Shopify pre-orders built to scale. Charged and fulfilled when you say so.
Oli, one of the co-founders of PreProduct, recently sat down with Jake from Startup Stacked to talk about building PreProduct, what merchants often get wrong about pre-orders, and what we’ve learned from helping ecommerce brands manage them at scale.
They also cover charging customers later, fulfilment, the operational side of pre-orders, and where the category is heading.
Read the full interview on Startup Stacked →
Pre-sell With PreProduct
7 day free trial with all plansMigrate pre-orders
This free Shopify sold out checker lists every variant in your store that’s sold out and not already on pre-order, with its image, SKU and a link to it. Add your email and the report lands in your inbox every Thursday, starting with what sold out since last week. Rather keep selling them? PreProduct can turn them into pre-orders.
Running a check takes seconds, but remembering to run it every week is the hard part. Add your email under the results and the report comes to you every Thursday at 6am US Central. From the second week on, each email opens with what changed since the last one:
The full list follows underneath. If nothing is sold out, you get a short “all in stock this week” email instead. You can follow up to five stores from one email address, and every email has a one-click unsubscribe link.
Shopify’s product list adds every variant’s stock into one total, like “40 in stock for 12 variants”, so it doesn’t tell you which ones have run out. A shirt can show 40 in stock while the medium in black has been at zero for three weeks. Every visitor who lands on that variant sees a sold-out button and leaves.
The checker reads your whole catalogue and pulls out just the variants customers can’t buy right now, so you get every gap in one list instead of opening products one by one.
A sold-out list is most useful when it changes what customers see on those pages. The variants that have been out the longest, or that keep selling out, are the ones to act on first.
Start taking pre-orders with PreProduct
Every Shopify store publishes a public feed of its products and variants, including whether each variant can be bought right now. The checker reads that feed page by page and keeps the variants marked as unavailable. It doesn’t need a login, an app install or access to your Shopify admin.
Yes. The product feed is public on every Shopify store, so you can check any Shopify store by entering its web address. It’s a quick way to see which of a competitor’s products or sizes have sold out.
A variant only counts as sold out when customers can’t buy it. If a variant has “continue selling when out of stock” turned on, or Shopify isn’t tracking its inventory, it can still be bought, so it won’t appear. That includes variants already running as pre-orders, because PreProduct uses that same setting to keep them on sale. The continue selling when out of stock guide explains how the setting works.
The checker only works with Shopify stores. If the web address belongs to another platform, has a typo, or the store’s product feed is blocked, you’ll see a “we couldn’t read this store” message. Try your store’s .myshopify.com address if your custom domain doesn’t work.
A check on this page shows results up to an hour old, so repeat checks don’t slow your store down. The email report is built fresh every Thursday at 6am US Central and compared with the week before.
Yes. One email address can follow up to five stores. Enter each store on this page and sign up with the same email.
Click the unsubscribe link at the bottom of any report. That deletes your email and every store you follow straight away. You can also enter your email on the opt-out page. Nothing is sent until you confirm your signup from the first email.
Yes. The checker and the weekly email are both free, with no account needed. They’re built by PreProduct, The Pre-order Specialists: Shopify pre-orders built to scale, charged and fulfilled when you say so.
Products that keep selling out have proven demand you’re turning away. Switching them to pre-orders lets customers keep buying while you restock, and PreProduct can charge them upfront, at dispatch or with a deposit. You can install PreProduct and list your first pre-order in a few minutes.
Pre-sell With PreProduct
7 day free trial with all plansMigrate pre-orders
Contents
Guest post from Akinwale Ojo of Zipchat.ai
Pre-order brands win on three things: speed, trust, and AOV. This list pairs the best Shopify apps for each piece, from deposit-taking checkout to AI support that runs while customers wait.
PreProduct is our top pick for the pre-order checkout layer. Zipchat is our top pick for AI chat. Stack the two, and the launch holds together from order to ship.
Pre-order is its own model. The cash lands weeks or months before the goods do, and the support load lives in that gap.
