Sales Channel App: must all merchant-facing features be embedded in Shopify admin?

Partner Discussions
1

Hi everyone,

We’re currently transitioning our app into a Sales Channel app and I’d like to confirm one point about Shopify’s requirements.

Does being classified as a Sales Channel app mean that all merchant-facing features (e.g., product management, order sync, channel settings, reporting/analytics) must be embedded directly in the Shopify admin using App Bridge?

Or is it acceptable to keep some functionality in an external brand portal (hosted on our platform), as long as the core sales channel functions (product publishing, order sync) are fully handled within the Shopify admin dashboard?

This clarification will really help us design the app in the right way.

Thanks in advance for your insights!

Daniel

2

Hey @dev_curaya, thanks for reaching out :waving_hand:.

In general, we do require sales channels to be embedded within the Admin and to follow our design best practices so that they feel native (App Bridge/Polaris), but we do permit some external experiences if functionality can’t be reasonably integrated.

We do expect that the primary/day to day workflows remain in the admin, but If you’re open to sharing what features you’d need to host externally, I’m happy to look into that to see if they’d be considered exceptions though. Hope this helps!