Hire Shopify Developers & Custom Solution Experts

"Shopify developer" describes at least six specialisms that share a platform and almost nothing else. Hourly rate tells you very little about fit — a strong theme developer given a custom app project delivers something that works and can't be maintained, and a senior backend engineer with no Liquid experience spends paid hours learning your theme.

Six specialisms cover nearly all Shopify development:

- Theme and front-end work — custom theme development, theme customisation, and anything visible on the storefront the editor can't do. On shopexperts, theme customisation packages have a median of $548. The majority of Shopify development sits here.

- App and API development — custom apps for internal workflows, public App Store apps, and API integrations. Custom development and app packages on shopexperts have a median of $1,000 for a defined scope; larger app builds are quoted per project. See Shopify app development.

- Checkout and Plus features — checkout customization, Checkout UI extensions and Shopify Functions development. Most of it needs Shopify Plus: extensions inside the checkout steps and custom Functions are Plus-only, although any plan can brand its checkout and use public apps built on Functions.

- Backend and systems — ERP and backend integrations, connecting Shopify to systems that weren't designed to talk to it. More data modelling than Shopify.

- Headless — Hydrogen and headless commerce development. A genuinely different discipline, and most stores don't need it; a well-optimised theme covers what merchants usually assume requires it.

- Fixing and hardening — bug fixes and troubleshooting, performance and speed optimization, and accessibility compliance. Reactive work, and frequently the right first purchase.

If you can't tell which applies, a short paid scoping engagement costs less than hiring the wrong specialism and discovering it in week three. Compare expert Shopify developers below, or browse the specific service you need.

Top-rated Shopify developers, agencies and Plus Partners

Mike Brennan

Shopify Plus EngineerRochester, United StatesFrom $2500

5.00(4 reviews)

shopexpertsscore

Helping Make Migrating to Shopify Easy for B2B. Moving to Shopify? We take on the heavy lift of complex migrations with custom-built apps and integrations that connect your systems, preserve critical functionality, and help modernize your technology stack. Book a Free Total Cost of Ownership Review Discover how simplifying your technology stack could reduce costs, improve efficiency, and build a stronger foundation for growth. Built and operated by Developer Squad. Recent work includes Shopify migrations, storefront optimization, and ongoing engineering support for brands such as: Donald Ross Sportswear Jeff Dunham Just Keep Livin’ by Matthew McConaughey Faith Fight Finish by Dak Prescott

Offered services

Shopify Development

Store Setup & Management

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Refactor Plus

AgencyKyiv, UkraineFrom $450

Not yet rated

shopexpertsscore

Hi from the Refactor Plus team 👋🏻 We're a Shopify development company delivering white-label services for agencies and building a suite of 15 public Shopify apps! 🙌🏻 We’re the go-to technical team when: You need a white-label partner to deliver top-notch quality Your brand has outgrown templates and plug-ins You’re scaling fast and need clean architecture, not technical debt 🙌🏻 We're experts in: Custom Shopify Theme development: Built for maximum performance (90-100 PageSpeed scores) and scalable architecture Tailored for enterprise-level needs: localisation, accessibility, multi-region, and complex UX Seamless migrations from other platforms - clean code, SEO-safe, and optimised for growth Shopify App development: Custom public and private apps (React.js + Node.js) Developing 15 public apps as our own products, designed for enterprise merchants Scalable, secure architecture aligned with the latest Shopify API standards and best practices Custom solutions: Integration of ERP, PIM, OMS, and WMS systems tailored to your Shopify Plus store Data migration and architecture planning for complex product catalogues and order history Custom workflows for fulfilment centres, inventory syncing, and multi-location logistics 🙌🏻 The Way We Work A dedicated project manager and tech lead are assigned to every project from day one We follow unified development standards and implement e-commerce benchmark functionality by default Clear reporting and transparent communication - you’re always informed, never chasing updates If you’re looking for a reliable technical partner to build, scale, or maintain your Shopify Plus presence, let’s talk!