We picked apps that hold up across the three jobs in the title: AOV, support, and launch speed. Each one had to install on Shopify in under an hour, work with deferred billing or a delayed ship date, and earn its slot from public Shopify App Store or G2 reviews. We scored on fit for pre-order workflows first, then price, then how well the app plays with the rest of a Shopify stack.
| # | App | Best for | Starting price | Rating | Why it earns the slot |
| 1 | PreProduct | Pre-order checkout + deposits | $59.99/month | 4.9/5 | Native Shopify checkout, deposit logic, deferred billing |
| 2 | Zipchat | AI customer support 24/7 | $49/month | 4.9/5 | Handles the “when will it ship?” wave on autopilot |
| 3 | Back in Stock by Swym | Waitlists + restock alerts | $19.99/month | 4.7/5 | Captures demand before the next drop |
| 4 | Klaviyo | Email + SMS for launches | Custom-based pricing | 4.7/5 | Deepest segmentation for pre-order lifecycles |
| 5 | AfterShip | Tracking + delay comms | $29/month | 4.5/5 | Cuts “where is my order” tickets in half |
| 6 | Growave | Loyalty + retention | $15/month | 4.8/5 | Rewards and VIP early access keep pre-order buyers coming back |
| 7 | ReConvert | Post-purchase upsells | $19.99/month | 4.6/5 | Lifts AOV on the thank-you page |
| 8 | Loop Returns | Returns + exchanges | $155/month | 4.7/5 | Exchanges keep revenue when pre-orders arrive late |
| 9 | Judge.me | Reviews + social proof | $15/month | 5.0/5 | Reviews soften the wait for new buyers |
| 10 | Kark Multi Location Inventory | Multi-location stock | $6.99/month | 5.0/5 | One stock record per location, ready for the drop |
PreProduct is a Shopify-native pre-order app. It lets you take a deposit, charge in full at order, or hold the card and bill later. The whole flow stays inside Shopify checkout, so the buyer never sees a third-party page. Pre-order lines are held back from fulfillment until stock lands, so only what’s ready is released to ship.
Pre-order brands use it to protect cash flow when stock lands six or twelve weeks out. A 20% deposit holds the order, and the rest is charged when the goods are ready.
Key features
Pricing: Free Starter plan available (5% of paid pre-order revenue); paid plans from $59.99/month.
Rating: 4.9/5.
Pros
Cons
Best for: Brands running pre-orders at scale, from a seasonal launch or sold-out hero product to thousands of SKUs alongside in-stock items. Also deposit-led and made-to-order operations.
Zipchat is an AI sales and support agent built for Shopify. It reads your live catalog, order data, and policies, then answers shopper questions on a Shopify store, website, WhatsApp, Instagram, Messenger, and email.
Pre-order brands feel the support load most in the gap between order and ship. The same five questions repeat for weeks: when will it ship, can I change the size, will I be charged now, and can I cancel. Zipchat answers all five without a human.
When a customer asks for a different size that is sold out, the out-of-stock assistant recommends an alternative instead of dropping the conversation. When the buyer wants to cross-sell into a bundle, AI product recommendations handle it inside the chat.
Key features
Pricing: Starts at $49/month with a free trial.
Rating: 4.9/5.
Pros
Cons
Best for: Pre-order brands with global buyers, long shipping windows, and a small support team that cannot run 24/7.
Back in Stock by Swym lets shoppers sign up for a stock alert when an out-of-stock product returns. For pre-order brands, this is the demand-capture layer that sits next to the pre-order toggle.
The app sends restock alerts by email or SMS, integrates with Klaviyo, and feeds intent data into your next drop forecast.
Key features
Pricing: Starts at $19.99/month.
Rating: 4.7/5.
Pros
Cons
Best for: Pre-order brands that drop in waves and want a hard signal on what to order next.
Klaviyo is the marketing engine most pre-order brands run on. Email, SMS, and reviews from a single contact record. The reason it works for pre-order is segmentation. You can split buyers by ship window, by deposit status, or by which drop they signed up for.
