Shopify Inventory API: A Guide on Possibilities and Technicalities

Please note: This post is based on information gathered from official Shopify help articles, community forums, the Shopify Slack community, and Reddit.  Since APIs continue to evolve, we recommend checking the linked sources for the most up-to-date information.

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One of the most frequently asked questions across Shopify Community, Shopify Partners Slack Group, and Reddit is:

How do you track inventory adjustments using the Shopify Inventory API?

The right answer evolves. Like most large SaaS platforms, Shopify continuously updates and evolves its APIs. That means some things are possible, and others still come with limitations.

For many growing stores, one major limitation is the lack of a fully accessible, bulk inventory movement log across the store. Manually clicking through individual variants to understand stock changes just isn’t practical at scale.

While Shopify Inventory API does offer flexibility and customization for managing stock data, it doesn’t provide a scalable UI or centralized visibility, especially for merchants managing multiple SKUs or warehouses.

This guide explains how the Shopify Inventory API works, what’s possible through it, what’s not, and how third-party apps can help with those gaps.

Understanding Shopify Inventory API

Shopify API is a set of programming interfaces that let developers interact directly with Shopify’s platform. 

It allows apps, tools, and external systems to securely access store data and perform functions like managing inventory, syncing orders, updating product details, or handling customer information.

This interaction happens between Shopify and external platforms through authenticated API calls. The goal is to automate operations, connect third-party tools, and let businesses customize how their store works beyond the default admin interface.

Using Shopify APIs, you can

• Retrieve and update data like inventory, prices, or customer details
• Build custom storefronts or back-office tools
• Automate order fulfillment, shipping rates, or customer messaging
• Integrate with CRMs, ERPs, or other external platforms

Common types of Shopify APIs

• Admin API: Used to manage everything on the backend, including orders, products, customers, and inventory. Available in REST and GraphQL formats.
  
  
• Storefront API: Enables developers to build custom customer-facing experiences using Shopify's data, ideal for headless commerce.
  
  
• GraphQL Admin API: A flexible way to query and update specific Shopify data fields. Reduces the number of API calls by allowing nested queries. Technically, this is a subset of the Admin API, not a separate API.
  
  
• Webhooks (Event API): Not a traditional API, but critical for real-time event handling. Triggers actions in external systems when something changes in Shopify (like an order placed or stock updated).
  
  
• Carrier Service API: Lets shipping providers display dynamic rates, handle zones, and offer live delivery costs at checkout. 

For merchants or developers building advanced inventory workflows, Shopify offers some additional APIs that are useful in specific inventory scenarios

• GraphQL Bulk Update Inventory API: Allows you to export or data at scale without hitting rate limits. Ideal for syncing large product catalogs or handling updates across thousands of SKUs in the background.
  
  
• Fulfillment Orders API: Lets you control how inventory gets assigned to orders. This becomes important when using multiple locations and needing logic to decide which location should handle each item in order.
  
  
• Inventory States (API v2023-01 and later): Shopify now supports categorizing inventory into states like available, reserved, incoming, damaged, and more. This allows more granular tracking of stock beyond just the available quantity.

Shopify inventory APIs are designed to give developers control and adaptability, whether building from scratch or plugging into existing systems.

Technical Capabilities of the Shopify Inventory API

Shopify inventory management API gives you structured access to inventory data, but it comes with specific endpoints, permissions, and limits. 

Here’s what you need to know before building any workflows or connecting any system around it.

Supported endpoints and data access methods

The Shopify inventory API is built around three core resources or data points

• InventoryItem: Stores metadata about a product's stock unit (e.g. SKU, cost, whether tracking is enabled).
• InventoryLevel: Stores the actual available quantity of an inventory item at a specific location.
• Location: Identifies where inventory is stocked or fulfilled from (warehouse, store, or third-party).

The Inventory API supports both REST and GraphQL formats:

The API supports both REST and GraphQL. REST is useful for single-resource CRUD operations. GraphQL allows multi-resource queries in a single request, reducing the number of round-trips.

Choose REST if

• You’re modifying one resource at a time
• You need predictable, versioned endpoints

Choose GraphQL if

• You’re fetching nested inventory data
• You want to minimize request count for multiple resources

All Inventory API calls require OAuth 2.0. Scopes must be granted during app install or via reauthorization.

Required access scopes

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Rate limits

To stay within limits

• Use GraphQL for fewer, more efficient queries.
• Cache static data like InventoryItem whenever possible.
• Monitor cost usage in GraphQL and back off on high-cost queries.