Offered services

Shopify Development

Store Setup & Management

Technical Support & Maintenance

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Peter Suh

Front-End DeveloperWashington, United StatesFrom $500

Not yet rated

shopexpertsscore

I have over 6 years of Shopify Development experience. I've worked both as a freelancer as well as a full time employee. I've worked with both Shopify Plus agencies, and smaller agencies. I am looking to continue my career as a freelancer specializing in Conversion Rate Optimization and Shopify Development.

Offered services

Shopify Development

Marketing & Growth

Store Setup & Management

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Soodo

AgencySingapore, SingaporeFrom $1500

Not yet rated

shopexpertsscore

Soodo is a Shopify agency based in Singapore helping eCommerce brands launch, scale, and optimize their stores. Our team combines design, development, and conversion optimization to build fast, high-performing Shopify experiences. We specialize in new builds, migrations, store revamps, and CRO-driven improvements that turn traffic into sales.

Offered services

Shopify Development

Store Setup & Management

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Andrei Babor

Front-End DeveloperBucharest, RomaniaFrom $50

Not yet rated

shopexpertsscore

I’ve been a Shopify developer for over 9 years and I help brands turn their e-commerce ideas into high-performing Shopify stores using Liquid, HTML, CSS, and JavaScript. I've worked in complex tasks such as integrating Shopify apps, Shopify Admin API, custom design development, apps extensions development, theme development and much more. I specialize in: Store migration Theme customization Store build or redesign Checkout upgrade Email marketing

Offered services

Shopify Development

Store Setup & Management

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YourStoreMatters

AgencyBrussels, BelgiumFrom $500

4.97(17 reviews)

shopexpertsscore

YourStoreMatters: The Shopify Growth Agency for Ambitious Brands. We help established brands scale their revenue on Shopify and Shopify Plus. We don't just build stores; we build systems that sell. Our focus is simple: High-Converting Design + Automated Customer Retention. How We Help You Grow: Shopify Store Builds: We design fast, premium stores that are easy for your team to manage. No messy code, just a stable foundation for growth. Email & SMS Marketing: As Klaviyo Master Silver Partners, we turn your email list into a consistent revenue engine (usually 30%+ of total sales) using automated flows and segmentation. Subscriptions & Loyalty: We implement Recharge and Love Loyalty to turn one-time buyers into recurring subscribers. Pain-Free Migrations: We handle the complex move from Magento, WooCommerce, or older Shopify themes so you don't lose data or rankings. Why Merchants Trust Us: We operate as your long-term partner, not a one-off freelancer. We are obsessed with your ROI, your site speed, and your customer's experience. Our Certified Tech Stack: We are official experts in the tools that power modern ecommerce: Growth: Klaviyo, Omnisend Apps: Recharge, Judge.me, Loox, Shopify Flow Themes: Specialized in customizing premium themes like Horizon, Archetype & Out of the Sandbox Themes. VERIFIED PARTNER PROFILE: Shopify · Klaviyo Master Silver · Rebuy Bronze · Recharge · Trustpilot · Judgeme · LoyaltyLion · TextYess Elite

Offered services

Shopify Development

Store Setup & Management

Marketing & Growth

Consulting & Strategy

Operations, Logistics & Fulfillment

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Maik Gossen

Shopify Setup SpecialistBerlin, GermanyFrom $100

5.00(4 reviews)

shopexpertsscore

I’m a german Shopify developer with over 5 years of experience working on e-commerce projects. My work focuses on custom Shopify development, store optimization, automations, and SEO foundations. I build and customize themes and apps using Liquid, HTML, CSS, GraphQL and JavaScript, and I regularly work with Shopify Flow and n8n to automate workflows and connect external tools. Projects I’m especially proud of include custom Shopify theme builds, clean migrations from WooCommerce and Shopware, and automation setups that significantly reduced manual work for store owners. I value clean code, clear communication, and solutions that are easy to maintain and scale over time.

