Shopify glossary

Shopify glossary

The terms that turn up in any Shopify Plus or B2B quote, each explained in one sentence with the platform limit that actually applies. Every entry says the day the figure was checked, because Shopify changes plans every few months.

B2B and wholesale

  • B2B catalog

    A B2B catalog is the set of products with their prices, quantity rules and volume pricing that gets assigned to specific companies. It is the equivalent of a wholesale price list, and it is the object whose limit decides whether a B2B project fits your plan: three active without Plus, unlimited with it.

  • Company

    A company is the customer in Shopify B2B: instead of a person, the buyer is an organisation with its locations and its associated buyers. The catalog it sees, its payment terms and who is allowed to order on its behalf all hang off the company.

  • Company location

    A company location is the specific address a company buys from, and it is the unit that actually decides the order: its shipping address, its taxes, its payment terms and, on Shopify Plus, its own catalog. A company with three branches can buy at three different prices.

  • Draft order

    A draft order is an order created from the admin or the API before a payment exists, with its lines, its customer and its prices already set. In B2B it is the usual way to turn a quote into an order and to enter an order taken over the phone or by email.

  • Payment terms

    Payment terms in Shopify B2B are the window a company has to pay an order: immediately, net 30, 45 or 60, or on receipt. They are assigned to the company or the location, and they let the buyer complete an order without entering a card.

  • Price list

    The price list is the part of a B2B catalog that decides what the buyer pays. It can be a percentage adjustment off the retail price or a fixed price per variant, and both forms can be mixed inside the same catalog.

  • Quantity rules

    Quantity rules are the minimum, maximum and increment a variant can be ordered in inside a B2B catalog. They are the native way to force full-case ordering or a minimum order, and they work on every plan that supports B2B.

  • Quick order

    Quick order is the table where a wholesale buyer enters quantities for many SKUs at once and sends them to the cart in a single operation. It is not a Shopify feature but a front-end pattern, and it is what separates a usable B2B portal from a good-looking catalog.

  • Shopify B2B

    Shopify B2B is the set of wholesale features built into the store itself: the customer stops being a person and becomes a company with its locations, and prices come from catalogs assigned to those companies. It is not an app or a separate theme, it is a data model inside the store you already have.

  • Volume pricing

    Volume pricing is a set of price steps inside a B2B catalog: past X units of a variant, the unit price drops. It is configured per product within the catalog and is available on every plan that supports B2B, Shopify Plus included or not.

Shopify Functions

  • Cart Transform

    Cart Transform is the Shopify Functions API that modifies cart lines before checkout: it can expand one line into several, merge several into a single one, or update a line’s price and title. It is the technical basis for bundles and product kits.

  • Input query

    The input query is the GraphQL file that declares what data a Shopify Function receives at run time. A Function only sees what its input query asks for, and because the input is capped at 128 kB, deciding which fields go in is as much work as the logic itself.

  • Shopify Functions

    Shopify Functions are your own code executed inside Shopify’s back end at specific points of the cart and checkout: discounts, validations, line transformation, shipping and payment methods. They are written in JavaScript or Rust, compiled to WebAssembly, and a custom Function can only be installed on stores with Shopify Plus.

  • Shopify Scripts

    Shopify Scripts was the system that came before Functions for applying your own discount, shipping and payment rules on Shopify Plus stores, written in Ruby from the Script Editor. It stopped executing in June 2026, and what replaces it is Shopify Functions.

  • WebAssembly (Wasm)

    WebAssembly is the format Shopify Functions are compiled to before they are uploaded. Shopify does not run your JavaScript or your Rust as written: it runs the resulting Wasm module, in a sandbox, with no network access and an instruction budget.

Checkout and accounts

  • Checkout Extensibility

    Checkout Extensibility is how Shopify checkout is customised today: UI extensions placed at allowed points, Functions that change discounts, shipping or payments, and configuration in the editor. It replaces editing checkout.liquid, which is no longer an option.

  • checkout.liquid

    checkout.liquid was the template that let Shopify Plus stores edit the checkout like any other page of the theme. Shopify has retired it in favour of Checkout Extensibility, where the checkout is no longer edited: it is extended with extensions and Functions at allowed points.

Themes and front-end

  • Core Web Vitals

    Core Web Vitals are the three metrics Google uses to measure page experience: LCP (how long the main element takes to paint), INP (how long the page takes to respond to an interaction) and CLS (how much content shifts while loading). On Shopify all three are almost always degraded by app scripts and unsized images.

  • Hydrogen

    Hydrogen is Shopify’s React-based framework for building headless storefronts that read their data from the Storefront API. Shopify pairs it with Oxygen, its own hosting, so the path from development to production is covered by the platform instead of assembled by you.

  • Liquid

    Liquid is the template language Shopify themes are built in. It runs on Shopify’s server before the HTML is sent to the browser, so it can read products, collections, the customer or the cart, but it cannot react to anything that happens on the page afterwards.

  • Metafields

    Metafields are custom fields added to a Shopify object — product, variant, customer, order, company — to store data the platform does not ship with. They are typed and validated, and they are readable from the theme in Liquid, from the API, and from inside a Shopify Function.

  • Metaobjects

    Metaobjects are content types you define inside Shopify, with their own fields: a size guide, a material, a store location, an author. They exist in their own right, are referenced from products or pages through a metafield, and the theme renders them like any other object.

  • Sections and blocks

    Sections are the modules of a Shopify template that a client can add, reorder and configure from the editor; blocks are the pieces that go inside a section. Since Online Store 2.0 they work on any template, and they are what makes a theme maintainable without a developer.

  • Theme app extension

    A theme app extension is how an app adds functionality to a theme without modifying its files: it contributes blocks the merchant places from the editor, or an embed enabled across the store. When the app is uninstalled, its blocks leave with it.

APIs and integrations

  • Admin GraphQL API

    The Admin GraphQL API is the interface an app or an external system uses to read and write a Shopify store’s data: products, variants, inventory, orders, customers, B2B companies and metafields. It is the route ERP integrations and automations come in through.

  • Ajax Cart API

    The Ajax Cart API is the set of routes (/cart.js, /cart/add.js, /cart/update.js, /cart/change.js) a theme uses to read and change the cart without reloading the page. It accepts several lines in a single call and can return the rendered HTML of the sections that need updating.

  • Headless commerce

    Headless means building the storefront yourself and asking Shopify only for the data, through the Storefront API, instead of letting Shopify render pages from a theme. You gain complete control of the front-end and you lose the theme editor, part of the app ecosystem, and maintenance that used to be somebody else’s.

  • Storefront API

    The Storefront API is the GraphQL interface meant for the buyer side: it reads products, collections and content, and creates and updates carts. It is designed to be used from the browser or an app with a public token, and it is what a headless store is built on.

  • Webhooks

    A webhook is an HTTP request Shopify sends to a URL of yours when something happens in the store: a new order, an updated product, a customer created. It is the right way to find out about changes, instead of asking the API every few minutes.

Plans and limits

  • Shopify Markets

    Shopify Markets is how one store sells in several countries from a single admin: each market has its countries, its currency, its languages, its taxes and its price adjustments. In B2B it has an extra role, because without Shopify Plus catalogs are assigned through B2B markets.

  • Shopify Plus

    Shopify Plus is Shopify’s top plan. What it unlocks that genuinely changes a project is four things: unlimited B2B catalogs assignable to a specific company or location, the ability to install custom apps containing your own Shopify Functions, checkout customisation beyond what a public app allows, and development stores.

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