For example, a founder on Shopify Plus hires a general developer in July to rebuild a Ruby discount rule. Shopify Scripts, the old way to change prices at checkout, stopped running on 30 June 2026. The rebuilt rule works in a test cart. It fails on a 200 line trade order.
We are a Shopify Plus agency, so we compete with some of the people you will interview. Read this for the money anyway. A wrong hire costs you the fees. Then it costs you the rebuild.
The short answer. Hire a Shopify Plus developer who can show five shipped things. The five are a Shopify Function, a checkout extension, a B2B price list setup, a custom Shopify CLI app, and code within Function limits. Then pay for one 4 to 6 hour trial task before you sign.
| Check | Ask this | A good answer sounds like | A red flag sounds like |
|---|---|---|---|
| Shopify Function | Walk me through the last Function you shipped | Names the input, the deploy step and the limit they hit | "I have worked with Functions on a few projects" |
| Checkout extension | Show me a checkout extension you built | Opens a preview on a test store and explains the rollout | "We test it in staging", with nothing to show |
| B2B price list | How is a B2B price list different from a customer tag? | Explains company, location and price list, and the tax effects | "Both give different prices to different people" |
| Custom app | Show me a custom app you built | Opens a repo and walks the folder and hosting choice | Describes the idea and shows nothing |
| Limits | What is the instruction limit on a Function? | 11 million, and a story about hitting it | "It is pretty fast" |
Decision rule. If a candidate cannot show an artifact for at least four of the five checks, do not hire them for Plus work. Pay for one trial task before you sign. The four-of-five cut-off is our judgement, not a measured rule.
Who this is for, and who it is not for. This is for you if your store is on the Plus plan and you are about to hire. It is also for you if you inherited a build you cannot read.
It is not for you if you run a standard Shopify store with a theme and a few apps. That work suits a general Shopify developer.
What each of the five checks means
Shopify Plus is Shopify’s top plan, built for larger stores. Here is each check in plain words.
- Shopify Functions. A Function is a small program Shopify runs inside checkout. It ships inside an app. Developers write Functions in JavaScript or Rust, which are programming languages. In our judgement most use JavaScript.
- Checkout extensions. checkout.liquid was the old checkout template, written in Shopify’s Liquid language. It is gone. We have not re-verified that on a Shopify page, so treat it as judgement. Custom checkout work now lives in checkout UI extensions. These are add-ons to the checkout page, written in React. React is a tool for building screens.
- B2B price lists. B2B means selling to other businesses. The buyer is a contact at a company at a location. A price list is attached to that company. B2B tools are now on every Shopify plan (Shopify pricing). Using them is not proof of Plus work.
- Custom apps and the Shopify CLI. The CLI, or command line interface, is the tool developers use to build and deploy apps. Anything custom now lives in an app. That needs backend skill, meaning code that runs on a server. Look for Node or Ruby. Look for OAuth, the login handshake between apps. Look for webhooks, which are automatic messages when something happens in the store. Look for the Admin API, which is how software reads and changes store data.
- Work that respects the limits. Code can pass in a three line test cart and fail on a 200 line trade order. We see this failure most. We have not measured how often.
Functions fail on real carts, not in the demo
Ask for the numbers below by heart. A developer who has shipped a Function has hit at least one. Shopify publishes them on its Function limits page. It notes that values scale up past 200 cart lines.
| Limit | Value | Where it bites |
|---|---|---|
| Instructions per run (steps the code may take) | 11 million | Loops over every line of a trade order |
| Runtime memory | 10,000 kB | Large product data pulled into the Function |
| Compiled app file | 256 kB | Heavy libraries added for one helper |
| Input | 128 kB | Asking for fields the rule never reads |
| Output | 20 kB | Changing many lines at once |
The same page warns that Function output cannot change the price of every line item in bulk. A candidate should know when a discount Function or a B2B price list is the better tool.
The deadline has passed. Shopify states: “As of June 30, 2026, Shopify Scripts has been deprecated. Any Scripts that were still published on your store have been deactivated and no longer work” (Scripts migration page). The scope of that rebuild is in our Scripts sunset post.
The Plus Partner badge is gone, so screen on shipped work
Founders still ask us to find a Plus Partner. That badge no longer exists. Shopify states this: “In April 2024, the Shopify Plus Partner Directory was replaced by the unified Shopify Partner Directory”. It adds: “The Shopify Plus Partner Program was sunset in December 2024” (Shopify’s migration notice).
An agency still selling you the badge is selling a title Shopify retired. A Partner is a company Shopify lists as an approved builder.
So screen on shipped work. These channels run from worst to best, in our judgement. We have not measured them.
- Open marketplaces. Plenty of profiles, very few Plus builds. Ask each profile for one live Plus store they worked on.