Offered services

Shopify Development

Store Setup & Management

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Stellar Soft

AgencyTallinn, EstoniaFrom $1000

5.00(5 reviews)

shopexpertsscore

Stellar Soft is a full-cycle software development company with a strong focus on e-commerce, which accounts for around 60% of our project portfolio. We specialize in Shopify, Adobe Commerce (Magento), and WordPress, with all development handled entirely in-house. Our Shopify practice covers the full scope - from building Shopify and Shopify Plus stores using themes or fully custom designs, to platform migrations from Magento, SFCC, WooCommerce, and OpenCart. We also work on theme customization and performance optimization, headless commerce with Hydrogen, and the development of both private and public Shopify apps and themes. Ongoing maintenance and support are a core part of how we work with long-term clients. For custom development projects, we work across a broad technology stack including JavaScript, TypeScript, React, Vue.js, Angular, Node.js, PHP (Laravel, Symfony), and Java with the Spring ecosystem. We also have the flexibility to bring in developers with specific expertise when a project calls for it, ensuring the right fit at every stage.

Offered services

Shopify Development

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Speed Boostr

AgencyWashington, United StatesFrom $450

5.00(24 reviews)

shopexpertsscore

Speed Boostr is a specialized Shopify performance and optimization agency focused on improving store speed, Core Web Vitals, and conversion performance. Our team works hands-on with Shopify merchants to identify and resolve real-world performance bottlenecks across themes, apps, and custom code. We specialize in Shopify theme optimization, JavaScript and Liquid cleanup, image and asset optimization, and technical performance audits. Our work is fully Shopify-native and focused on measurable outcomes. Faster load times, better user experience, and higher conversion rates. We work primarily with established Shopify stores that want expert-level technical improvements without sacrificing design, functionality, or scalability.

Offered services

Shopify Development

Technical Support & Maintenance

Store Setup & Management

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Simon Davies

Shopify App DeveloperLondon, United KingdomFrom $75

Not yet rated

shopexpertsscore

I’m a senior Shopify App developer with 8+ years of experience building and scaling both custom and public Shopify applications for small startups to enterprise level companies. I build Shopify applications using Laravel, React and Polaris, I have extensive knowledge of Shopify's APIs and the Shopify ecosystem. I have helped grow public shopify apps to over 7k installs and handling 350K daily webhooks. I bring 17 years of overall web development experience, with a strong focus on clean architecture, performance, and long-term maintainability, especially important for Shopify apps that need to pass review, scale reliably, and evolve with Shopify’s ecosystem.

Offered services

Shopify Development

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How to hire a Shopify developer

Development quotes vary widely — the same brief can return figures far apart, because it was ambiguous enough to support both readings.

Write the brief as an outcome with constraints, not a task. "Build us a custom app" produces vague quotes. "Build a custom app that syncs inventory between Shopify and our NetSuite instance every 15 minutes, handles 8,000 SKUs across three locations, and alerts us on sync failure" produces comparable ones. Time spent on the brief saves back-and-forth and money later.

Match the specialisation, not the rate. Theme and Liquid work fits freelancers and small studios. Custom apps need API experience. Shopify Plus builds, Functions and checkout work need a specialist with shipped Plus projects — a general developer learns them on your budget. On shopexperts, development freelancers list a median starting price of $100 and agencies $250 (October 2026).

Verify Partner status where it matters. Shopify's Partner Program has five tiers: Registered, Select, Plus, Premier and Platinum, with Platinum at the top. Verify claimed tiers in the Shopify Partner directory rather than accepting them from a proposal. Non-Partners can be excellent, but they lack the Partner support channel that resolves platform edge cases quickly.

Ask for live URLs and follow up on two of them. Three live Shopify stores from the last twelve months, and for a large project, contact two of those merchants directly. Ask whether the project shipped on time, what changed mid-project, and whether they'd hire again. That conversation is worth more than any portfolio.

Insist on milestone structure. Good quotes break into phases — discovery, build, QA, launch — with deliverables and payment tied to each. A lump sum with no phase breakdown means either a senior developer confident enough to absorb the risk, which is rare, or nobody has thought about the hard parts yet, which is common.

Ask who owns the code and where it lives. Repository access, documentation, and whether you can hand the project to another developer without an archaeology exercise. This costs nothing to agree upfront and is expensive to resolve later.