A clean pre-order flow keeps the buyer warm for the eight weeks between order and delivery, which is when most refund requests happen.
Key features
Pricing: Free plan available; custom-based pricing.
Rating: 4.7/5.
Pros
Cons
Best for: Brands that build hype before the drop and need to nurture buyers through a long ship window.
AfterShip turns the post-purchase wait into a branded experience. It pulls tracking data from 1,100+ carriers and gives buyers a page they can check without emailing support.
For pre-order, the magic is the delay comms. When a drop slips by a week, AfterShip can push a branded update by email and SMS so the buyer hears it from you first.
Key features
Pricing: Starts at $29/month.
Rating: 4.5/5.
Pros
Cons
Best for: Pre-order brands shipping internationally where carrier delays are normal and proactive comms protect trust.
Growave is an all-in-one retention platform for Shopify. It rolls loyalty points, VIP tiers, referrals, reviews, and wishlists into one app, so you are not stitching four tools together to keep customers coming back.
For pre-order brands, loyalty is how you turn a one-off deposit into a repeat buyer. Reward points for placing a pre-order, give VIP tiers early access to the next drop, and let wishlists capture who wants the product before it is live. The wait becomes part of the relationship instead of a reason to churn.
Key features
Pricing: Free plan available (up to 200 orders/month); paid plans start from $15/month.
Rating: 4.8/5.
Pros
Cons
Best for: Brands that want to turn pre-order buyers into repeat customers and reward the community that backs each launch.
ReConvert sits on the Shopify thank-you page and turns it into a second revenue moment. Buyers who already gave you a card are far more likely to add a low-friction item.
For pre-order, the play is to bundle a fast-shipping accessory with the long-lead-time main product. The accessory ships in three days. The buyer feels progress while they wait for the drop.
Key features
Pricing: Starts at $19.99/month.
Rating: 4.6/5.
Pros
Cons
Best for: Pre-order brands that have a small range of in-stock add-ons (stickers, cleaning kits, accessories) to attach to the main drop.
Loop Returns is built around one idea: keep the revenue. Instead of pushing every return into a refund, the portal steers shoppers toward an exchange or a credit.
That matters for pre-order. When a drop ships late or the fit is wrong, Loop holds the dollars inside your store. A 30% exchange rate on returns is the difference between a refund line and a fresh order.
Key features
Pricing: Starts at $155/month.
Rating: 4.7/5.
Pros
Cons
Best for: Pre-order brands at scale where one in five orders comes back and the exchange rate moves the P&L.
Judge.me is the most-installed review app on Shopify for a reason. It is fast, it is cheap, and it ships every feature most brands need on day one.
For pre-order, reviews from a past drop hold the next launch together. A shopper deciding to wait twelve weeks needs proof that the last batch arrived in good shape.
Key features
Pricing: Free plan available; paid plans start from $15/month.
Rating: 5.0/5.
Pros
Cons
Best for: New and growing pre-order brands that need social proof on the cheap before the next drop.
Kark Multi Location Inventory is built for Shopify brands with stock spread across several warehouses or stores. It holds one record per SKU per location, in real time, and feeds the storefront the right number on every product page.
For pre-order, the value lands on drop day. When the inventory hits the dock, Kark routes it to the right region, and the chat layer (Zipchat reads from this same feed) tells global buyers exactly what is shipping from where.
Key features
Pricing: Starts at $6.99/month.
Rating: 5.0/5.
Pros
Cons
Best for: Pre-order brands with two or more fulfillment locations and global buyers who ask, “Is it shipping from my country?”
You do not need all ten apps on day one. Most brands grow into the stack over two or three quarters.
A simple rule works here.
| Stage | Annual revenue | Apps to install first |
| Launching | Under $500k | PreProduct, Zipchat, Back in Stock, Klaviyo |
| Scaling | $500k to $5M | Add AfterShip, ReConvert, Judge.me, Growave |
| Mature | $5M+ | Add Loop Returns, Kark |
Three filters help when you pick between two apps in the same slot.
