What can you move to Shopify, and how?
Shopify’s migration guide lists what a store might bring across: products, customers, historical orders (orders already fulfilled), gift cards, certificates and store credit, blogs and pages. Import products first, then customers, then orders, so each order connects to its product and customer.
| What | How it gets in | Watch for |
|---|---|---|
| Products and variants | Product CSV, or a migration app | Up to 3 options and 2,048 variants per product. A product missing a variant option fails to import. |
| Product images | A public link per image in the product CSV | Shopify downloads them during the import. Up to 250 per product; no video or 3D models. |
| Customers | Customer CSV, or a migration app | Passwords cannot move. Total Spent and Total Orders are not imported. If customers share an email or phone number, only the last is imported. |
| Order history | A migration app or the Order API (no CSV import) | Staff who get new-order emails receive one per imported order, unless you switch them off first. |
| Gift cards, certificates, store credit | A migration app or the GiftCard API | A product CSV cannot create a gift card. |
| Reviews | A reviews app | Shopify says WooCommerce reviews cannot be exported or migrated directly; its guide names Judge.me, Loox and Yotpo. |
Shopify’s list of migration guides has no page for Salla or Zid. For WooCommerce, products and customers move by CSV, and order history with the migration apps listed in Shopify’s guide. Salla and Zid stores use the same routes: CSV files, or a migration app that lists your platform.
What can Salla, Zid and WooCommerce export?
Each platform’s help pages say where to click, not always which columns the file holds. Export a sample and compare it with Shopify’s templates.
| Platform | Products | Customers | Orders |
|---|---|---|---|
| Salla | Select products, then Actions, then export with a custom template. Emailed. | Select customers, Actions, Export customers. Emailed to the store. | Export all, or by template (up to 5). Emailed to the store. A page Salla marks as older adds: Excel or CSV, and orders with no products are not exported. |
| Zid | Products, Actions, Export all: every detail, or quantities only. | Customers, three-dot menu, export all or selected. An Excel file, emailed. | Export all, or filter by status, date or shipping method. Emailed. |
| WooCommerce | Products, Export: pick columns, types and categories. A CSV downloads. | WooCommerce, Customers, Download: a CSV of registered and guest customers. | Needs an extension, such as WooCommerce’s Customer / Order / Coupon Export (CSV or XML). |
Salla and Zid both list a reviews export. A Shopify reviews app must accept your file, so check first.
What does Shopify’s product CSV import need?
A product CSV that does not match Shopify’s format fails, and a customer CSV must use Shopify’s headings: there is no column mapping. Rules that catch most files:
- Title is the only required column for new products. Add the URL handle when a product has variants.
- The handle is the page address, /products/handle. It defaults to the title; set it to keep an old slug. Letters, dashes and numbers, no spaces.
- Options: one option value per row, up to 3 options. A WooCommerce attribute with the values 50 ml and 100 ml becomes two rows.
- Images are links, and Shopify downloads them during the import, so import before you close the old store.
- Weight goes in grams with no decimals: 5.125 kg is 5125, and 4 lb is 1814 (Shopify’s examples).
- The file is UTF-8, comma separated and 15 MB at most. Arabic text needs the UTF-8 save: read a few rows after importing. Sorting in Excel or Numbers can cut products off from their images.
- An import cannot be cancelled and keeps no history. Back up first, untick “Publish new products to all sales channels”, and check the products before they go live. For a large import for a merchant, Shopify advises testing a small subset on a development store.
| URL handle | Title | Option1 name | Option1 value | Price | Product image URL |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| oud-perfume | Oud perfume | Size | 50 ml | 180 | https://old-store.example/oud-50.jpg |
| oud-perfume | Size | 100 ml | 320 | https://old-store.example/oud-100.jpg |
The second row repeats the handle and skips the title: that is how the 100 ml bottle joins the same product.
How do you keep your Google traffic and old links?
Shopify’s link structure likely differs from your old platform’s, so old links may stop loading. Shopify’s example: /policies/shipping-policy becomes /pages/shipping-policy. A redirect sends the old address to the new page.
- Make the list first. Google’s site-move guide starts with the URLs that matter: in your sitemaps, most visited in your analytics, linked from other sites in Search Console. Map each to its new page, and reuse the old product slug as the Shopify handle where you can.
- Create the redirects: Content, Menus, View URL Redirects, Create URL redirect, or import a CSV. They work immediately, up to 100,000 per store (more on Plus).
- One rule: Shopify only redirects from a broken address, one that returns a 404. If an old address still loads a valid page, the redirect will not work.
- Keep them as long as possible, generally at least 1 year, Google says. Permanent redirects do not cost PageRank, but rankings can move for a few weeks or more on a medium-sized site.
- Keep your domain. Google advises changing one thing at a time, so move platform first and rebrand later.
- Submit sitemap.xml, which Shopify generates itself, in Google Search Console once the store is out of private mode.
How do you point your domain to Shopify without downtime?
Connecting means updating DNS records at your domain provider: the provider stays your registrar, it takes minutes to 48 hours, and Shopify charges nothing extra. Transferring moves the registrar to Shopify, takes up to 20 days and adds a 1-year renewal fee. Shopify’s advice: start by connecting.
Two traps. Disconnect the domain in the old platform’s settings, or you might get SSL certificate errors. And connect before any transfer, because a domain in use can go down during one. Salla’s domain FAQ covers moving a domain into Salla or between Salla stores, not out of Salla, so ask Salla’s support before you cancel.
What should be on your migration checklist?
| When | Do this |
|---|---|
| Before | Export products, customers and orders from the old store, and keep the files. |
| Before | Compare each export with Shopify’s CSV templates. Flag products with more than 3 options. |
| Before | List the old URLs that matter and map each to its new page. Find out where the domain is registered and where its email records live. |
| During | Import products, then customers, then order history. Switch off staff new-order emails first. |
| During | Check a sample: price, weight, stock, variants, images, Arabic text. |
| During | Set up payments (such as Tabby and Tamara, and cash on delivery), shipping and taxes. |
| During | Add the redirects. Place test orders: paid, failed, refunded, cancelled, and one marked fulfilled without buying a shipping label. |
| After | Connect the domain, make it primary and disconnect it from the old platform. Open your top old URLs to confirm they redirect, and submit the sitemap. |
| After | Invite customers to create new passwords. Watch orders and Search Console for the first weeks, and keep the redirects for at least a year. |
What should you check on launch day?
- The store is public: required launch steps done, no password page.
- Shopify Payments test mode is off, and each payment method you offer takes a real order.
- The domain opens the new store, with and without www.
- Your 10 most visited old URLs land on the right pages.
- Arabic and English pages open on a phone, and the checkout and email wording reads right.
- Order, shipping and refund emails arrive, sitemap.xml opens, and your ad and analytics tags fire.
After launch, order questions and updates can run through the WhatsApp Business API in the UAE, and ads that open a WhatsApp chat are covered under click-to-WhatsApp ads. More guides are on the Webly blog, or ask us about your store.