Transfer Etsy to Shopify: The Full Migration Guide

What actually transfers from Etsy to Shopify

Not everything comes with you, and the guides that say "it's easy, no coding required" quietly skip this part. Here is the honest split.

Moves cleanly (via CSV): product titles, descriptions, prices, tags, and variant/pricing data export via Etsy's built-in CSV download from Shop Manager → Settings → Options → Download Data, and import into Shopify admin under Products → Import or via the Store Migration app. Note that the CSV from Etsy only includes listings that are currently available for sale — you may need to temporarily re-list other products to include them in your export.

Moves, but needs work: product images are not included as importable URLs in the Etsy CSV — you will need to download them manually or use a migration tool that handles image transfer. Descriptions often need reformatting because Etsy and Shopify handle line breaks and HTML differently. On Shopify you can use rich HTML, embedded videos, and comparison charts that Etsy's character-limited fields never allowed. Complex variants also need hands-on cleanup: a product can have a maximum of 3 options in Shopify's importer — products with more than 3 options won't have their options imported, so spot-check variant-heavy products after import. You can resolve this issue using third-party apps or metafields.

Does not move at all: personalization fields, shipping profiles, and customer reviews do not transfer automatically. Your Etsy search ranking does not follow you, and your Etsy shop URL and SEO authority also do not carry over, which makes redirect planning critical. Etsy's algorithm is entirely separate from Google, and your Shopify store will need to build its own search presence from scratch.

Customers — the most misunderstood part: Order history and customer data are exportable as separate CSVs from Shop Manager → Settings → Options → Download Data → Orders section. However, you don't own your Etsy customers' email addresses — Etsy's terms prevent using them off-platform — so you'll be starting fresh with customer acquisition on Shopify. You can only bring over customers who voluntarily joined your newsletter list. When importing orders, make sure to include both the orders and the order items files to facilitate a successful transfer.

That last group is why a migration is a project, not a button.

How to export Etsy customers and orders

Exporting customers and orders is a separate job from exporting products. Here is the exact path:

1. Export orders: From Shop Manager → Settings → Options → Download Data, navigate to the Orders section, choose CSV as the type, select the period (month and year), and click Download CSV.
2. Export order items: From Shop Manager, separately download your order items data — this is a second file you need alongside the orders CSV for a complete import.
3. Export reviews: From the same Download Data location, scroll down and select "Download Your Reviews" to get a JSON file you can later import into a Shopify review app.
4. Import into Shopify: In your Shopify admin, navigate to Apps and choose Store Importer, then upload your CSVs. Note that if you have any pending orders, you must close them before transferring — when pending orders are imported, they are handled as completed orders.

Remember: the email addresses in your customer export are restricted by Etsy's policy. Etsy's policy only allows you to contact customers about their order and forbids any kinds of unwarranted promotions — you can only migrate clients that have joined your newsletter list voluntarily.

Why sellers leave Etsy

The friction compounds over time. Transaction fees sit at 6.5% per sale (per Etsy's published fee schedule), plus a per-listing fee and payment processing on top. You cannot access customer emails for remarketing, branding is heavily restricted, and your visibility depends entirely on Etsy's algorithm rather than your own marketing. Etsy's fee structure can genuinely eat into margins you can't absorb, and you end up with no platform-independent brand identity.

Shopify removes all of that: you get a fully owned storefront, your own domain, direct customer data, and a checkout experience you control entirely. Integration with Google tracking and Facebook Pixel makes Shopify a favorite for larger brands looking to market their products at scale — something Etsy cannot offer.

For print-on-demand sellers specifically, owning your store also means you can run Meta and Google ads to your own audience, set your own pricing without Etsy's algorithm penalizing you for it, and collect customer emails to build repeat-buyer flows — none of which are fully available on Etsy.

The four ways to transfer Etsy to Shopify

There is no single "transfer" button, so pick the method that matches how much data you have.