Filter 1: Does it cover the pre-order wait? A tool that ignores the four-to-twelve-week ship gap will not earn its slot on a pre-order brand. Test by asking the vendor how the app handles a delayed ship date.
Filter 2: Does it work with Shopify checkout? Apps that pull buyers off the native checkout cost conversion. Push hard on this.
Filter 3: Can it run while you sleep? Pre-order brands sell globally. AI chat, branded tracking, and waitlist alerts have to run on their own.
The stack is not magic. Three patterns kill the ROI even when every app is installed.
The stack is bigger than the team. Five apps with five dashboards and no owner is a recipe for ignored alerts. Pick one operator to own the stack and review it weekly.
The data is not joined up. If Klaviyo, Zipchat, and AfterShip pull from different order records, the buyer gets three answers to the same question. Run one source of truth (Shopify) and let the apps read from it.
The ship date keeps slipping. No app fixes a broken supply chain. If the drop date moves three times, the trust loss is bigger than any tool can recover. Be honest in the comms, refund fast when you have to, and rebuild on the next launch.
A working threshold for a pre-order stack: ticket volume under five percent of orders, refund rate under three percent of pre-orders, and at least one in three returns turned into an exchange.
The cleanest pre-order opener is two apps: PreProduct for the checkout and Zipchat for the support layer. PreProduct holds the deposit and the ship window. Zipchat answers every “when will it land” question that the wait produces. Together, the buyer feels held from order to delivery.
Add the rest as orders grow. The stack pays back when the launch lands clean and the ship window stays quiet.
Try Zipchat free or book a demo.
PreProduct is our top pick for the pre-order checkout layer. It handles charge-upfront, charge-later and deposit pre-orders inside Shopify’s native checkout, then holds pre-order lines from fulfillment until stock lands. Pair it with Zipchat for support, Klaviyo for email and SMS, and AfterShip for shipping comms.
Shopify’s native pre-order options are basic. They mark a product as “pre-order” but do not handle deposits, deferred billing, or pre-order-specific email flows. For anything beyond a one-off campaign, a dedicated app pays back fast.
Two moves help most. First, install an AI chat like Zipchat that reads your live catalog and order data, so it can answer “when will it ship” without escalating. Second, install AfterShip to give buyers a branded tracking page and proactive delay alerts.
Yes, when the AI reads the live order and catalog data. Zipchat handles the WISMO wave that follows every pre-order launch, answers in 95+ languages, and recommends alternatives when a size sells out. Read more in our guide to the best AI chatbot for Shopify.
Akinwale Ojo
Content Strategist @Zipchat.ai
Akinwale Ojo is a Content Strategist with over six years of experience in SEO and technical content writing. He helps B2B, B2C, and SaaS companies grow through data-driven content strategies, turning complex product insights into search-optimized articles that improve organic visibility, support lead generation, and strengthen brand positioning.
Pre-sell With PreProduct
7 day free trial with all plansMigrate pre-orders
Contents
A pre-order is just an order placed before stock has landed in your warehouse. So yes, a pre-order can absolutely sell out, the moment a merchant runs out of the supply they’ve allocated to that campaign.
If you’re a shopper wondering why a pre-order page suddenly says sold out, this is by design, not a glitch. If you’re a merchant trying to figure out how to cap pre-orders without overselling, this guide walks through the formula, the variant-level controls and the per-customer limits that keep your pre-order campaign in your control.
For the full setup walkthrough, see our complete guide on how to do pre-orders on Shopify.
Pre-orders are inventory-aware. Each listing draws down against an allocation set by the merchant, usually tied to an incoming purchase order, a production run or a deposit cap. When that allocation is gone, the buy button disappears or switches to a waitlist state. From a customer’s perspective, it reads as “sold out” because functionally it is.