- Curated marketplaces. Better developers, generic screening. Run your own technical interview on top.
- The Shopify Partner Directory. Useful for finding agencies. It will not tell you who writes the code. Ask for the named developer and a sample of shipped work.
- Search on the skill, not the plan. Search “Shopify Functions” or “checkout extension”, not “Shopify Plus”. Only people who shipped that work list it.
- Other Plus merchants. The best channel in our experience. Ask two of them who fixed their checkout.
Pay for one trial task. Before any contract, pay for 4 to 6 hours of real work. Ship a small discount Function to a test store, document the deploy and write one test.
That is our own practice. The cost is a few billable hours. The cost of skipping it is the rebuild.
In house, contractor or agency
Pick the model that fits the work. Do not pick the one that fits this quarter’s budget.
| Model | Fits when | Fails when |
|---|---|---|
| In-house developer (an employee) | 30 or more hours of dev work a week, ongoing app upkeep | Under 10 hours a week, because you pay for idle time |
| Contractor | One scoped project, and you have someone to review it | Nobody technical scopes it, so the contractor decides |
| Specialist agency | Time-boxed work needing senior judgement fast | Steady 40 hour weeks, where the hourly maths stops working |
| Full-service agency | Plus work is one of five jobs beside email and ads | The hard build is the point, so it gets passed down |
Run the arithmetic before you post a job. Multiply your real weekly dev hours by a contractor’s quoted hourly rate and by 52. If the total is below the loaded cost of a salary, a contractor is cheaper. Loaded cost means salary plus benefits and tax.
Be honest about the hours. Take an illustrative store with 6 hours of real work a week. At a quoted $140 USD an hour, a contractor costs about $43,680 a year. Replace the hours with your own. If the agency route fits, a Shopify development agency can cover the build without a permanent hire.
What breaks, and who owns it
The usual push-back is that a good interview is enough. It is not, because a bad hire looks fine for a few months. These are five patterns we meet in builds we inherit. We have not measured how common each one is.
- The theme developer with a Plus headline. The portfolio is themes, meaning the look of the store, built in Liquid and sections. No app, no Function, no checkout work.
- The app installer. Every problem becomes another subscription, and no one can explain them.
- “I will pick it up as we go.” They will, on your store, at your rate.
- The agency with no named developer. You meet the lead and the manager. A junior writes the code.
- “We just need to rebuild it.” Sometimes true. Ask for a written list of what stays and why.
Who owns the build after the contract ends is the question nobody asks. Name the person who accepts each change before work starts.
We build the Shopify Plus platform for SENE Studio. There, 37 changes reached the order systems between 14 July and 8 September 2026. A named person accepted every one. That gate is the difference between a build you can hand over and one you cannot.
Three things to do this week
- Score your stack against the five checks. Write down which of the five is covered today.
- Write the trial task. One page: a small discount Function on a test store, a documented deploy and one test. Budget 4 to 6 hours and pay for it.
- Get a second read on the scope. Before you sign anything large, have someone outside the deal check what is really being built.
Common questions
Do I need a Shopify Plus developer if my store is on a standard plan?
Usually not. A store with a theme and a few apps suits a general Shopify developer. Hire for Plus skills when you rely on Functions, checkout extensions or a custom app. B2B tools alone are not the test, because they are now on every plan. If you plan to move to Plus within twelve months, start with someone who has shipped Functions.
Is a Shopify Plus Partner badge still a useful filter?
No, because it no longer exists. Shopify replaced the Plus Partner Directory with the unified Partner Directory in April 2024. It sunset the Plus Partner Program in December 2024. Use the Partner Directory to find agencies, then test for shipped Functions, checkout extensions and custom apps yourself.
Do Shopify Scripts still work?
No. Shopify states that as of 30 June 2026 Scripts has been deprecated, and any Scripts still published were deactivated. Discount, shipping and payment logic now has to live in Functions. Ask any candidate for a Function they migrated from a Script, with the deploy step and the limit they hit.
How much does a Shopify Plus developer cost?
Not measured here, because rates vary by region and seniority and we hold no sourced market sample. Get three written quotes for the same scoped task. Then price the trial task first. Between 4 and 6 hours of paid work shows you the real rate and the real quality before a contract.
Can one developer cover all five skills?
A few can, and they are expensive. The common pattern is one senior who covers four well. A specialist then covers the fifth, most often performance work under the Function limits. An agency bundles that. An in-house team hires twice.
Facts checked October 2026. Shopify’s Function limits, Scripts migration, Partner Directory and pricing pages were re-read on 5 October 2026. Re-check by 5 November 2026. Sources: Function limits, Scripts migration, Partner Directory migration, Shopify pricing.
