Shopify Webhooks

Before writing code

Fetch live docs:

1. Web-search site:shopify.dev webhooks for webhook overview
2. Web-search site:shopify.dev webhook topics for available event topics
3. Web-search site:shopify.dev gdpr mandatory webhooks for GDPR requirements

Subscription Methods

HTTP (Default)

Shopify POSTs JSON to your endpoint:

• Set up via GraphQL: webhookSubscriptionCreate
• Verify with HMAC-SHA256

Amazon EventBridge

For AWS-based architectures:

• Events delivered to EventBridge partner event source
• Automatic retries and dead-letter queues
• Set up via Partner event source ARN

Google Cloud Pub/Sub

For GCP-based architectures:

• Events published to Pub/Sub topic
• Topic must grant Shopify publish access

Amazon SQS

For queue-based processing:

• Events delivered directly to SQS queue

HMAC Verification

Every HTTP webhook includes X-Shopify-Hmac-SHA256 header:

import crypto from 'crypto';

function verifyWebhook(body: string, hmacHeader: string, secret: string): boolean {
  const hash = crypto
    .createHmac('sha256', secret)
    .update(body, 'utf8')
    .digest('base64');
  return crypto.timingSafeEqual(
    Buffer.from(hash),
    Buffer.from(hmacHeader),
  );
}

Always verify HMAC before processing — reject unverified webhooks with 401.

Webhook Topics

Orders

orders/create, orders/updated, orders/paid, orders/fulfilled, orders/cancelled, orders/delete

Products

products/create, products/update, products/delete

Customers

customers/create, customers/update, customers/delete

Cart

carts/create, carts/update

Checkout

checkouts/create, checkouts/update

Inventory

inventory_levels/update, inventory_items/update

Fulfillments

fulfillments/create, fulfillments/update

Refunds

refunds/create

Mandatory GDPR Webhooks

Every Shopify app MUST implement these three webhooks:

1. customers/data_request — customer requests their data (data portability)
2. customers/redact — customer requests data deletion
3. shop/redact — store uninstalls your app, delete all store data within 48 hours

Failure to implement these can result in app rejection or removal from the App Store.

Retry Policy

• Shopify retries failed deliveries (non-2xx responses)
• Up to 8 retries over 4 hours with exponential backoff
• Retried webhooks maintain the original payload from when triggered
• Use X-Shopify-Triggered-At header to detect stale payloads
• After all retries fail, the webhook subscription may be removed
• Check webhook delivery status via webhookSubscriptions query

Subscribing via GraphQL

mutation WebhookSubscriptionCreate {
  webhookSubscriptionCreate(
    topic: ORDERS_CREATE
    webhookSubscription: {
      callbackUrl: "https://your-app.com/webhooks/orders"
      format: JSON
    }
  ) {
    webhookSubscription {
      id
      topic
      endpoint {
        ... on WebhookHttpEndpoint {
          callbackUrl
        }
      }
    }
    userErrors { field message }
  }
}

Best Practices

• Always verify HMAC before processing
• Respond with 200 immediately, then process asynchronously
• Implement idempotency — webhooks may be delivered more than once
• Use the webhook ID (X-Shopify-Webhook-Id header) for deduplication
• Implement all three mandatory GDPR webhooks
• Handle webhook subscription failures — re-subscribe if delivery fails repeatedly
• Use EventBridge/Pub/Sub/SQS for high-volume scenarios
• Log webhook deliveries for debugging (but never log sensitive customer data)
• Version your webhook handler to handle schema changes across API versions

Fetch the Shopify webhook documentation for exact topic names, payload schemas, and subscription patterns before implementing.