Back In Stock Wizard for Shopify

Note: This guide covers the Shopify version of Back in Stock Wizard. If you installed the app on a BigCommerce store, see the BigCommerce Store Owner Guide instead – the storefront widget install and a few other steps work differently there.

Table of Contents

Getting Started

Installing the App

Back in Stock Wizard is available from the Shopify App Store. To install:

  1. Find Back in Stock Wizard in the Shopify App Store and click Add app / Install.
  2. Shopify shows an approval screen listing the permissions the app needs:
    • View products and View inventory – so the app knows when items are out of stock and when they are restocked
    • View themes – so the app can confirm the subscription form is installed on your storefront
    • Manage files – so you can upload images for your emails and form
  3. Approve the permissions to continue. You will be brought into the app automatically using your Shopify login – there is no separate account, password, or “enter your store domain” step.

If you later choose the legacy widget install method (for older themes), Shopify will ask you to approve one additional permission at that time.

Required Onboarding

After your first login, you will be guided through two required steps before you can access the dashboard:

Step 1: Welcome

Confirm your contact details and store address. You will be asked for:

Click Get Started to continue.

Step 2: Billing

Set up your payment method. Your subscription is billed through Shopify – approve the recurring charge to activate your plan. Once complete, you will have full access to the dashboard.

Initial Setup

After completing the required onboarding, you will see a setup checklist that walks you through configuring your store. These steps are optional but recommended:

  1. Email Template – Customize the look and feel of the “back in stock” notification emails sent to your subscribers. See Email Template for details.
  2. Subscription Form – Customize how the subscription form appears on your product pages. See Subscription Form for details.
  3. Mail Settings – Set up a custom email domain so notifications are sent from your own domain instead of a generic one. See Mail Settings for details.
  4. Enable Back in Stock Form – Add the subscription form to your storefront so customers can sign up for notifications. See Enabling Back in Stock on Your Storefront for details.

You can complete these steps in any order and return to them at any time.

Enabling Back in Stock on Your Storefront

The Back in Stock form is a small subscribe box that appears on your product pages. It shows only when a customer selects a variant (or product) that is out of stock, letting them enter their email to be notified when it is back.

On Shopify, the form is delivered as a theme app block that you add to your product page in the Shopify theme editor. You add the block once and it appears on every product page automatically.

Start from the button in the top navigation bar of your dashboard:

Clicking the button opens the Enable Back in Stock on your storefront window. The app first checks your live theme to determine which install method applies.

Recommended: add the app block (Online Store 2.0 themes)

Most modern themes (such as Dawn) support app blocks. You’ll see a three-step checklist:

  1. Click Open Theme Editor – a new tab opens with your product template and an Add app block prompt for Back in Stock.
  2. Click Add, drag the block to where you want the subscribe form to appear (most stores put it just below the Add to Cart button), then click Save in the top right.
  3. Come back to the app and click Verify Installation to confirm.

If verification succeeds, you’ll see “Back in Stock block is on your product page.” If it can’t find the block, you’ll see “Block not detected on your product template” – make sure you added the block to your product section and clicked Save in the theme editor, then verify again.

If you’ve placed the block but verification still can’t reach your theme, you can use Mark as Installed to flip the status manually.

 

 

Older themes: legacy install

If your theme is a vintage / Online Store 1.0 theme that can’t use app blocks, the window offers two options instead:

When a legacy install is active, the window shows a Legacy install active banner with an Uninstall button so you can remove it later. Removing it stops the form from loading on your storefront.

Dashboard

The Dashboard is your home page and provides an at-a-glance command center for your store’s subscription activity. The layout is built from a KPI strip, a chart + event-mix row, and a tabbed activity panel.

Setup Track

If you have not yet completed the initial setup checklist, a horizontal stepper appears at the top of the Dashboard. Each step shows its status (current, completed, or skipped), and the current step has an action button you can click to jump straight to that screen. You can also Skip a step if it does not apply. The stepper disappears once all steps are completed or skipped.

Date Range Filter

Use the Start Date and End Date fields at the top to filter dashboard data to a specific time period. By default, the dashboard shows the last 30 days.

KPI Tiles

A row of six tiles showing your most important metrics for the selected date range. Each tile displays the current value, the change versus the prior period, and a sparkline trend.

Daily Activity

A bar chart on the left showing activity trends over the selected date range:

Use the filter dropdown to group data by Day, Week, or Month.

Event Mix (last 24 hours)

A compact sidebar to the right of the Daily Activity chart that breaks down the last 24 hours of activity by event type, so you can see at a glance what is happening right now without changing the dashboard date range.

Activity Panel

A tabbed panel at the bottom of the dashboard:

Activity Log

A live, day-grouped feed of everything happening in your store. Each entry shows the event type, the product (when applicable), the subscriber email, and a relative timestamp. Use the filter chips at the top to narrow the feed to one or more event types:

Top Activity by Product

A table showing the products driving the most activity. Columns:

Profile

Access your profile by clicking your name in the top-right corner and selecting Profile.

You can update:

Subscribers

The Subscribers page gives you a complete view of everyone who has signed up for restock notifications. It is organized into three tabs:

Active Subscribers

Shows all currently active subscriptions – people waiting to be notified when a product comes back in stock. You can see the subscriber’s email, the product they are watching, and when they subscribed.

Subscriber History

Shows the full history of all subscriptions, including those that have already been notified, expired, or unsubscribed. This is useful for tracking engagement over time.