Major retailers handle this the same way. Target’s own help centre notes that “when an item is available for preorder, there is a limited quantity of Preorder inventory available”, and once the limit is met, no additional pre-orders can be placed (see Target’s pre-order help page). It’s standard practice, not a quirk of small brands.
The simplest framing: a pre-order is a merchant making a promise to deliver. If you can only realistically deliver 150 units, you shouldn’t be taking 300 pre-orders. Caps protect the brand from refunds, chargebacks and the worst kind of customer service emails.
According to Wikipedia, pre-orders exist so manufacturers can gauge demand and sellers can be assured of minimum sales. The cap is what keeps that gauge accurate.
There’s no single reason to set a pre-order limit, but four come up over and over.
If you’re managing pre-orders against incoming purchase orders or an ERP, the cap is usually the single most important number to get right. We’ve covered the operational side of that in our guide on managing pre-orders on your ERP.
The cap shouldn’t be the raw PO quantity. There are two buffers worth subtracting before you set the public-facing limit.
The formula:
Maximum pre-orders = PO quantity − defect/buffer stock − expected cancellations
The defect buffer covers units that arrive damaged, fail QA or get held back as warranty stock. 10 to 15% is a reasonable starting point depending on your supplier reliability.
The cancellation buffer covers customers who change their mind before fulfilment. Across the 1 million pre-orders dataset, the average cancellation rate sits at 5.4%, with 2025 Q1 trending lower at 2.8%. If you’re charging a deposit or charging upfront, expect the lower end. If you’re using charge-later, expect closer to the average.
You have an incoming purchase order for 150 units.
So your safe pre-order cap is roughly 120 units. You could comfortably push to 130 if you’re using a deposit or charge-upfront model, since those tend to commit customers more strongly. Push past 150 and you’re betting on every single unit arriving in perfect condition and zero customers cancelling. Not a bet worth making.
Product-level caps aren’t always enough. Demand rarely splits evenly across sizes, colours or configurations. If you’re allocating 120 units across five sizes, you don’t want one popular size selling 80 pre-orders while two others sell three each, then having to refund the oversold size when stock lands.
Variant-level allocation matters. The practical approach:
Once a variant hits its cap, the pre-order button should automatically delist for that variant only, leaving the rest of the listing live. Native Shopify settings can stop a product from selling at zero stock, but they can’t manage allocations the way a pre-order tool can. For the bigger picture on inventory operations, see our guide on how to manage pre-order inventory in Shopify.
Inventory caps stop your campaign from overselling. Per-customer limits stop one buyer from wiping out the campaign. They’re different tools for different problems.
Common scenarios where per-customer caps make sense:
Shopify has a native quantity-per-order field at the product level, but it’s blunt and doesn’t enforce across separate orders. For pre-orders specifically, the app layer is where the real enforcement happens. PreProduct lets you set per-customer caps that hold across multiple sessions, so one buyer can’t make three separate orders to grab nine units of a one-per-customer drop.
How you communicate the cap matters too. Make the limit visible on the product page so customers don’t feel ambushed at checkout. Our breakdown of pre-order button design best practices covers where to surface details like this without breaking the page layout.
The worst pre-order experience: a customer adds an item to cart, checks out, gets a confirmation email, and a week later receives a refund saying the product is no longer available. That’s not a cap, that’s a broken cap.
Three behaviours need to fire the moment a cap is reached.
Carting policy matters here too. 62.1% of stores in the 1 million pre-orders dataset isolate pre-orders to their own cart, partly because it makes overselling easier to control. Mixed carts work, but the inventory logic has to be tighter.
Selling out is a good problem. Handle it badly and you waste demand. Handle it well and you set up the next campaign with stronger signal.
A clean post-sellout flow:
For the distinction between pre-orders, backorders and waitlists in this context, our pre-orders vs backorders vs waitlists comparison breaks down when each tool earns its place.
No. A pre-order means the product hasn’t shipped yet, usually because stock hasn’t landed. Pre-orders only show as sold out when the merchant’s cap has been reached. The two states are different: pre-order is an active sales channel, sold out is the end of one.
