Scheduled sales

A scheduled sale takes a percentage off a set of products between two dates. You set one up on the Pricing rules screen with Schedule a sale. Scheduled sales come with the Growth plan and above, and ending or deleting a sale works on every plan, so you are never stuck with one.

Setting one up

• A name. For a checkout discount, shoppers see it next to the discount.
• The discount, from 1 to 90%.
• Most off in total: the deepest a product can go once this sale, any other automatic discount and any markdown already on it are added up. 50% unless you change it.
• How the sale reaches shoppers: change the prices, or discount at checkout.
• When it starts and ends. Times are in the time zone set in Settings.
• Which products: every product, some collections or some products. Products tagged no-discount are always left out.

Once saved, a sale starts at its start time with nothing else to switch on. The app checks for sales due to start or end every five minutes.

Two ways to run a sale

1. 1
   Change the prices

   When the sale starts, the app lowers each price in Shopify and the old price shows crossed out next to it. A product with no compare-at price gets today's price as one, and a product that already has a higher one keeps it. When the sale ends, each price goes back to what it was. A sale like this needs automatic price changes switched on in Settings.

2. 2
   Discount at checkout

   Your prices stay as they are. Product pages show the full price, and the discount comes off in the cart and at checkout next to the sale's name. Shopify turns the discount on and off on your dates.

Either way the percentage comes off today's price, so 20% off is the same 20% in both. A sale never takes a product with a cost entered below that cost.

Ending a sale

A sale ends at its end time. End now on the sale's card ends it straight away, and End all sales and restore prices, on the Pricing rules screen and in Settings, ends every sale at once. Deleting a sale ends it first.

A price change that can't start, because automatic price changes are off, it clashes with another discount, or Shopify isn't answering, stays scheduled with the reason on its card. It tries again every few minutes until its end time passes.

Prices you change by hand are kept

If you change a product's price yourself while a price-changing sale is running, the sale's card and the home screen list it under Changed by hand during this sale. When the sale ends, that price stays as you set it and every other price goes back. History then stops offering to undo the prices that were kept.

Sales that overlap

Before a sale is saved, and again when a price change starts, the app checks it against your other automatic discounts and its own sales on the same products and dates. It won't let them add up past Most off in total, or below cost. Percentages compound, so 30% and then 20% is 44% off in total. Two price-changing sales can't run on the same products at the same time, since each would undo the other when it ended.

A checkout discount doesn't combine with other product or order discounts, so Shopify gives the shopper whichever is better. Free shipping still combines. Products already marked down past your total are left out when a price change starts, and the app tells you how many. A checkout discount waits until you tag them no-discount or change the numbers.

When a clash is only possible, for example another app's discount whose size the app can't read, you get a warning after saving and the sale goes ahead.

Blocking discount codes

Block discount codes on carts with sale items is off by default. With it on, a cart holding any product the sale is aimed at won't take a discount code, and checkout shows “Discount codes can't be used on sale items.” It covers every product the sale is aimed at, including ones it didn't mark down. The message is in English for now.

Tags while a sale runs

A sale can add tags to its products while it runs and remove others, then put them back when it ends. Use it to fill a Sale collection set to “tag is Sale”, or to switch on a sale badge in your theme. Each list takes up to 10 tags. Tagging runs in the background, a batch at a time, and the sale's card shows how far it has got. Tags you change yourself during the sale are left alone.

Sales and the EU price rules

With the EU price rules on, the crossed-out prices from a price-changing sale are checked like any other price change. A checkout discount changes no prices, but what shoppers paid during it is recorded, so the 30-day price for a later discount counts it.