Limitations of Shopify Inventory API

Shopify Inventory API is built to help merchants manage stock levels, track product availability, and sync inventory across locations and SKUs. 

It works well for most standard inventory operations. But like any system, it has limitations, especially when used in more complex workflows or scaled environments.

These limitations fall into two main categories: operational and technical.

1. Operational limitations

The API supports basic inventory use cases, but there are gaps when working with larger catalogs, multiple warehouses, or custom inventory logic.

• Bulk updates are rigid

Shopify’s Inventory API doesn’t support “true” bulk uploads through a single file or operation.

Developers must either send many small requests or use the inventorySetQuantities GraphQL mutation, which allows updating up to 250 inventory items per request, an improvement from the previous limit of 100.

However, if one adjustment fails, it may still return a partial success, making debugging difficult when syncing data from spreadsheets or external systems. 

• Limited visibility into inventory states

Some inventory states, such as “committed” (inventory allocated to open orders) exist within Shopify but are not accessible or adjustable via the Inventory API. 

This limits your ability to track or manage conditions like reserved stock, damaged goods, or items on hold for pre-orders unless you build custom logic or use third-party apps.

• No long-term inventory history

The Shopify API inventory history is only short-term. Historical inventory adjustments are limited to approximately 90 days, with no native way to access or export a comprehensive history over time. 

This can create blind spots in reporting, auditing, and demand planning.

• Multi-location behavior lacks automation

While Shopify supports multiple inventory locations, the Inventory API doesn’t expose or manage how stock is routed or transferred between them.

There’s no endpoint to automatically rebalance inventory or apply fulfillment logic across warehouses. 

Any decision-making around which location should fulfill an order must be handled through Shopify’s built-in settings or custom code.

These issues often require merchants to use middleware or add manual workflows to compensate for missing features.

Technical limitations

From an engineering perspective, integrating the Inventory API into larger systems comes with its own challenges.

• Strict rate limits

REST calls are capped at 40 requests per minute per store, refilled at 2 per second. Hitting these limits, common during large inventory syncs, results in 429 Too Many Requests errors and can cause sync delays.

• No built-in forecasting or automation

The Inventory API is transactional. It updates or retrieves quantity data but doesn’t support any logic for forecasting, reorder alerts, or buffer stock settings. 

Merchants either have to build this functionality themselves or use apps from the Shopify App Store that automate inventory management by querying and updating inventory on their behalf.

• Custom integrations require extra layers

Connecting the Inventory API with systems like ERPs or WMS platforms usually requires middleware to map data fields, manage retries, and handle inconsistencies. This increases both development time and ongoing maintenance.

While these limitations don’t stop the API from being useful, they highlight the need for additional systems or processes when managing inventory at scale or with more advanced logic. 

For businesses with those needs, the API is a starting point, not a complete solution.

Struggling with stockouts, overselling, or inventory mismatches? Here’s a helpful guide to fixing common Shopify inventory issues.

How Shopify Apps Extend Inventory Management

By now, you’ve seen that Shopify’s inventory management API handles two core functions: updating stock levels and managing product quantities across locations.

That works well for standard day-to-day operations.

But as your business scales, these built-in capabilities often don’t keep up with the complexity. Managing inventory across multiple warehouses, planning for future demand, and syncing stock across channels usually requires more advanced tools. 

This is where third-party inventory apps step in, not just as a convenience, but as a necessary layer that fills the functional gaps left by the Shopify inventory management API.

How Shopify Apps Overcome the Shopify Inventory API Challenges  

When Shopify’s built-in tools fall short, Shopify apps step in to give you more control and less manual work. Here’s how apps help dodge Shopify Inventory API issues. 

1. Automation of tedious inventory operations

Stock updates, low inventory checks, and restock alerts often need to be done manually inside Shopify. When you’re working with dozens or hundreds of SKUs, this becomes repetitive and difficult to maintain, even with the API. 

Prediko’s inventory app handles these tasks by automating sync across channels, reorder alerts, and safety stock logic. It connects to your Shopify store and monitors stock levels in real-time. 

When SKUs fall below a defined threshold, you get an alert without having to check manually. This helps you prevent stockouts without spending time on routine admin.

Here’s a detailed guide if you want to automate the process of sending POs on Shopify. 

2. Forecasting tools and demand prediction

Shopify inventory API doesn’t offer built-in capabilities to trigger demand forecasting. You’d have to export sales data, calculate trends, and then make sense of the spreadsheets to guess when to reorder.

Prediko’s AI uses the past sales, seasonality, and growth trends to predict future demand. 