Pre-orders are a commitment from both sides. The customer commits to buy, the merchant commits to deliver against the timeline shared at checkout. If a merchant can’t deliver, the standard remedy is a full refund. That’s why setting the cap correctly matters: a missed pre-order delivery is more damaging than a smaller, sold-out campaign.
Shopify’s native inventory settings can stop a product from selling at zero stock, but they don’t handle pre-order-specific caps, variant-level allocation or per-customer limits. A dedicated pre-order app handles all three. With PreProduct, you set the cap, the variant allocation and the per-customer rules at listing creation, then the app enforces the rest automatically.
Yes, and you usually should. Allocating one product-level cap to a multi-variant listing almost always means some variants oversell and others underperform. Variant-level limits keep the allocation honest and let you reallocate mid-campaign if demand skews.
Use per-customer purchase caps. These are different from inventory caps. They limit how many units a single customer can pre-order across one or more orders. For limited drops, founders editions or any campaign where fair distribution matters, this is the lever to use.
Pre-orders can sell out, and that’s a feature of running pre-orders properly, not a bug.
The recap:
If you’re setting up pre-orders on Shopify and want variant-level caps, per-customer limits and automatic state changes when a cap is reached, PreProduct handles all of that natively, so you can run pre-orders at scale alongside in-stock products without overselling. Start a free trial and set your first pre-order cap in minutes.
Pre-sell With PreProduct
7 day free trial with all plansMigrate pre-orders
Contents
Understanding backorder vs out of stock is essential for any ecommerce merchant facing inventory gaps. Stockouts cost retailers $1.2 trillion globally every year in direct lost sales alone. When customers land on a product page and can’t buy what they want, the consequences ripple through your revenue, customer loyalty and brand perception.
But there’s more than one way to handle out of stock ecommerce situations. You can mark products as “out of stock” and block purchases entirely. You can accept backorders and let customers buy now for later delivery. Or you can take a third approach that some merchants overlook: pre-orders.
Understanding the difference between backorder vs out of stock (and knowing when each makes sense) can mean the difference between capturing revenue and losing customers to competitors. By the end of this guide, you’ll know exactly which approach fits your situation.
So what does backorder mean exactly? A backorder happens when a product is temporarily unavailable but customers can still purchase it. The backorder meaning is simple: the item isn’t in your warehouse right now, but you’ve confirmed that more inventory is coming. Customers place their order, you take payment (or vault their card), and you ship once stock arrives.
Think of backorders as a promise: “We don’t have it today, but we will soon, and we’re holding your spot.”
The key characteristics of a backorder:
Backorders usually work best for short restocking windows. On average, it takes 14-21 days to fulfill a backorder, though this varies by product and supply chain. The shorter the window, the more willing customers are to wait.
From an operational perspective, backorders let you continue taking orders rather than turning customers away. But they also create fulfillment complexity. You need systems to track incoming inventory, manage customer expectations, and process payments at the right time.
When a product is marked “out of stock,” customers cannot purchase it at all. The buy button is disabled, replaced with a “Sold Out” badge, or the product may be hidden from your store entirely.
An out-of-stock status signals uncertainty. Unlike backorders, there’s no guarantee the product will return, and no commitment to a timeline. Customers have to wait and hope, or look elsewhere.
The key characteristics of out of stock:
Out of stock is the default setting for most ecommerce platforms when inventory hits zero. It’s the safest approach from a fulfillment standpoint because you’re not making promises you can’t keep. But it’s also the most expensive from a revenue standpoint.
When customers encounter out-of-stock products, 69% abandon their purchase entirely and shop elsewhere. And 43% will go directly to a competitor. Every “Sold Out” badge is a potential lost customer.
