Can you automate inventory management with Shopify Flow?

Automating Inventory Management with Shopify Flow

Shopify Flow provides several inventory-specific triggers and actions for automating stock management. As of April 2026, these are available on Shopify ($79/month), Advanced, and Plus plans.

Inventory Triggers

• Inventory quantity changed — Fires when stock level changes for any variant
• Product added to store — When a new product is published
• Order created — Allows inventory checks alongside order processing

Inventory Automation Examples

Low-Stock Alert

1. Trigger: Inventory quantity changed
2. Condition: Inventory quantity is less than 10
3. Action: Send email to [email protected] with product name, SKU, and current quantity

Auto-Hide Out-of-Stock Products

1. Trigger: Inventory quantity changed
2. Condition: Inventory quantity equals 0
3. Action: Unpublish product from online store

Auto-Republish Restocked Products

1. Trigger: Inventory quantity changed
2. Condition: Inventory quantity is greater than 0 AND product is unpublished
3. Action: Publish product to online store

Tag Products by Stock Level

1. Trigger: Inventory quantity changed
2. Conditions and actions:
   • If quantity < 5: Add tag "critical-stock"
   • If quantity 5-20: Add tag "low-stock"
   • If quantity > 20: Remove tags "critical-stock" and "low-stock"

Reorder Point Notification

1. Trigger: Inventory quantity changed
2. Condition: Inventory quantity is less than reorder point (stored in product metafield)
3. Action: Create a draft order for the supplier with reorder quantity
4. Action: Send Slack notification to #inventory channel

Multi-Location Inventory

For stores with multiple locations (warehouses, retail stores), Flow can route inventory actions based on location:

• Transfer stock between locations when one falls below threshold
• Route orders to the nearest fulfillment location based on customer shipping address
• Alert specific warehouse managers based on which location triggered the low-stock event

Limitations

• Shopify Flow cannot modify inventory quantities directly (it can tag, notify, and trigger, but not adjust stock counts)
• For automated purchase order creation, a third-party inventory app (Stocky, Inventory Planner) connected to Flow is needed
• Flow processes events within seconds but cannot batch multiple inventory changes into a single workflow run
• Inventory triggers fire per-variant, not per-product (a product with 10 variants may trigger 10 separate workflow runs)