1. Shopify's own Store Migration app

Shopify ships a first-party Store Migration app that pulls products from Etsy straight into your Shopify admin (Shopify Help Center). After installing the Store Migration app, export your products from Etsy in CSV format and upload the CSV into the app, without making changes to the CSV. It is the cleanest option when it works — but availability varies by store, and the importer has limits (notably the three-option maximum for variants), so check whether it covers your catalog before relying on it.

2. Manual CSV export and import

Export your listings from Etsy's Shop Manager, clean up the CSV so it matches Shopify's column template, and upload it in Shopify admin → Products → Import. Free and full-control, but the column mapping is fiddly and large catalogs get tedious. Google Sheets is recommended to edit a formatted version of your CSV files. Best for stores under roughly a hundred listings.

3. A dedicated migration app

Apps like Easy:Import, LitExtension, Matrixify, and Cart2Cart handle products — and some handle orders and customers too. LitExtension transfers products, customers, orders, blogs, and reviews in three steps without disrupting your store's operations. They cost a small one-time or monthly fee and save hours of column-wrangling. Best for large or variant-heavy catalogs, or any store where the three-option import limit would cause variant data loss.

4. Run both stores in parallel

Shopify's Marketplace Connect app lets you keep selling on Etsy while managing everything from Shopify, syncing listings, orders, and inventory. If you want to grow into something bigger, adding Shopify alongside Etsy is probably the better path rather than a hard cutover. Keep Etsy for discovery traffic while you build your own Shopify audience — just make sure to use an inventory sync tool, because overselling a POD item on two channels simultaneously causes refunds. This is less a migration and more a hedge — good if you are not ready to leave Etsy's built-in traffic behind.

Step-by-step: exporting Etsy and importing to Shopify

Here is the order that keeps you from re-doing work.

1. Export your Etsy data. Pull your listings CSV from Shop Manager → Settings → Options → Download Data. Separately, export your orders CSV, your order items CSV, and your reviews JSON — they are all separate files and separate jobs. The CSV only includes listings that are currently available for sale — temporarily re-list any products you want to include.
2. Set up Shopify first. Create the store, pick a plan, and build your shipping zones before you import anything, because products land without shipping rules attached.
3. Rewrite your SEO titles. On Etsy, titles are stuffed with keywords for the search algorithm. On Shopify, write natural titles that appeal to humans while being keyword-rich for Google. This is also a good time to expand descriptions — Shopify has no character limit, so you can add specifications, size guides, and comparison sections.
4. Import products. Use the Store Migration app, the manual CSV route, or a dedicated migration app. Then spot-check ten listings for broken formatting, missing images, and collapsed variant combinations — especially for any products with more than three option types.
5. Download and re-upload images. The Etsy CSV does not carry importable image URLs, so download product photos separately and re-upload them in Shopify, or use a migration tool that automates this step.
6. Set up URL redirects. Your Etsy listings had their own URLs. Plan redirects for any Shopify product pages you want Google to find, especially your bestsellers.
7. Import orders. Include both the orders and the order items files to facilitate a successful transfer, and close any pending orders in Etsy before importing.
8. Handle customers with care. Etsy does not hand you a clean, email-marketable customer list. Only bring over subscribers who opted into your newsletter — using the broader export for email marketing violates Etsy's terms.
9. Rebuild reviews. Etsy's review system is platform-specific, so you will need to rebuild social proof on Shopify using an app like Judge.me. You can download your reviews as a JSON file from the same Download Data section and re-import them via a review app, but expect some to be unrecoverable.

Budget a weekend for a small store and a week for a large one. Product data is fast; the cleanup and the reconciliation are what eat the hours.