The fundamental difference comes down to purchase availability and customer commitment. Here’s how they compare:
| Factor | Backorder | Out of Stock |
|---|---|---|
| Can customers purchase? | Yes, with delayed fulfillment | No, purchase blocked |
| Restocking timeline | Confirmed or estimated | Unknown or indefinite |
| Payment timing | Upfront or deferred | None |
| Customer expectation | “My order is coming soon” | “Maybe it will come back” |
| Revenue impact | Preserved (delayed) | Lost |
| Operational complexity | Higher | Lower |
From a customer psychology perspective, the difference is significant. A backorder customer has made a commitment. They’ve decided to buy, entered their payment details and are waiting for delivery. An out-of-stock customer hasn’t committed to anything. They’re still in consideration mode and can easily be distracted by a competitor.
This psychological difference matters for your business. Customers who have already committed are less likely to cancel or shop around. But backorder customers also have higher expectations. They expect clear communication, accurate timelines and a smooth delivery experience.
Backorders work best in specific scenarios where you have confidence in your restocking timeline and customers are willing to wait.
Fast-moving bestsellers
When a popular product sells out faster than expected, backorders let you continue capturing demand. If you have a reliable supplier and predictable restocking timeline, accepting backorders keeps sales flowing while you wait for the next shipment.
Core catalog items
For products that are a permanent part of your catalog, backorders make sense during temporary stockouts. These are items you’ll definitely restock, and customers know they’re getting a product that’s proven and available.
Short restocking windows
Backorders work best when the wait time is measured in days or weeks, not months. The sweet spot is typically 2-6 weeks. Beyond that, customer patience wears thin and cancellation risk increases.
Reliable supplier relationships
Only offer backorders when you’re confident in your restocking timeline. If your supply chain is unpredictable, making promises you can’t keep will damage customer trust more than simply saying “out of stock.”
When NOT to use backorders:
The risk with backorders is overpromising. If you tell customers their order will ship in two weeks and it takes six, you’ve created a support headache and potentially lost their trust for future purchases.
Sometimes the safest approach is to be upfront: this product isn’t available, and you can’t make promises about when it will return.
Discontinued products
If you’re not bringing a product back, don’t pretend otherwise. Mark it out of stock (or redirect to an alternative) and move on. Accepting backorders for discontinued items is a recipe for refunds and complaints.
Uncertain restocking timelines
When you really don’t know when inventory will arrive, it’s better to be honest. Telling customers “out of stock” is more trustworthy than making up a timeline you can’t guarantee.
Supply chain disruptions
Major supply chain issues can make restocking timelines impossible to predict. During periods of uncertainty, marking products out of stock protects both customer expectations and your operations team.
Quality or compliance issues
If a product is unavailable due to quality concerns or regulatory issues, you need to resolve those before selling again. Out of stock is the appropriate status while you work through the problem.
The downside of out of stock is lost revenue. But the upside is operational simplicity and honest customer communication. Sometimes it’s better to lose a sale today than damage trust with a broken promise.
For Shopify merchants dealing with stockouts, we’ve written a comprehensive guide on what to do when products are out of stock on Shopify, covering strategies from hiding products to setting up notifications. Understanding Shopify backorder functionality is crucial for maintaining sales during inventory gaps.
Here’s where most backorder vs out of stock discussions fall short. They treat these as the only two options when there’s a third approach that often works better for ecommerce: pre-orders.
Understanding preorder vs backorder differences is crucial for choosing the right strategy. Pre-orders are different from backorders in a few important ways:
The data backs this up. According to our analysis of over one million pre-orders generating $85M+ in revenue, the most common pre-order shipping timeframe is 121-150 days. That’s 4-5 months. Customers don’t just tolerate these wait times, they expect them.
The average pre-order cancellation rate? Just 5.4%. Despite wait times that would be unacceptable for a backorder, pre-order customers stay committed because they’ve made a conscious choice to wait for something they want.
Another insight: 90.4% of pre-orders carry no discount. Customers aren’t waiting because they got a deal. They’re waiting because they want early access to the product. This is fundamentally different psychology than a backorder, where customers often feel they’re being inconvenienced.