Which kind of Shopify developer do you actually need?

Six distinct specialisations, and the wrong choice costs more than the rate difference. Match your project to one of these before you shortlist. The prices below are fixed-price packages listed on shopexperts in October 2026; each covers a defined scope, so larger projects are quoted separately.

Theme and Liquid developer — theme customisation packages have a median of $548, custom section packages $280 and custom theme builds $1,750. Custom sections, layout changes, theme customisation, OS 2.0 migrations, styling beyond the editor. This covers the majority of Shopify development work. If your requirement is something visible on the storefront that the theme editor can't do, this is your hire.

Custom app developer — custom development and app packages have a median of $1,000 (middle half $390 to $2,499); larger app builds are quoted per project. Custom apps for internal workflows, public apps for the App Store, embedded admin tools, and anything using the Admin API, webhooks or OAuth. Distinct skill set from theme work; the overlap is smaller than merchants assume.

Shopify Plus and checkout specialist — Plus and checkout packages have a median of $1,050 (middle half $625 to $8,000). Plus setup and migration, Functions, Checkout Extensibility, multi-store, B2B. In practice it needs someone with shipped Plus projects. Mistakes here affect checkout, which makes them immediately expensive.

Integration engineer — integration packages have a median of $625, across 7 packages from $250 to $10,000. Connecting Shopify to ERPs, 3PLs, PIMs, CRMs and accounting systems. The work is data modelling and error handling more than it is Shopify, and someone who has only worked inside Shopify usually underestimates it.

Headless and Hydrogen developer — three headless packages are listed, at $2,499, $2,800 and $5,000; full builds are scoped per store. React engineering against the Storefront API. Genuinely different discipline, and most stores don't need it — a well-optimised theme covers what merchants usually think requires headless.

Maintenance and support developer — monthly support retainers have a median of $1,950 (middle half $500 to $2,575), and bug-fix packages $95. Ongoing fixes, theme updates, app conflicts, small features. Undervalued and frequently the right answer when the real problem is that nobody owns the store technically.

If you can't tell which of these your project needs, that's a legitimate reason to pay for a short scoping engagement before hiring. It's cheaper than hiring the wrong specialisation and discovering it in week three.

How much does a Shopify developer cost?

Shopify development spans a wide price range, because "development" covers everything from a CSS fix to an enterprise replatform. Typical market ranges, followed by what developers on shopexperts list:

Per project

$500 – $500,000+

Small fixes to enterprise Plus builds

Hourly rate

$60 – $400

Freelance developers to senior Plus specialists

Monthly retainer

$500 – $30,000+

Maintenance to active feature development

Starting prices on shopexperts

$85 – $1,000

Middle half of 596 listed; median $200

The first three tiles are typical market ranges, not shopexperts data. The fourth is: in October 2026, 596 Shopify Development experts listed a starting price. A starting price is the smallest job an expert will quote, often an audit or a small fix, so treat it as a floor, not a quote.

In the wider market, small theme fixes and Liquid customisation sit at $500-$3,500. Custom section development runs $600-$3,000 per section. Full theme development or heavy customisation runs $5,000-$30,000. Custom app development runs $12,000-$120,000+ depending on whether it's a private internal tool or a public App Store listing with billing and review. Integration work — ERP, 3PL, PIM, accounting — runs $15,000-$150,000+. Shopify Plus setup and enterprise builds run $20,000-$400,000+ depending on migration complexity and checkout customisation. Headless builds run $25,000-$500,000+.

Ongoing retainers sit at $500-$3,000/month for maintenance and small fixes, $3,000-$10,000/month for regular feature work, and $10,000-$30,000+/month for dedicated Plus development capacity. Well-specified work — theme customisation, defined feature builds, app configuration — travels well across time zones.

Architecture decisions, Plus edge cases and anything where the specification will change mid-project go better with a developer who shares some of your working hours, because the cost of a misunderstanding scales with the complexity of what's being built. Request a free quote for a figure specific to your project.

What do Shopify developers do?