Its restock alerts take into account your supplier lead times and safety stock. Your plan gets updated based on current sales, so you don’t sit on excess inventory or face stockouts 

3. Multi-channel syncing and centralized dashboards

When you sell across multiple platforms, it becomes difficult to keep inventory synced. Shopify inventory API allows tracking per location and offers only limited data flow across external sales channels.

Such multi-location inventory tracking helps keep the chaos away.

P.S. Read this guide to set up and optimize Shopify’s multi-location inventory.

Prediko centralizes your inventory data from multiple channels and warehouses. You can view all your SKUs and POs in one dashboard, with live syncing across each connected source.

This gives you one place to manage your inventory without a high number of API calls.

Common Use Cases for Inventory Apps

Apps such as Prediko are not just there to make things easier. They help you build workflows that aren't possible through Shopify’s Inventory API alone.

• Inventory forecasting and reorder planning: Get predictive models to plan restocks based on real-time demand trends, supplier lead times, and historical data, without manual calculations.
• Inventory control across multiple locations: Monitor what’s in stock, what’s running low, and what’s reserved at each location, all from a single dashboard.
• Low stock alerts and automated purchasing: Set up thresholds for SKUs and trigger purchase orders in a click when stock dips.
• Generate reports and analytics: Get regular insights into your inventory performance. See what’s working and double down, and course-correct what’s not.

These kinds of tasks become too complex or time-consuming when handled manually. With the right inventory app, you're not just getting automation, you’re getting control and predictability over how stock flows across your business.

Best Practices for Integrating Inventory Apps with Shopify

Shopify inventory apps can give you more visibility, control, and automation, but only when they’re integrated the right way.

A misconfigured setup or skipped permission step can lead to sync delays, incorrect stock values, or security issues.

Here are the best practices to follow when bringing an inventory app into your Shopify workflow.

1. Ensuring data consistency between Shopify and third-party systems

When multiple tools are feeding into or pulling from your inventory, data mismatches are one of the most common issues. These usually happen when systems fall out of sync i.e. stock is updated in one tool but not the other.

To avoid this

• Sync inventory from a single source of truth. Decide whether Shopify or the third-party app will lead stock updates
• Schedule regular audits between both platforms to catch mismatches (if any) early
• Avoid manual edits inside your inventory app if Shopify controls the stock levels. It creates a disconnect that can be hard to trace later
• Go with an inventory app designed specifically for Shopify stores

2. Handle large catalogs without hitting Shopify API limits

Shopify’s Inventory API has strict rate limits: 40 requests per store per minute, replenished at 2 per second. When syncing hundreds or thousands of SKUs, these limits can easily be hit, causing sync errors or timeouts.

If you’re managing a large catalog, you must use inventory apps. These apps eliminate call limits, letting you update, sync, forecast, and track inventory in real time, no matter the size of your catalog.

With Prediko, for example, you get unlimited SKUs and POs right from the base plan.

If you’re scaling or managing a large product range, this approach ensures faster syncs, smoother workflows, and fewer disruptions.

3. Managing access scopes and permissions

Inventory apps need to access sensitive product and stock data. During installation, they request access. Giving apps more access than needed can expose your store to unnecessary risk.

You must follow the principle of least privilege—only authorize the specific data and functions an app needs. Inventory apps like Prediko are built with this in mind, requesting only what’s required to forecast, sync, and manage stock effectively.

Being intentional with access scopes not only protects your data but also helps keep your tech stack clean and compliant.

Use Prediko to Bypass Shopify’s Inventory API Limitations

Shopify’s Inventory API helps manage stock levels and sync inventory across locations. But when you need forecasting, automation, or control over large catalogs, it falls short. 

Inventory apps, like Prediko, can take over where the API ends, helping you automate restocks, predict demand using past sales and supplier lead times, and manage inventory across all your channels from a single place.

If you think Prediko can replace and improve the workflows you've built with Shopify’s Inventory API, start your 14-day free trial today. Connecting your store takes just minutes, and you’re ready to build smarter, faster inventory workflows.

Frequently Asked Questions

How do I extract inventory from Shopify?

Use the Admin API (REST or GraphQL) or export data manually from the Inventory section in the Shopify admin. Or you can use apps like Prediko that sync with your Shopify store inventory in real-time. 

What are the limitations of Shopify's Inventory API?

It doesn’t track long-term inventory history, lacks forecasting, and is limited by API rate caps and basic inventory states.

Are there any risks in integrating third-party apps with Shopify?

Yes. Risks include data exposure, store slowdowns, app conflicts, and unexpected costs. Always review permissions and choose trusted, high-rated apps.