When pre-orders work better than backorders:
Pre-orders also give you payment flexibility that backorders typically don’t. With charge-later pre-orders, you can vault a customer’s card at checkout and charge when you’re ready to ship. This reduces refund risk for longer timelines while still capturing customer commitment.
For a deeper comparison, see our guide on pre-orders vs backorders vs waitlists.
With three options available, how do you decide which approach fits your situation? Here’s a decision framework based on the most common backorder vs out of stock scenarios:
| Scenario | Best Approach | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Known restock date (2-4 weeks) | Backorder | Short wait, high confidence, keep sales flowing |
| Known restock date (4-12 weeks) | Pre-order with charge-later | Longer wait needs proper expectation-setting |
| Unknown restock timeline | Back-in-stock notification | Don’t make promises you can’t keep |
| New product launch | Pre-order | Build anticipation, capture early demand |
| Seasonal product (returning later) | Pre-order or notification | Depends on how far out the restock is |
| Product being discontinued | Out of stock + redirect | Don’t accept orders you can’t fulfill |
| Made-to-order items | Pre-order with deposit | Collect commitment before production |
| High-ticket items | Pre-order with deposit | Reduce risk for both parties |
The key questions to ask:
Regardless of which approach you choose, clear communication is essential. Customers can handle waiting. What they can’t handle is uncertainty. Here are best practices for managing backorder vs out of stock situations in your store.
Set expectations on the product page
Don’t bury the shipping timeline in fine print. If an item is on backorder or pre-order, make the expected delivery date prominent. “Ships in 2-3 weeks” or “Expected ship date: April 15” gives customers the information they need to decide.
Use dedicated buttons and messaging
A generic “Add to Cart” button doesn’t tell customers they’re committing to a delayed order. Use clear labels like “Pre-order Now” or “Backorder” to signal that this isn’t a standard purchase.
Send automated updates
Keep customers informed throughout the wait. A simple “Your order is still on track to ship next week” email can prevent support tickets and build trust. If timelines change, communicate proactively.
Consider payment timing carefully
For short backorders, charging upfront is usually fine. For longer waits (especially 30+ days), consider charge-later options where you vault the customer’s card and charge closer to shipment. This reduces refund requests and expired card issues.
Our data shows that 43.8% of pre-order listings use charge-later, which suggests merchants are finding value in delaying payment for longer lead times.
Forecast demand to prevent stockouts
The best backorder strategy is avoiding backorders in the first place. Use inventory forecasting tools and pre-order inventory management to predict demand and set reorder points that give you buffer before running out.
Don’t overcommit
If you’re not sure how much inventory you’ll receive, consider capping backorders or pre-orders to avoid overselling. It’s better to turn away some orders than to cancel orders after customers have committed.
The backorder vs out of stock decision isn’t just about definitions. It’s about choosing the right tool for your specific out of stock ecommerce situation. If backorders are the answer, compare the best Shopify backorder apps.
Backorders keep sales flowing during short, predictable stockouts. They work best when you have confidence in your restocking timeline and customers are willing to wait a few weeks.
Out of stock is the honest approach when you can’t make promises. It protects customer trust and operational simplicity, even though it means lost sales in the short term.
Pre-orders offer a third path that many merchants overlook. When comparing preorder vs backorder options, pre-orders handle longer timelines, build anticipation for new products and give you payment flexibility that backorders don’t. For most ecommerce scenarios beyond simple restocks, Shopify pre-orders are worth considering.
The common thread across all three approaches? Communication. Customers can handle delays when they know what to expect. What they can’t handle is uncertainty, broken promises or radio silence.
If you’re running a Shopify store and want to explore pre-orders as an alternative to Shopify backorder management, our guide on how to do pre-orders on Shopify covers the full setup process. And for managing inventory across pre-orders and regular stock, see our guide on managing pre-order inventory in Shopify.
Whatever approach you choose, the goal is the same: capture demand, keep customers informed and deliver on your promises.
Pre-sell With PreProduct
7 day free trial with all plansMigrate pre-orders
Contents