Shopify provides "locations" as the unit for managing inventory and shipping. If you're only selling through your ecommerce site, you can operate without thinking about locations at all, but if you manage separate warehouse sites or physical stores, this feature becomes necessary for shipping and inventory management.
This article organizes the basic concept behind Shopify locations, how to operate them from the admin, and their impact on inventory and fulfillment, from a practical perspective.
What Are Shopify Locations?
A location on Shopify is a unit representing a site where inventory is stored and managed.
When you set up your store, one location is automatically created by default. You can individually register your own warehouse, a physical store, an external fulfillment warehouse, and more, and manage inventory counts separately for each product.
On Shopify, inventory isn't managed at the "product" level — it's managed at the "product × location" level. This mechanism lets you accurately grasp the inventory situation at each site.
Product details: total inventory is managed as the sum across each location
Why Set Up Shopify Locations?
Setting up locations lets you do the following:
Inventory Management
You can track inventory separately at each physical location. Setting up multiple locations lets you get a clearer picture of your inventory across your entire business.
Anywhere you manage products or store inventory — a store, a warehouse, a pop-up shop, a dropshipping supplier — can be set up as a location.
Shipping from a Location That Matches the Customer's Address
You can ship an order from the location closest to the customer. Even if one location is out of stock, if another location has inventory, the order can be split and shipped from multiple locations.
In-Person Sales at a Physical Store
Using Shopify POS or similar, you can tie your store's order data together and process in-person sales at a retail location. Adding a location to a POS device lets you track inventory accurately.
App Integration
You can integrate with dropshipping apps and third-party logistics services.
Order Routing
Order routing is a mechanism that automatically assigns which location an order ships from, based on rules you configure.
You can set priorities based on criteria like inventory availability, distance to the shipping destination, and avoiding split fulfillment. This eliminates the need to manually decide which site to ship from, enabling efficient shipping management even when operating across multiple sites.
Common Cases Where Setting Up Locations Is Necessary
Setting up locations is essential in cases like the following:
- Shipping from multiple warehouses or stores
- Managing inventory across distributed sites in partnership with a 3PL partner
- Wanting to manage physical store and online store inventory separately
- Wanting to use the optimal shipping site for each region
Even if you're only selling through your ecommerce site at first, setting this up with future expansion in mind makes it easier to change your operations later.
The Operational Benefits of Separating Shipping Sites
Managing locations separately makes your inventory management and shipping decisions clearer.
- You can automate the decision of which site to ship from
- You can separate store inventory from ecommerce inventory
- It becomes easier to prevent inventory discrepancies
For operations with multiple sites, setting up locations is essentially a must.
The Role Locations Play in Shopify Fulfillment
Locations are also used as a factor in deciding where an order ships from. Once an order comes in, Shopify assigns where to ship it from, based on where inventory exists and your shipping settings.
If your location settings aren't configured properly, inventory that does exist may not be recognized as available for fulfillment, requiring manual intervention. After adding a product, always check which location its inventory is assigned to.
You Can Set Shipping Priority
Using order routing rules, you can automatically assign online orders based on inventory availability and proximity.
From Settings > Shipping and delivery > Order routing in the admin, you can set the rules used when assigning a location. You can set a priority for each rule — for example, setting "minimize split fulfillment" to a high priority will assign a shipping location that lets the entire order ship from a single location.
Fulfillment
If you don't want to use this location's inventory for online sales, disable the "This location's inventory can be used for online order fulfillment" option (enabled by default).
Physical Store
If you want to display it as a physical store, enable the setting in the "Retail store" section, which lets customers find it through the Shop app. Click "Save."
Optional: register the address and other information under Edit location address
Shipping and delivery: select Order routing
Order routing: set shipping-related rules
Add rule: list of rules you can add
How to Add a Shopify Location
You add a location from your admin settings.
