How to migrate a custom-built website to Shopify

Custom-built stores tend to reach us at the same moment. The developer who built it has moved on, every change needs a quote, and the team works around the site instead of with it.

You can migrate a custom-built website to Shopify in four moves. Export your data into a shape Shopify understands. Decide what replaces each bespoke feature. Map redirects for every URL that earns traffic. Then rehearse the cutover before you switch the domain. The data and the bespoke features set the timeline, not Shopify.

Why is a custom build different from other migrations?

Moving from WooCommerce, Magento or Wix follows a well-worn path. There are known export formats and apps built for the job. A custom platform has none of that. Your data sits in a database designed by one team, for one business, often years ago.

That isn't a problem. It just means the first job is to understand the database before anything moves. We read the tables, find where products, customers and orders actually live, and note the logic that only exists in code.

What data can you move to Shopify?

Shopify's guide to transferring data lists the options. They run from copy and paste, through CSV files and migration apps, to a custom solution built on the Shopify API.

For a custom build, the realistic routes are CSV and the API.

• Products move by CSV or through the API.
• Customers move by CSV or the Customer API.
• Historical orders move through the Order API and Transaction API, or a migration app that accepts your export.
• Gift cards, blogs and pages have their own API routes too.

Shopify's guide sets the order. Import products first, then customers, then historical orders, so orders connect to the right products and customers. It also warns that staff set to receive order notifications will get an email for every imported order. Switch those notifications off before the import.

Passwords are the usual gap. We plan as if they won't move, and build a clean activation path so returning customers keep their history.

What happens to the bespoke features?

This is where custom builds need the most care. Years of development usually leave features nobody has listed in one place. Trade pricing rules, a quote tool, a stock feed to a supplier, a product configurator.

We list every feature and write down the job it does. Then we decide what owns that job on Shopify.

1. A native Shopify feature. More of the old custom work lands here than most teams expect.
2. A public app from the Shopify App Store, when the job is common and the vendor is solid.
3. A custom Shopify app, when the workflow is yours alone.

Our note on custom apps or public apps covers how we make that call. If the old site talks to an ERP, the integration gets its own plan. We scope those through apps and integrations.

Some features simply retire. The best migrations arrive with a shorter list, not a longer one.

How do you protect your Google rankings?

Shopify uses its own URL structure. Your custom site almost certainly doesn't match it. Shopify's guide says old links to specific pages likely won't load after the move, so set up redirects before you transfer the domain.

We crawl the old site and map one-to-one 301 redirects for the URLs that earn traffic. Blanket redirects to the homepage aren't the plan. After cutover we watch Search Console for the pages that matter. Our note on keeping your rankings through a Shopify migration goes into the detail.

What does a custom build migration look like in practice?

Every project follows the same shape. The length of each stage changes, not the order.

1. Discovery. We audit the database, the features, the integrations and the traffic. You get a clear window and a cutover plan.
2. Data mapping. We decide how your products, options and categories become Shopify products, variants and collections.
3. Export. We write the scripts that pull clean data out of the old system.
4. Build. The theme, apps and integrations come together on a store your team can run.
5. Import and check. We move the data in Shopify's order, then compare it against the old site.
6. Redirects and rehearsal. We test the redirects, customer logins and reorder paths.
7. Cutover and aftercare. We switch the domain and watch orders, activations and search traffic.

Product data is the stage that surprises people. When several people have owned a catalogue, the naming and structure drift apart. We saw that on Surrey Cricket Club, where years of different product owners had left the old catalogue hard to manage. We restructured it on the way into Shopify. Their print on demand providers had no native Shopify integration either, so we built a custom export process to route orders to them.

Should we rebuild the storefront at the same time?

Usually, yes. A custom site's templates don't come with you, so you need a Shopify theme either way. Designing it alongside the migration lets the product structure, collections and templates work together from launch.

That's why many of our migrations include a design and build. It adds time, but you only launch once. Your team gets a store they can merchandise every day without calling a developer.

Where parallel helps

We run Shopify migrations from custom builds as well as Magento, WooCommerce, Wix and BigCommerce. The same people who read your database carry out the data work, the redirects and the cutover. Most clients then keep the store under monthly support.

Tell us what your custom platform does today. Book a call and we'll map what moves, what changes and how long it takes.