Discount codes

Discount codes are the most common type of discount method. Customers enter a specific code at checkout to receive a discount. Commonly used for specific marketing strategies, such as email campaigns or partnerships. Discount codes can lead to increased engagement, a sense of exclusivity, and a sense of urgency, but forgotten discount codes might lead to cart abandonment.

When you create a new discount code, it displays in the Discounts section of your Shopify admin. To distribute this discount code, you can send the code to your customers by email, or display it on your online store. Your customers need to enter the code during checkout to receive the discount.

When you create a discount code, you can configure the following details:

• The dates for which the code is valid
• The number of times that a code can be used
• A minimum order amount before the code can be used
• Which products, collections, or variants the discount can be applied to
• If the discount combines with other discount classes

Your customers can redeem discount codes in your online store and in person if you're using Shopify POS.

After your discount codes are set up, you can use the Sales by discount report to find out how often your discount codes are being used.

Considerations for creating discount codes

Before you create a discount code, review the following considerations:

• A discount code can apply to up to 100 specific customers, products, and variants. If you exceed that, then an error message displays: There is 1 error with this discount code: Item entitlements exceeded max number.
• There's a cumulative limit of 20,000,000 unique discount codes for each store. After your store reaches this limit, you can delete discount codes in order to create new discount codes. Third-party apps and custom solutions cannot bypass or increase this limit.
• To ensure that discount code names are added correctly to your store's checkout URL, avoid using special characters in the name of the discount code.
• If you create a discount with a start and end time, then the time is based on the time zone that you selected in your Shopify admin. For example, if your store's time zone is Eastern Standard Time (EST) and you select a start date of November 26, then your discount starts at 12:00 a.m. EST on November 26.
• A discount with the maximum use of one per customer applies only to that specific discount. If you delete that discount and then add in a duplicate with the same maximum use restriction, then customers who used the previous discount can also use this new discount one time.
• If a customer applies a discount code at checkout, then it won't apply to their post-purchase offers.
• Discount codes can't be applied on the post-purchase page at checkout.