When to reorder on Shopify: what an app needs from you
Yes, a Shopify app can tell you when to reorder, and Restoc is built to do exactly that and nothing wider. This page pins down what merchants ask first: the numbers the app needs from you, the history it pulls for itself, and what it sends back.
What an app needs from you before it can answer
Most merchants searching this have already tried the spreadsheet. It holds up until a supplier takes five weeks instead of three, or a hero SKU sells twice as fast as usual, and you find out you are out of stock when a customer emails you.
So the real question is not whether an app can show you your stock levels, because Shopify already does that. It is narrower:
- Can something work out the level at which this SKU needs reordering, given how fast it sells and how long the supplier takes?
- Will it tell me without me logging in to look?
- Will it tell me how much to order, not just that something is wrong?
Two inputs carry all three answers, and neither takes long.
- A sales velocity window. 7, 14 or 30 days, set store-wide. Short windows react faster to a spike. Longer ones are steadier. On Pro you can override the window on a single SKU through custom reorder rules.
- A lead time, per SKU. The days your supplier actually takes. A locally printed item on a five-day turnaround and a container shipment on a ten-week turnaround get different reorder points, because they are different risks.
The app brings the rest. The install reads your catalogue and current inventory levels and backfills 30 days of order history, so velocity is not starting from zero on day one. After that, Shopify webhooks and a scheduled sync job keep stock and sales current.
The arithmetic itself sits in a tested pure function, so the same inputs always produce the same reorder point, including the awkward cases: a SKU with no sales in the window, a SKU with less history than the window you picked, a SKU already at zero. If you want to see what the Shopify admin and Flow give you before adding anything, our guide to the built-in routes covers that first.
What comes back once those two numbers are in
A dashboard that reads as days, not units
Current stock, days of inventory remaining and reorder status for every active SKU, so the question becomes how long until this runs out rather than is 14 a lot.
An alert on the crossing, not on a schedule
Email on every plan, Slack through an incoming webhook on Growth and Pro, fired when a SKU crosses its reorder point. You do not have to log in to find out.
A weekly report with quantities
Every SKU currently below its reorder point, with a suggested order quantity against each one, readable in the app and exportable as CSV for a purchase order or a supplier email.
One alert per crossing
Delivery runs through a background job built to be idempotent, so a single crossing produces a single alert rather than the same SKU nagging you on every run.
Questions
Is there a Shopify app that tells me when to reorder?
Yes, and Restoc is being built as exactly that: a reorder-alert app rather than a full inventory suite. It works out a reorder point for each SKU and fires an alert when stock crosses it. It connects through Shopify's standard install flow and reads products, inventory levels and orders, nothing wider. It is a web app, so there is no mobile app and no browser extension. You sign in with an email address and password.
How does it work out when to reorder?
It uses your numbers, not an industry average. Sales velocity comes from your own Shopify sales history over the window you choose: 7, 14 or 30 days. Lead time is the days your supplier takes, held against the SKU. The calculation is a tested pure function, so the same inputs always give the same number. Our page on setting a reorder point in Shopify walks through the arithmetic if you want to check it by hand.
Does it need weeks of sales history before it is useful?
No. The install backfills 30 days of order history alongside the catalogue and inventory pull, so there is velocity to work with from the first sync. After that, order and inventory webhooks plus a scheduled sync job keep the numbers current. A SKU with no sales in the chosen window shows as having no measured velocity, which is honest rather than a guess. Our page on days of inventory remaining shows what each row reads once the first sync lands.
Can I set a different lead time for every supplier?
Yes. Lead time is stored per SKU, so a locally printed item on a five-day turnaround and a container shipment on a ten-week turnaround each get their own reorder point. The sales velocity window is store-wide on Starter and Growth. A per-SKU velocity override is Pro's custom reorder rules.
Where does the alert arrive?
Email on every plan, including Starter. Slack alerts, through an incoming webhook alongside email, are part of Growth and Pro. The alert fires when a SKU crosses its reorder point, not on a fixed weekly schedule. Delivery runs through a background job built to be idempotent, so one crossing produces one alert. The dashboard keeps a list of recent alerts with the channel each went to and whether it has been delivered.
Does it tell me how much to order, or just that I am low?
Both. Alongside the alerts there is a weekly reorder report. It lists every SKU currently below its reorder point, with a suggested order quantity against each one. Read it in the app or export it as CSV, which is the format most merchants want for pasting lines into a purchase order. The weekly report page covers what sits in each column.
How many SKUs can it track, and what does it cost?
Starter is $29 a month for up to 200 tracked SKUs. Growth is $59 a month for up to 1,000. Pro is $99 a month for up to 2,000. Paid a year at a time they are $290, $590 and $990, which is ten months' price for twelve. Starter carries the working set: a reorder point per SKU, the store-wide velocity window, email alerts on a crossing, the weekly report with CSV export, and the dashboard of days of inventory remaining. Growth adds Slack alerts and five times Starter's capacity, enforced at sync time. Pro adds the per-SKU velocity window override. Every plan covers one location, and our page on multiple locations says plainly what that does and does not cover.
Can I try it before paying, and how is the charge made?
There is a 60-day free trial on every plan. The length is deliberate: at least one full weekly reorder cycle completes before the first charge, so you read a real report before you pay for one. Billing runs through Shopify's native billing API, so the subscription lands on your Shopify invoice rather than as a separate card payment. Annual billing is offered as an option at signup. Restoc has not launched yet, so the way in today is the waitlist.