What to do about Etsy SEO after migration

This is the subtopic most migration guides skip. Etsy SEO and Shopify SEO are different disciplines. Etsy's algorithm is entirely separate from Google, and your Shopify store will need to build its own search presence from scratch. Etsy's algorithm rewards keyword-stuffed titles; Google rewards readable, intent-matching copy. When you move, you lose Etsy's marketplace authority and the search traffic it brought — so you need to replace it with your own organic presence and paid traffic.

For POD sellers, the paid-traffic replacement is usually Meta or Google ads. Running both stores in parallel during the transition lets Etsy's search traffic keep coming in while you build Shopify's own audience. See our guides on scaling Facebook Ads on Shopify for print-on-demand and Facebook Ads agencies for ecommerce: what POD operators should know to plan that transition.

The fee math nobody runs (the profit angle)

Every other guide lists fees and moves on. But the fees are the reason people move — so let us actually run the numbers, because Etsy and Shopify take their cut in completely different shapes.

On Etsy, transaction fees sit at 6.5% per sale (per Etsy's published fee schedule), plus a $0.20 per-listing fee and payment processing on top. On Shopify, there is no per-listing fee and no transaction fee when you use Shopify Payments — you pay a flat monthly plan fee instead. The break-even logic: divide your Shopify monthly plan cost by your per-order savings on transaction fees. Below that order count, Etsy's pay-per-sale model may still be cheaper. Above it, Shopify's flat fees win — and the gap widens with every additional sale. That calculation is exactly what the "just switch!" articles never show you.

For POD sellers, the margin math gets a further layer: production and shipping costs from your fulfillment partner eat into every order, and once you are running ads to replace Etsy's built-in traffic, your ad spend is a third cost line. See our breakdowns of Printful's shipping calculator step-by-step and Printify hoodie base costs to run the numbers on your specific products before you migrate.

What breaks after you migrate: the reconciliation problem

Here is the trap. Once you are on Shopify and running your own Meta or Google ads to replace Etsy's built-in traffic, your numbers stop agreeing with each other — and it is not a bug.

Shopify counts a sale when a real order completes. Meta claims a sale whenever its ad was clicked or even just seen inside its attribution window, so a gap between Meta-reported purchases and actual Shopify orders is normal on the default window. Then your bank deposit is a third number entirely, because a Shopify payout subtracts processing fees, refunds, and chargeback fees before the cash lands.

So one week of sales can show up as several different totals: ad-platform purchases, Shopify orders, total sales after refunds, and cash in the bank. None is wrong; they answer different questions. This is the part of leaving Etsy that catches sellers off guard. On Etsy, the platform hid the fees and the attribution inside a single dashboard. On Shopify, you own the whole stack — which is more control and more moving parts.

That is where PodVector fits. Victor, its AI employee, reads your live data from Shopify, Meta Ads, Google Ads, Printify, Printful, and Klaviyo, then computes your true per-order margin after every fee and ad dollar. When something is quietly losing money, Victor flags it and proposes a Shopify-side move — repricing a worst-margin SKU, adjusting a free-shipping threshold, or creating a discount — which you approve or reject before anything changes. He reads your ad data but does not touch your ad account. It is not a dashboard you babysit — it is an AI employee that does the reconciliation math you would otherwise do by hand every week. Learn how AI fits into a post-migration Shopify store in our guide to the POD seller's guide to AI solutions for ecommerce.

Post-migration quick wins for POD sellers

Once your store is live on Shopify, a few moves pay off quickly:

• Connect your fulfillment partner. If you have not already, set up your Printify or Printful integration on Shopify before your first order lands. Our Shopify–Printify integration setup guide and Printful US shipping times and costs guide will get you sorted quickly.
• Set up a free-shipping threshold. Shopify lets you configure a free-shipping threshold that Etsy never gave you direct control over. A well-set threshold raises average order value and can improve conversion rate on paid traffic. Victor can propose and execute the right threshold for your catalog with your approval.
• Launch Meta ads to seed your Shopify audience. Etsy provided built-in discovery; Shopify does not. Our guide to scaling Facebook Ads on Shopify for print-on-demand covers how to build that audience from scratch without wasting your first budget.
• Explore fulfillment options while you have a fresh slate. If you are also running WordPress, see our Printify WordPress setup guide for a multi-channel setup that keeps inventory in sync.
• Run both channels until Shopify traffic is proven. Closing your Etsy shop before you have replaced its traffic is the most common post-migration mistake. Keep it open, use Marketplace Connect to sync inventory, and treat the migration as a parallel build rather than a hard cutover.

