Store Leads
The State of Shopify in 2021
Shopify is the dominant ecommerce platform with a large user base and very impressive growth. Only WooCommerce rivals the number of stores using Shopify, however the value of the average Shopify merchant is much higher than the average WooCommerce merchant.
In this report, we'll cover the following essential statistics on Shopify usage.
- Shopify growth
- Social media usage on Shopify stores
- Contact information on Shopify stores
- Top categories for Shopify stores
- Top countries for Shopify stores
- Top Shopify apps
- Number of employees for Shopify stores
- Number of products sold for Shopify stores
- Top Shopify technologies
- Top Shipping Carriers used by Shopify stores
- Top Shopify themes
- Shopify store top-level domain distribution
- Top Shopify stores
- New Shopify stores
- Stores switching to Shopify from other platforms
- Stores switching from Shopify to other platforms
Create a free account to get a feel for the data we provide.
Shopify Growth
At present, there are 1,655,149 live stores running on the Shopify platform.
Shopify's quarter-over-quarter growth has been quite impressive over the last few years. With the world's economy continuing to move online, there is little reason to expect it to change.
Shopify has recently diversified into offline commerce, and is now an omni-channel platform, though it is safe to say that the vast majority of their volume remains online commerce.
- Shopify stores increased 13.5% quarter-over-quarter in 2021 Q3.
- Shopify stores increased 74% year-over-year in 2021 Q3.
Cumulative Stores by Quarter
It's hard to know exactly when a Shopify store was first created but we use a heuristic combining DNS and WHOIS data that provides a reasonable approximation.
Social Media Usage On Shopify Stores
Ecommerce brands use social media sites to engage with millions of consumers. Instagram and Facebook are the dominant social media sites for ecommerce stores, by far, with Twitter, Pinterest and YouTube also having notable usage.
- Instagram is used by 49.7% of Shopify stores.
- Facebook is used by 44.1% of Shopify stores.
- Twitter is used by 12.5% of Shopify stores.
Contact Information On Shopify Stores
Email remains an extremely popular communication channel for merchants. Many merchants also provide a phone number so that their customers can reach them instantly.
- 56% of Shopify stores have an email on their website
- 32% of Shopify stores provide a phone number on their website
Top Categories For Shopify Stores
Here is the breakdown of industry verticals for stores on Shopify.
- 28.5% of Shopify stores sell Apparel products.
- 10.7% of Shopify stores sell Home & Garden products.
- 10.3% of Shopify stores sell Beauty & Fitness products.
Top Countries For Shopify Stores
The largest part of Shopify's install base is within the United States, but they have a solid presence within the United Kingdom, Canada and Australia as well.
- 51.0% of Shopify stores are in United States
- 7.9% of Shopify stores are in United Kingdom
- 6.4% of Shopify stores are in Canada
- 5.6% of Shopify stores are in Australia
With a paid account, stores can also be segmented by region and city.
Shopify Plus
Many of the biggest stores are running Shopify Plus, Shopify's most expensive pricing plan which includes the most features. At present, there are 22,356 Shopify domains running Shopify Plus.
Top Shopify Apps
Shopify has done a phenomenal job creating a robust partner ecosystem for their platform. 4,676 different vendors have published 7,558 apps in the Shopify App Store.
Here are the top Shopify apps, ordered by number of installs, across all stores.
- 14.8% of Shopify stores have installed the Product Reviews Shopify app.
- 12.5% of Shopify stores have installed the Klaviyo: Email Marketing & SMS Shopify app.
- 9.8% of Shopify stores have installed the Mailchimp Shopify app.
This list is not representative of all Shopify apps since we are only able to detect a subset of app installs. Fortunately, many of the most popular apps can be detected. At present, we are tracking 4,978,551 installs for 2,148 different apps.
With a paid account on Store Leads, you'll be able to see which stores have installed specific apps. You can also see when specific apps were installed (or uninstalled) by each store.
You may also be interested in the following reports that look at the top Shopify apps by segment:
Number Of Employees For Shopify Stores
Here is the breakdown of Shopify stores by the number of employees.
- 0.8% of Shopify stores have 1 - 9 employees.
- 0.4% of Shopify stores have 10 - 24 employees.
- 0.2% of Shopify stores have 25 - 49 employees.
Number Of Products Sold For Shopify Stores
Here is the breakdown of Shopify stores by the number of products that they sell.
- 22.0% of Shopify stores sell 1 - 9 different products.
- 17.1% of Shopify stores sell 10 - 24 different products.
- 14.4% of Shopify stores sell 25 - 49 different products.
Top Technologies on Shopify Stores
Many Shopify merchants run third-party technologies on their store in addition to apps from the Shopify App Store.
We're tracking 347 different technologies that have 8,961,827 collective installs on Shopify stores.
- Cloudflare CDN is used by 98.0% of Shopify stores.
- Apple Pay is used by 60.4% of Shopify stores.
- Shop Pay is used by 52.2% of Shopify stores.
Here are the top 10 third-party technologies, ordered by number of installs, across all Shopify stores.
Top Shipping Carriers Used By Shopify Stores
- USPS is used by 8.9% of Shopify stores.
- UPS is used by 7.4% of Shopify stores.
- Fedex is used by 3.0% of Shopify stores.
Here are the top 10 shipping carriers across all Shopify stores.
Top Shopify Themes
Shopify has an active and extension theme store. Merchants using Shopify can use one of those pre-built theme or develop their own custom theme to meet their needs. We're currently tracking over 500 different Shopify themes. Here are the top themes.
- The debut theme is used by 26.7% of Shopify stores and is the most popular theme.
- The brooklyn theme is used by 6.0% of Shopify stores and is the second most popular theme.
- The minimal theme is used by 5.5% of Shopify stores and is the third most popular theme.
Shopify Store Top-level Domain Distribution
.com is the most popular top-level domain for Shopify stores. This is not surprising since alternate top-level domains have only been introduced somewhat recently and there is still a certain cachet associated with .com domains.
That said, you'll find stark regional differences in certain countries. In Australia, .com.au is the most common top-level domain with .com a close second. This is the exception however as .com domains dominate in virtually all other countries.
- 73.1% of Shopify stores have a .com domain.
- 3.0% of Shopify stores have a .co.uk domain.
- 2.8% of Shopify stores have a .com.au domain.
Top Shopify Stores
Shopify powers some of the biggest and most popular stores on the Internet. Here are the top Shopify stores ordered by worldwide store rank.
New Shopify Stores
Shopify continues to add high-ranking stores every week. Here are the 5 highest-ranked stores added most recently.
Stores Switching to Shopify From Other Platforms
Over the last 90 days, Shopify has taken 18,253 merchants from competitive ecommerce platforms.
Here are the top stores that have switched to Shopify from competitive ecommerce platforms.
Stores Switching from Shopify To Other Platforms
Over the last 90 days, Shopify has lost 21,320 merchants to competitive platforms.
Here are the top Shopify stores that have recently changed to a competitive platform.
Get more insights on Shopify stores
Our search interface is easy to use and helps you find the Shopify stores that are relevant to you.
You can segment stores on a variety of dimensions:
- Social Media accounts
- Email address
- Phone numbers
- Country
- Installed Apps
- Theme and Theme Vendor
- Number of Products Sold
- Third-party technologies
- Creation date
- Platform
- Top-level domains
- Domain status
- Domain type
For more insights on Shopify stores, create a free account and have a look for yourself.