Shopify Editions Winter 2024

Welcome to first new Shopify feature release for 2024, Shopify Editions Winter. As the ecommerce world evolves, so does Shopify with its biannual Editions releases! These Editions are Shopify's commitment to upgrading and adding to their cutting-edge tools and products. You can always count on Shopify to stay ahead of the dynamic ecommerce landscape.

We're so excited to be a trusted Shopify Plus Partner and look forward to the new Shopify announcements. We're here to dissect the news and give you the highlights of those features we think will be gamechangers and productivity boosters. There were lots of amazing new features (100+) announced so we're not going to cover all of them, however we'll focus on those that have our team most excited.

Let's dive into the Winter 2024 Editions. What are the standout features? How will Shopify revolutionize the experience for merchants? Buckle up and let's explore the latest and greatest from Shopify's innovative universe!

More Product Variants

If you're a Shopify merchant (or developer) you've no doubt run into the 99-variant limit on products. Variants in Shopify are used to create different versions of the same product, such as variations in size, color, or material. These variants allow your shop to offer a range of choices for a single product without cluttering the store with separate listings for each version. Sadly, we've all been stuck with a maximum of 99 variants since the beginning of Shopify. Well, cheer up emo kid because today's announcement puts a huge light at the end of the tunnel.

Shopify has now released a new GraphQL product API that supports up to 2000 variants per product. Wow, amazing! Get ready for more complex product catalogs with greater variations. These new APIs are in developer preview only with a general release coming later.

Merchants and developers can now create more sophisticated product options with the expanded 2000 variant limit. Our Shopify ecommerce team is super excited about this new feature. Get ready merchants, you're going to love the extra variants.

Combined Listing App

This new app lets merchants combine products. It empowers merchants to create a product listing that combines all the different variations of a product into one centralized product listing. Each variation can have its very own image carousel, descriptive URL, and publishing controls. Each combined listing can be highlighted with its own specific title, product description, and image gallery.

Expanded Checkout Extensibility

If you're a Shopify Plus merchant, you've probably already heard about Checkout Extensibility. It's basically the new way for you to customize and enhance the checkout experience in Shopify Plus. Gone are the old days of checkout.liquid (which is being deprecated very soon.) Checkout Extensibility is wave of the future for Shopify and it's rolling out to more pages of the site.

Up until now, merchants (and developers) had access to only the core checkout page for enhancement. This included adding sections, UI updates and other Shopify Function capabilities. Starting today, Shopify is launching even more ways to customize the checkout experience.

Thank You and Order Status Page Extensions

All the amazing customization capabilities of the checkout page is now coming to the "Thank You" page and Order Status page. These sections now support the standard checkout extensions. You can now customize the look and feel, color settings/schemes, header and footer customizations, and container styles. All of this is fully app-based and upgrade-safe which ensure future compatibility and extensibility for developers.

Customer Account Page Extensibility

All of this amazing customization is also coming to the Customer Account page. We're able to design and develop better customer account experiences.

More AI with Shopify Magic

We all know that AI is a hot topic. Shopify hit the ground running in 2023 with Shopify Magic for product descriptions and now they're back in 2024 with even more AI powered magic. Here in the Winter Edition, Shopify is launching even more ways for merchants to use AI including image manipulation, expanded autowrite and upgraded search. Let's take a look at some of the key new AI capabilities

Transform product photography with AI

Every product in your store has an image, probably more than one. You spend a lot of your time dealing with various types of image manipulation. Imagine now if you could use integrated AI tools to help with basic image editing features? Well, now you can with the expanded Shopify Magic image manipulation capabilities!

Create professional product photos with new AI-enabled image editing features. Instantly generate, match, or remove the background of existing images using just a few clicks or keywords. Need to create more contact for your product shot? Maybe you want to show that model on the beach? All of this and more are now available using the AI-enhanced image features in Shopify.

AI-based image editing will not only save time, it will also enhance the visual appeal of your products, making them stand out to potential customers. It can even lead to more sales, as clear and attractive product images are a key factor in customer shopping decisions.

Create store pages faster with Shopify Magic

If you're a Shopify merchant, you've no doubt used the native AI-based product description tool that is part of Shopify Magic. With Shopify Magic, you can speed up your writing process and generate great product descriptions in minutes.  Shopify Magic uses the product title and keywords, to generate product descriptions. This super cool text generation capability has now expanded into other sections of the Shopify Admin including Pages. Now you can easily create an About Us or FAQ page with ease. Just a few clicks and prompts, and here comes the text!