FAQs

How long does it take to transfer Etsy to Shopify?

Product data moves in a few hours to a day, depending on catalog size and method. A fully reconciled store — products, customers, orders, reviews, shipping rules, URL redirects, and a spot-check — usually takes a weekend for a small shop and up to a week for a large, variant-heavy one. The copy is fast; the cleanup is slow.

Can I export Etsy customers to Shopify?

Partially. You can export order and customer data as CSVs from Etsy's Download Data section, but Etsy's terms prevent using customer email addresses off-platform, so you will be starting fresh with customer acquisition on Shopify. You can only migrate clients that have joined your newsletter list voluntarily. Import the order history for records and for identifying past buyers — just do not use the broader email list for cold marketing campaigns.

Can I move my Etsy reviews to Shopify?

Not directly into the storefront. You can download your reviews as a JSON file from the Download Data section, then import them through a Shopify review app like Judge.me. Expect to lose some in the process — many sellers treat the migration as a fresh start and use the launch as an opportunity to solicit new verified reviews from their first Shopify orders.

Will I lose my Etsy sales history?

Only if you skip the step. Past orders and customer data are exportable from Etsy and importable into Shopify with dedicated order-migration apps — they just do not ride along with your product import. When importing orders, make sure to include both the orders and the order items files to facilitate a successful transfer. Moving them is worth it for records and for marketing to past newsletter subscribers.

Is Shopify cheaper than Etsy?

It depends on your volume. Etsy charges a 6.5% transaction fee per sale (per Etsy's published fee schedule), a per-listing fee, and payment processing on top. Shopify charges a flat monthly plan fee with no transaction fee when you use Shopify Payments. Divide your monthly plan cost by your per-order transaction fee savings to find your personal break-even order count. Below it, Etsy's pay-as-you-sell model can be cheaper; above it, Shopify wins and the gap grows with volume.

Do I have to close my Etsy shop when I move to Shopify?

No. If you want to grow into something bigger, adding Shopify alongside Etsy is probably the better path. Shopify's Marketplace Connect app syncs inventory across both channels. Migrating your data does not force you to leave Etsy — and leaving too early, before Shopify traffic is proven, is the most common post-migration mistake.

What does not transfer from Etsy to Shopify?

Personalization fields, shipping profiles, customer reviews, favorites, and shop stats do not transfer. Your Etsy SEO rankings stay on Etsy. You don't own your Etsy customers' email addresses — Etsy's terms prevent using them off-platform. All of these are rebuild jobs, not blockers — but budget time for them.

What happens to pending orders when I migrate?

If you have any pending orders, you must close them before transferring your orders to Shopify — when pending orders are imported, they are handled as completed orders. Fulfill or cancel all open Etsy orders before running your migration to avoid confusion in your new store's order records.

Why don't my Shopify, Meta, and bank numbers match after migrating?

Because they measure different things. Shopify counts completed orders, Meta counts ad-influenced purchases inside its attribution window, and your payout reflects cash after fees and refunds. A gap between them is expected, not broken — the goal is to reconcile them into one true profit figure, not to force them to be equal. Victor, PodVector's AI employee, reads your live data across Shopify, Meta Ads, Google Ads, Printify, Printful, and Klaviyo to surface that reconciled view — and proposes Shopify-side moves (with your approval) when the margin math says something needs to change. Try PodVector free to see how it fits your post-migration stack.