Basic Steps for Adding a Shopify Location
Here's the operational flow:
1. From the admin, go to Settings > Locations, and select "Add location"
Settings: select Add location
2. Under "Add location," edit the location name and address
Add location: change the location name and address under location details
2-1. Add a location name
Add a location name: enter the location name
2-2. Add a location address
Edit location address: enter the address and other address information
Right after being added, a location has no inventory assigned to it, and inventory from existing products is not automatically moved or duplicated to it.
Also, if you leave the "use for fulfillment" setting disabled, that location won't be used for fulfillment even if it has inventory. If you plan to use it as a shipping site, make sure to check that nothing is left unconfigured.
What Happens to Inventory When You Add a Shopify Location?
When you add a new location, inventory is handled as follows.
For New Products
When you add a new location, new products are automatically registered to that location with a default inventory quantity of 0. After that, you can adjust the inventory quantity from Products > Inventory in the admin.
For Existing Products
Adding a location doesn't move or remove existing inventory — a product is registered at the new location with 0 inventory, and you assign inventory to it as needed.
You can later choose which products each location stocks, and adjust inventory quantities individually.
Key points to note:
- Each location's inventory is tracked independently — it's not shared or pooled with other locations
- A new location is added to the bottom of your order routing list
- By default, each new location's inventory is available for online purchase
- If you need to update a large amount of inventory, you can use the bulk editor or a CSV file
How to Assign a Product's Inventory to a Location
There are two main ways to assign inventory:
- Setting it individually from the product management screen
- Bulk-editing by location from the inventory list screen
If you have a large number of products, bulk adjustment from the inventory management screen is more efficient. Enter the numbers to match the actual inventory at each site.
Common Reasons Inventory Doesn't Reflect at a Shopify Location
After setting up a location, you may run into cases like "there's inventory, but it can't be shipped" or "the inventory isn't reflecting." The main causes are:
- The product hasn't been assigned to that location (inventory quantity still 0)
- "This location's inventory can be used for online order fulfillment" is disabled
- A different location is being selected due to order routing priority
- Inventory tracking is turned off
Right after adding a location, always check your inventory assignment and fulfillment settings.
In particular, cases like "there's inventory but it can't be purchased" or "it's not showing up as a shipping site" often stem from an overlooked location setting.
Common Questions About Shopify Locations
Here are some common questions that come up when setting up locations.
Deleting a Shopify Location
Locations can be deleted. That said, always check whether it has inventory before deleting it. If a location has products with remaining inventory, you can't delete it. You'll need to bring inventory down to zero, or move it to another location, before deleting.
A location can also be deactivated instead of deleted, and only active locations count toward your plan's limit. If you have no specific reason to delete it, we recommend deactivating it instead.
Points to note when deleting:
- After deletion, the product itself remains, but its association with the deleted location is lost
- The product continues to be managed at your other active locations
- At least one location is required, so you can't delete every location
- Past order history related to a deleted location is retained, but new shipments from that location are no longer possible
The Limit on Shopify Locations
The number of locations is capped depending on your Shopify plan.
- Shopify Starter: 2 locations
- Basic Shopify: 10 locations
- Grow: 10 locations
- Advanced Shopify: 10 locations
- Shopify Plus: 200 locations
Once you hit the limit, you can't add a new location. It's important to periodically clean up unnecessary locations and keep only the sites your operations actually need.
※ The location limit may change with plan or specification updates. Check Shopify's official help pages for the latest limits.
Make the Most of Shopify Locations
Shopify locations are the foundational setting behind inventory management and shipping decisions. Adding or removing a location is simple in itself, but if you don't understand that inventory doesn't move automatically, it can lead to trouble.
Understand both the operations in the admin and their downstream effects together, and design a location setup that fits your own operations.
Location design isn't just about inventory management — it's also a foundational setting with an eye toward future site additions, 3PL integration, and physical store expansion.
If you're operating with future expansion in mind, keep in mind a design that makes good use of location management and order routing features.