Semantic Search

If you're not already using the Shopify Search & Discovery App, then you're missing out on some great native capabilities. Use the Shopify Discovery app to customize search, filtering, create swatches and product recommendations. Lookout for an improved way for your buyers  to search for products using the new AI-powered storefront features.

Semantic Search, is the new AI-powered storefront search feature that goes beyond keyword matching by better understanding the shopper’s intent. This new enhancement returns richer, more relevant search results. When a customer enters a term into the search bar, the AI powered system generates related search suggestions. This provides the customer with valuable inspiration based on their search term.

Native Shopify Subscription App

Subscriptions are a great way to sell products on a recurring basis. You can offer subscriptions on a monthly, weekly, or daily basis to take advantage of ongoing revenue. Using subscriptions you can increase customer lifetime value and generate predictable revenue. Until now, you had to use a third-party app to support these subscription services. That all changes today!

Shopify is now introducing their new, free Shopify Subscriptions app. Easily set up and manage subscriptions directly from the Shopify admin. Your customers will be able to modify or skip subscription orders directly from their account on your store. You no longer need to rely on a third-party app to support basic subscription services.

Expanded B2B Features

If you're a Shopify Plus merchant, you've probably already using the handy B2B capabilities. Shopify B2B is designed specifically to cater to the unique needs of business-to-business transactions. Shopify B2B already supports companies, customized pricing structures, bulk discounts, and payment terms, but get ready for some great new upgrades.

With today's announcement during Shopify Editions Winter 2024, you have even more useful B2B features available in your Shopify Plus stores. Here are some of the great new features that have our enterprise team excited.

Support for sales reps

You can now assign sales reps to your B2B customers. Using new staff permissions within the Admin, you can assign Staff Members to place orders and view customer information for their assigned company locations. Specific access levels for sales managers and sales reps can be defined using roles within the staff permissions. This is a great way to give your B2B customers even more support and guidance. This

With the new Sales Rep feature in your Shopify B2B store, you can build stronger, personalized relationships with your customers. When a sales rep is dedicated to a particular customer, they become deeply familiar with that customer's unique needs, preferences, and business challenges. Over time, this can result in more successful sales, higher B2B customer retention and a deeper trust between the company and your sales reps.

Headless with B2B

You may have already heard about Shopify Hydrogen for headless development, well now you can include your B2B store. Build unique B2B storefronts by tapping into Shopify’s APIs and developer tools. This opens up endless development possibilities using the power of a headless configuration. Shopify is now including the B2B features into the headless paradigm. The customization options are endless. With this new release, Shopify lets B2B businesses combine Shopify's reliable ecommerce capabilities with a bespoke frontend design.

Custom discounts for B2B

One powerful tool that Shopify provides to developers is Shopify Functions. This allows developers to inject code that provides customized backend logic within Shopify. These functions can be developed as apps and then installed within the store. Shopify Functions provide access to backend customizations for discounts, shipping, and payment methods. And now, Shopify has extended these functions to work with B2B checkout.

You can now use Shopify Functions to create promotional discounts just for B2B customers. Discounts can be automatically applied at checkout, including additional discounts on top of specific catalog prices. You can create hyper specific discounts just for your B2B clients.

Schedule Gift Cards

You can now send gift cards to recipients. That's right, it may seem kind of obvious, however this is a long-awaited feature for Shopify gift cards. Customers have the option to buy a gift card and have it sent to someone with a custom message. You can enter the email and schedule date for digital arrival of the gift card. It's simple and totally useful. Watch more about it:

Shopify POS Terminal

If you're a retail store using Shopify, then Shopify POS is a great expansion for your omnichannel reach. The Shopify POS and POS GO are integrated into your Shopify platform creating a unified solution for your business. Seems like that would be enough right? Well, get ready for the next great advancement with Shopify POS Terminal.

POS Terminal is the ultimate all-in-one countertop tool for your retail customers. It's a dedicated payment terminal with Wi-Fi and Ethernet, featuring an integrated customer display. You can customize the screen with your own images or logos. Expect great new features like the ability to capture customer emails at checkout and one-tap digital receipts.

POS Terminal is the perfect companion giving your store a customer-facing display. Now you can offer a real time screen where buyers view their purchase itemized on-screen. They can even complete the purchase and check out confidently with clear flows for payment, PIN entry, tipping, and receipt selection.

Exciting New Shopify Features in 2024

As a trusted Shopify Plus Partner, we are excited to see the evolution of the platform. Shopify's commitment to pushing the platform forward with a steady cadence has created one of the most modern platforms ever developed for ecommerce. We look forward to a long partnership with Shopify and continue to recommend it to our clients.

Do you need help with your Shopify Plus or POS services? Contact our team of experts and let's talk about launching your business into the future with a Shopify installation.

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