Subscriber Activity

Shows a log of events related to your subscribers, such as:

Products

The Products page shows all products in your store that have active or historical subscription activity. For each product, you can see:

Use this page to identify which products are most in-demand and prioritize restocking accordingly.

Features

The Features page shows additional capabilities and premium add-on modules available for your store.

Each feature displays:

Simply toggle a feature on to activate it, or off to deactivate it. Some features may require additional configuration after enabling – you will be guided through any necessary setup.

Settings

Email Template

Customize the notification emails that are sent to subscribers when a product comes back in stock. The page has a live preview on the right that updates as you make changes. Use the preview’s product dropdown to render the email with one of your own products (defaults to sample data). Two header actions are also available: Final Preview (full-size modal) and Send Test (delivers a real test email to an address you choose).

What you can customize:

Colors

Colors are split into five sub-sections so you only adjust what is relevant:

The form hides any color picker that has no visible effect – for example, the Description color hides if “Show Product Description” is off, and the View Item Button and Add to Cart Button sub-sections hide entirely when their show toggles are off. The Footer Link color hides until you fill in a Privacy or Terms URL (or enable Manage Subscriptions).

Use the Final Preview action to see your finished email at full size before saving, or Send Test to send a real notification email to yourself.

Subscription Form

Customize the appearance of the subscription form that appears on your product pages.

What you can customize:

Changes are previewed in real-time as you make them.

Mail Settings

Configure a custom email domain so that notification emails are sent from your own domain (e.g., notifications@yourdomain.com) instead of a generic address.

How to set up a custom domain:

  1. Enter your domain name and click Add Domain.
  2. The system will display the DNS records you need to add to your domain registrar:
    • DKIM record – For email authentication
    • SPF record – For sender verification
    • DMARC record – For email policy
  3. Add these DNS records at your domain registrar or hosting provider.
  4. Click Verify Domain to check that the records are properly configured.
  5. Once verified, your emails will be sent from your custom domain.

You can also Remove Domain if you want to revert to the default sending address.

Send-From Email Address

Once your domain is authenticated, a Send-From Email Address field appears in the custom-domain section. This lets you choose the address your notifications are sent from (and replied to). Type only the part before the @ – your verified domain is added automatically (shown as a @your-domain.com suffix on the field).

Data Export

Export your active subscriber data as a CSV file.

The export includes:

Click Export to generate the file. Previous exports are shown in the Export History table below, where you can download them again. Each export shows the date, who created it, file size, format, and download count.

Data Import

Import subscriber data from a CSV file to bulk-add subscriptions.

Your CSV needs columns for Email, Product Name, and a product identifier – SKU or Variant ID (at least one is required). A subscription Date column is optional.

The import follows a four-step wizard:

  1. Upload CSV File – Select your CSV file. Common column names are detected automatically.
  2. Preview Data – Review the first rows of your file to confirm it parsed correctly.
  3. Map Columns – Match your CSV columns to the required fields. The Product identifier group lets you map SKU and/or Variant ID – at least one is required. A Variant ID is resolved to a SKU against your live Shopify catalog, and each row is matched to the real product in your catalog so imported subscriptions attach to the same product the restock notifications watch.
  4. Results – The import is dispatched to run in the background. You’ll see a confirmation that it was queued (“Your import has been dispatched and will process in the background”). Use Import Another File to start a new import.

Imported totals appear in the Import History section below the wizard (Imported Products and Imported Subscribers), which updates once the background import finishes.

Billing

View and manage your subscription. On Shopify, billing is handled through Shopify’s recurring app charges, so your plan appears alongside your other Shopify app subscriptions.

What you can see:

Notifications to Inventory Percentage

This setting only appears if the Notifications to Inventory Percentage feature is enabled for your store. Unlike most settings, it is configured directly from the Features page rather than from its own Settings page – click View Settings on the feature card to open the configuration modal.

Limit how many back-in-stock notifications are sent based on the inventory quantity that comes back into stock.

By default, every active subscriber waiting on a product receives a notification the moment it is restocked, no matter how few units are available. With this feature enabled, you can cap the number of notifications so they roughly match the inventory you have on hand – useful when popular products tend to sell out again within minutes of restock.

How it works:

When a product is restocked, the system calculates how many subscribers to notify using this formula:

subscribers to notify = round(restocked inventory × percentage / 100)

Notifications are sent to the oldest subscribers first (by subscription date). At least one notification is always sent, even if the calculation rounds down to zero.

For example, if a product is restocked with 100 units and 200 subscribers are waiting:

For variant-tracked products, the calculation uses the total in-stock inventory summed across all in-stock variants.

Configuration:

Daily Report

This setting only appears if the Daily Report feature is enabled for your store.

Receive an automated daily summary email with your store’s subscription activity.

Configuration:

Support

Help Center

Click the Help Center link in the navigation to visit the Back in Stock Wizard support website for articles, guides, and FAQs.

Contact Us

Use the Contact Us form to reach our support team directly. Fill in:

Click Send Message to submit your inquiry. You will receive a confirmation notification once your message is sent.

Store Switching

If you manage multiple Shopify stores with Back in Stock Wizard, you can switch between them without logging out.

Your current store is indicated in the interface. To switch to a different store:

  1. Navigate to the store selection page (accessible from the user menu if you have multiple stores).
  2. You will see a list of all stores linked to your account, showing the store name and store identifier.
  3. Click Switch to this store next to the store you want to manage.

All pages and settings will update to reflect the selected store.