I’m trying to setup a new custom app for a client store. We have a number of internal migration tools (metafields, metaobejcts, menus, etc.) that use the Admin API, however I’m receiving the error in the screenshot
My colleague has been in touch with Shopify and they said
After looking into this further, it appears the issue is related to the type of development store you are using. Stores created under the “Create a store for a client” option do not support building or testing custom apps. To access the tools needed for building and testing custom apps, you will need to create your development stores using the “Create a store to test and build” option instead.
I’m 100% sure this didn’t used to be the case. Does anyone know when this changed, and how we are supposed to create new stores for clients without the ability to add custom apps to them?
Thanks Jon - if you can share the store URL I can look more directly into this. If you’re building stores in the partner dashboard to transfer to clients they are not able to have custom apps created in them. This isn’t a new change and is not related to the developer platform.
Hi, @TerenceShopify . I have to disagree. What @jon-radiant is talking about is custom apps created through the store’s admin (this type: https://help.shopify.com/en/manual/apps/app-types/custom-apps) which are very different from regular apps. Their direct purpose is to be built for that specific site, and they are not “development” apps, they are the final apps that will be used only on that specific store.
Shopify allowed this, we built multiple apps like this, either to connect directly through the Admin API to GraphQL or to use in the theme for the Storefront API integration. In our case, we don’t have an install process or OAuth, nor does it have an admin UI. It’s a custom integration built for the specific needs of the customer and their site.
On Shopify Plus development stores, Shopify no longer allows us to create these apps. The admin interface to create the apps is still there, no warning is displayed, until you actually try to create the app and then you get the error in the screenshot. I personally think it’s related to the new Developer Platform/Dashboard - in the migration, you broke the old functionality. While improving the workflow for regular apps, site-specific custom apps were broken. But it only happens for stores using Shopify Plus features in our case.
i faced the same issue. Totally agree with @Bogdan_Barbu this seem like a bug not a new change. shopify changed the name from ‘custom app’ to ‘legacy custom app’ but did not allow to create at the development store. while still able to create at ‘shopify plus sandbox’ =))
@Nguyen_Tran@TerenceShopify Does anyone know if “legacy custom apps” can be created on the Shopify Plus stores when they are no longer in development (when they have been transferred to the client)? In any case, this change is strange and the error message in the admin area seems more like a bug, because there’s text missing from the message (“exceeds limit….” - what exceeds limit? There’s no subject in the sentence, contrary to how English is written).
Do we have any solution for this? I came across the same issue. I have a Shopify Plus store that’s transferred and currently running there, I’m able to create custom apps without any problem. I can also create apps for development stores that are non-Plus.
However, when I create a development store and select that it’s for a “Plus” client, I encounter the same issue. So, it might be true what’s mentioned in this thread.
I transfered the store to client and they went with Grow plan and now I am able to create the custom legacy app. So don’t know if there is any other way to fix this issue
Hi all - there is an issue with Client Transfer Stores if they are created with the Shopify Plus features. We are working to fix this. In the mean time you are able to create custom apps in client transfer stores so long as you don’t activate the Shopify Plus features when the store is created.
As observed above we have announced in the changelog that starting on January 1st of 2026 it will no longer be possible to create new custom apps in Admin. Instead all apps must be created in the Dev Dashboard. Dev Dashboard created apps have access to all of the features of the app platform whereas custom apps in admin have only a small set of features available. Additionally custom apps in the dashboard lack some of the security features of apps created in the Dev Dashboard.
So is there a way to do this (what Jon describes in his original post) via apps created in the dev dashboard? We also need to connect with GraphQL to add in products for a client store - a store that will need to run on Plus, and has > 100,000 SKUs, will need to add sometimes > 1000 in 24hrs and uses metafields, metaobjects etc. We had a dev store for them (without the plus features) using a custom app but came up against the limit of adding their product catalog - and now on a Plus store it seems we can’t use a custom app to do this…
You can create an app in the dev dashboard and then distribute it to your client’s store. When you choose distribution for your app you will want it to be a custom apps - assuming this is an app only for this one client. Then you will specify the URL of the store in which the app is to be installed. After that you can install the app into that client’s store with the URL provided in the partner dashboard.
We have already created the tools to push products into our store using graphql (and the fully documented admin api)
We have now upgraded to shopify plus, an expensive upgrade
The tools we built to import products no longer work, even though shopify promised they would.
It is unclear how to replicate our requirements to push products via graphql with this new dev system. Can you point us to the current documentation on how to simply upload products via graphql for shopify plus. One that isn’t broken.
Can you say more about what’s not working with the tools you built? There are a variety of ways to get access tokens that can be used to make GraphQL API requests - which one are you using in your tools?
Thanks for the reply, I have added the app the the dev dashboard and am trying to use the client credentials grant that you have specified. This gets me the message *Oauth error persistence_failed: There was a problem issuing an access token.
*
This is using a test site from the dev dashboard. It looks like it recognises the client id and secret, but wont go any further
I am also having problem retrieving an access token for my app created by Shopify CLI. {“error”:“persistence_failed”,“error_description”:“There was a problem issuing an access token.”}
This is the only error i’ve got and it’s not helpful at all, sadly. I can’t identify any problem by that error message