Six specialisations, and most developers are genuinely strong in one or two:

Theme Development and Liquid

Custom sections, layout, OS 2.0 migration, storefront work

Custom App Development

Private and public apps, Admin API, webhooks, embedded tools

Shopify Plus and Checkout

Plus migration, Functions, Checkout Extensibility, multi-store, B2B

Integrations and Data

ERP, 3PL, PIM, CRM and accounting system connections

Headless and Hydrogen

Storefront API, React storefronts, PWA and mobile

Maintenance and Support

Theme updates, app conflicts, bug fixes, ongoing small features

Frequently asked questions about hiring Shopify developers

What does a Shopify developer do?

Shopify development covers six fairly distinct specialisations: theme and Liquid work on the storefront, custom app development against Shopify's APIs, Shopify Plus and checkout work using Functions and Checkout Extensibility, integrations with ERP, 3PL and accounting systems, headless builds with Hydrogen, and ongoing maintenance. Most developers are genuinely strong in one or two of these, and matching the specialisation to your project matters more than comparing hourly rates.

How much does a Shopify developer cost?

On shopexperts, the 596 development experts who list a starting price have a median of $200, and the middle half sit between $85 and $1,000 (October 2026). A starting price is the smallest job an expert will quote. Fixed-price packages are closer to project costs: theme customisation has a median of $548, custom development and apps $1,000, Shopify Plus and checkout $1,050, and monthly support retainers $1,950. Larger builds are quoted per project, so request a free quote with your scope.

Freelancer, agency, or Shopify Plus Partner?

Freelancers fit theme work, defined features and maintenance. Agencies fit larger projects where design, development and project management need coordinating, and where continuity across a longer engagement matters. Plus specialists fit Plus stores and projects with custom Functions, in-checkout extensions, multi-store or B2B. On shopexperts, development freelancers list a median starting price of $100 and agencies $250 (October 2026). Pick the smallest team that can credibly deliver your scope — a larger team costs more and rarely delivers more until the scope needs it.

Do I need a Shopify Plus Partner for a Plus build?

Not necessarily. Plus work (custom Functions, checkout extensions, multi-store, B2B) rewards prior Plus experience, so ask for shipped Plus projects and check any claimed tier in Shopify's Partner Directory. A general developer can work on a Plus store, but learns its enterprise layer at your expense.

How long does Shopify development take?

Small theme fixes take 1-3 weeks. Full theme development or heavy customisation takes 4-12 weeks. Custom app development runs 6-16 weeks. Integration projects run 8-20 weeks depending on the system at the other end. Shopify Plus migrations and enterprise builds take 12-32 weeks. Rush timelines are possible, usually at a premium, and almost always achieved by compressing QA, which is where the cost reappears later.

What's the difference between a Shopify developer and a general web developer?

Platform-specific knowledge: Liquid templating, Shopify's app architecture and injection patterns, checkout extensibility rules, Functions, Plus enterprise features, and how to ship without breaking site speed or app compatibility. A capable general web developer can learn Shopify, but the ramp-up comes before productive feature work starts, and you're paying for it. For a store that runs its business on Shopify, platform-specific experience usually pays for itself.

Should I hire offshore Shopify developers?

For well-specified work, location matters less than the brief — theme customisation, features built from clear specifications, app configuration, and defined bug fixing travel well across time zones. Don't assume it costs less: on shopexperts, development experts based outside the US, Canada, Western Europe, Australia and New Zealand list a median starting price of $300, against $199 for those based there (October 2026). Where it goes wrong is anything where the specification will change mid-project, or where architecture decisions are being made rather than executed, because the cost of a misunderstanding scales with what's being built. Many mid-market brands run a hybrid: local senior direction and architecture, offshore implementation underneath it.

What should I ask a Shopify developer before hiring?

Five things. Which of the six specialisations is their primary one, and what proportion of their last year was spent there. Three live Shopify URLs from the last twelve months, ideally in a comparable scope. How they structure customisations so future theme updates don't destroy them — the answer should involve separate section and snippet files rather than edits to core theme files. Who owns the repository and documentation at the end. And what happens if the scope changes mid-project, because it will.