync layer
A secondary database that mirrors your Shopify catalogue and keeps itself current. The app reads from it instead of calling Shopify on every screen, which is the whole difference between an app that feels native and one that feels like a website.
- Catalogue and cart syncProducts, variants, collections, images and prices mirrored and kept current.
- Webhook drivenShopify tells the mirror when something changes, so an edit in your admin reaches the app in seconds.
- Stock stays honestInventory levels tracked against Shopify, so the app does not offer what is no longer there.
- Built to survive an outageIf Shopify's API is slow or rate limits, the app still browses rather than showing a spinner.
- Search that is actually fastIndexed beside the app instead of queried live, which is what makes filters feel immediate.
- One source of truthShopify remains it. The mirror is a copy for reading, never a second place where data is edited.
App 03 of 04
Checkout on Shopify
The cart is native and instant. Payment completes through Shopify's own checkout, which is both a rule worth respecting and the answer that keeps everything else working.
- Native cartAdding, changing and removing happens in the app with no page loads.
- Shopify checkoutPayment runs where your store's settings, taxes and fraud checks already live.
- Shop Pay and walletsApple Pay, Google Pay and Shop Pay behave as they do on the web, because it is the same checkout.
- Discount codesThe codes you already run, applied and honoured without a second system to configure.
- Orders land in your adminAn app order is a Shopify order. Your fulfilment, reporting and apps see it as normal.
- Subscriptions and apps keep workingWhatever you run on Shopify keeps running, because we did not replace any of it.
App 04 of 04
Push and merchandising
A console for the people who run the store, so campaigns and home screens do not need a developer or a release.
- Push notification campaignsSegment by what somebody browsed, bought or abandoned, scheduled or sent now.
- Abandoned cartA push costs nothing and reaches people email no longer does.
- Home screen merchandisingBanners, featured collections and the order of things, changed without an app update.
- Back in stock alertsTied to the inventory the sync layer is already watching.
- App-only offersA reason to install and a reason to keep it, priced with your existing discount codes.
- What it is doingInstalls, sessions, conversion and revenue from the app, separate from your web numbers.
How to turn a Shopify store into an app.
Six steps, and the first one is a conversation rather than a migration plan. Nothing about your store changes.
- 01
Us
We look at your store
Your catalogue, your theme, the apps you run and anything unusual in how you sell. Read-only, and no changes to anything.
- 02
Us
Scope, price and date
What the app does in its first release, at a fixed price with a launch date, free and yours to keep.
- 03
Both
Design to your brand
Your screens in your identity, tapped through as a prototype before any code is written.
- 04
Us
Sync first, then screens
The mirror is built and syncing before the app is written against it, which is why the app is quick from the first build you see.
- 05
Us
Both stores
Listings, screenshots, privacy disclosures and the review, for Apple and Google, included in the price.
- 06
Both
Live, and pushing
The app is out, your team sends its first campaign, and we watch the numbers with you.
What the app is built from.
Your costed plan names which of these are in the first release. The sync layer is never one to defer, because every other feature reads from it.
- Shopify API integrationProducts, collections, inventory, customers, orders, discounts, metafields and webhooks. We have worked across most of the surface rather than a corner of it.
- Catalogue and cart syncA secondary database mirroring your store, kept current by webhooks, so screens read locally instead of waiting on an API.
- Theme-matched native UIBuilt to your brand rather than picked from a gallery, and laid out for a phone rather than adapted from a web page.
- One-tap checkoutA native cart, then Shopify's own checkout with Apple Pay, Google Pay and Shop Pay behaving exactly as they do on the web.
- Push notification campaignsSegmented, scheduled and sent by your team from a console, with abandoned cart and back-in-stock built in.
- Wishlists and recently viewedThe reasons somebody opens an app instead of a browser, and two things most wrapper apps never add.
- Customer accountsThe same Shopify accounts, orders and addresses, so nobody has to register twice.
- Search and filtersIndexed alongside the app, which is what makes a filter feel immediate rather than considered.
- App store submissionListings, screenshots, privacy disclosures and the review for both stores, included in the price.
- Analytics for the appInstalls, sessions, conversion and revenue, reported separately from your web store so you can tell what the app is worth.
What an app is worth to a Shopify store.
An app earns through the people who already buy from you rather than through new ones, which is why it is usually the cheapest channel a store adds.
- Repeat customersAn icon on a home screen is a reminder every day. A bookmark is not.
- Push instead of emailDelivered and seen, at no cost per message, to people who chose to install.
- Faster browsing, fewer exitsA store that opens instantly loses fewer people between the first screen and the cart.
- App-only offersA discount that exists to make installing worth it, run on your existing codes.
- No rented softwareThe monthly fee a builder charges is money the app does not have to earn back.
- Wishlists that come backSaved items plus a back-in-stock push is the simplest repeat sale there is.
Example, three years
What a rented app costs over the life of a store
- App builder subscription, per month
- ~$250
- Year one
- $3,000
- Three years
- $9,000
- What you own at the end
- nothing
Plans vary and some start lower, so put your own quote into the same sum. The question is not which is cheaper this month, it is how long the rental takes to pass the build and what you hold when it does.
Who we build Shopify apps for.
Tell us what your store sells and how often people come back, and the first release is scoped around that.
Stores with repeat customers
Supplements, coffee, cosmetics, pet food. Anything somebody reorders without thinking.
Built to fit
- Reorder from past orders in two taps
- Back-in-stock and replenishment pushes
- Subscriptions surfaced rather than buried
Brands outgrowing an app builder
The template served its purpose and now the roadmap is somebody else's.
Built to fit
- Your brand rather than their theme
- The features you asked for and did not get
- A migration that keeps your installs and your customers
Large catalogues
Thousands of products, where browsing speed is the whole experience.
Built to fit
- A synced catalogue so filters answer instantly
- Search indexed beside the app
- Collections and merchandising your team controls
Stores that live on push
Drops, restocks and limited runs, where minutes matter.
Built to fit
- Segmented campaigns sent by your team, not by us
- Scheduled drops with a countdown
- Notifications that survive the platforms' rules
Multi-market merchants
Several currencies, languages or Shopify markets under one brand.
Built to fit
- Market-aware pricing and availability
- Language switching inside the app
- One app rather than one per country
Stores with an unusual model
Made to order, hire periods, bundles or anything a template does not anticipate.
Built to fit
- The awkward part built rather than worked around
- Metafields read properly instead of ignored
- Whatever your existing apps add, respected
A price and a date you can plan around.
- 01 · Before we start
Free costed plan
Tell us the idea. You get the scope, a fixed price and a launch date in writing, free, whether you go ahead or not.
- 02 · Week 1
Design and prototype
Your screens in your brand. You click through a working prototype before any code is written.
- 03 · Weeks 2 to 4
Build and test
Our team builds your app and tests every screen. A new build reaches your phone each week.
- 04 · From about day 30
Launch and support
We publish to the App Store and Google Play, then keep the apps fixed, current and running.
Most first releases go live in about 30 days. Larger apps take longer, and your costed plan fixes the scope and the exact date.
What goes live first, and what follows.
Your costed plan splits the build into releases with their own fixed prices and dates. The first one is a store your customers can browse and buy from.
About 30 days
First release
- Sync layer against your catalogue
- Browse, search, product pages, cart
- Shopify checkout and customer accounts
- Live on the App Store and Google Play
After launch
Second release
- Push campaigns and abandoned cart
- Wishlists and back-in-stock alerts
- Home screen merchandising your team controls
- App-only offers and segments
When you need it
As you grow
- More markets, currencies and languages
- Subscriptions and loyalty surfaced in the app
- Deeper personalisation from order history
- Performance work as the catalogue grows
We publish your apps. It is in the price.
Every build ends with your apps live on the App Store and Google Play. Submission is part of the job, never an extra: we prepare everything, handle the review and fix whatever the stores ask for.
Included in every build
- Store listings. Name, description, keywords, screenshots and preview images.
- Privacy and compliance. Privacy details, data forms and content ratings each store requires.
- Signed release builds. Built, signed and uploaded for iOS and Android.
- Review and approval. We answer the reviewers and resubmit if anything is flagged.
- Updates after launch. Every new version goes through the same process.
The one cost that is yours
Apple and Google charge for a developer account. It is opened in your company's name, so the apps and their listings always belong to you.
- Apple App StoreUS$99 a yearApple Developer Program
- Google PlayUS$25 onceGoogle Play Console
Store fees are set by Apple and Google and may change.
What it is built with.
Your costed plan names exactly what your app uses. The backend is Shopify, and stays Shopify.
The apps
- Flutter
- React Native
- Swift
- Kotlin
Shopify
- Storefront API
- Admin API
- Webhooks
- Metafields
- Shopify checkout
The sync layer
- Python
- PostgreSQL
- Redis
Around it
- Push notifications
- App Store
- Google Play
- Analytics
What sets the price.
There is no price list, because a hundred products and a hundred thousand are different builds. Your fixed price comes from the scope in your costed plan.
Get your fixed priceCatalogue size and shape
Variants, options and metafields matter more than the product count alone.
Native or hybrid
One codebase for both stores, or each built on its own.
Design depth
Theme-matched from your existing brand, or a design system built from scratch.
Which Shopify apps matter
Subscriptions, loyalty, reviews and bundles each need surfacing properly in the app.
Markets
One country or several, with the currencies and languages each expects.
Push and merchandising
A simple broadcast, or segments, schedules and campaign reporting.
We have built a lot of these.
Your app is designed and built new for your store. What carries over is knowing the Shopify API well enough to know where it is slow, where it rate limits and which webhooks are worth trusting, and knowing that the answer to all three is to stop calling it on every screen. That decision, made before anything is designed, is why these apps feel like apps. None of it is learned on your budget, which is why the scope, the price and the date can be fixed.
After launch, we stay.
Shopify ships API changes on a schedule and the phone platforms change their rules every year. Both are our problem rather than yours.
Shopify API versions
Shopify releases a new API version quarterly and retires old ones on a published timetable. We track that, move your app forward before anything is deprecated, and you never hear about it unless something in your store changes as a result.
Watching the sync
The mirror is the thing that must not drift. We watch webhook delivery, reconcile against Shopify on a schedule and alert on the gap rather than on uptime, because a catalogue that is quietly two days stale looks fine until somebody orders a discontinued product.
Store updates
Apple and Google change their rules every year. We test your app against each new version of iOS and Android, update what needs it and handle the resubmissions.
Fixes
You tell us once and we take it from there. Every issue is logged, fixed, tested and released. Anything touching cart or checkout goes ahead of everything else.
Peak trading
Your busy days are known in advance. We load test the sync layer before them and watch through them, because an app that stalls on the one weekend that matters undoes a quarter of work.
Handover
The app is yours and so is everything needed to run it. Your team gets the code, the store accounts, the deployment process and written documentation. Your Shopify store was never ours to hand back, which is rather the point.
What our clients say.
It was really great, they are there for me whenever I had a problem or to fix something. Thank you so much Ameer
GomezApr 2023I've been working with Appkodes for almost a year and i can recommend them to work with as they are so much friendly and professional and you can clearly see it once you start your project right away. They are intact and they are transparent with their communication.
JohnFeb 2023Asked before most builds.
Not here? The costed plan answers the rest, for your app.
Your idea stays yours. We can sign an NDA before you share the details, and you hear from us within 24 hours.
How much does Shopify mobile app development cost?
It depends on the size and shape of your catalogue, whether the apps are native or hybrid, how deep the design work goes and which of your existing Shopify apps need surfacing in the app. You get a fixed price in a free costed plan before any work starts, and it does not move unless you change the scope.
How do you turn a Shopify store into an app?
We read your store, build a database that mirrors your catalogue and keeps itself current from Shopify webhooks, then build the apps against that mirror. Browsing is fast because nothing waits on an API call. The cart is native, checkout runs on Shopify, and orders land in your admin as normal. Nothing about your store is migrated or changed.
Custom app or a Shopify app builder, which should we choose?
A builder is the right answer when you want an app this month, the template suits you and a monthly fee is easier than a project. It stops being the right answer when the template stops fitting your brand, when a feature you need is on somebody else's roadmap, or when the subscription has quietly passed what a build would have cost. A build is yours, is designed for your store, and does not stop working the month you stop paying.
Does anything about our Shopify store change?
No. Shopify stays your backend and your source of truth. Your admin, your theme, your existing apps, your fulfilment and your reporting all carry on exactly as they are. We read from Shopify and we do not write a second system that has to be kept in step by hand.
Why is the app faster than a wrapper?
Because it is not asking Shopify for the same catalogue over and over. A wrapper loads web pages and most builder apps call the API on every screen, so each tap is a network round trip. We mirror the catalogue into a database beside the app and keep it current with webhooks, so a filter or a collection opens from data that is already there.
How does checkout work?
The cart is native and instant, and payment completes through Shopify's own checkout. That keeps Shop Pay, Apple Pay, Google Pay, your discount codes, your taxes and your fraud settings behaving exactly as they do on the web, and it means an app order is a Shopify order in your admin like any other.
Do our other Shopify apps keep working?
The ones that work at the store level do, because we have not replaced anything. Subscriptions, loyalty, reviews and bundles usually need surfacing deliberately in the app rather than appearing on their own, so tell us which ones matter at the scoping session and they go in the scope.
Native or hybrid?
Hybrid for most stores, because one codebase serves both platforms and a shopping app rarely needs anything the platforms treat differently. Native earns its extra weeks when the app leans on the camera, on background work or on platform features that behave differently. We tell you which yours is before you pay for either.
Who owns the app?
You do. The code is handed over with documentation, and the App Store and Google Play accounts are in your company's name. Your Shopify store was always yours, and this page exists partly because that should stay true of the app as well.
Your first release could be live
next month.
Tell us about the app you want to build. We send back a costed plan with a fixed price and a launch date, free and yours to keep.
