As an Shopify Plus partner we have completed over 250 of different projects. Some of them were migrations, some were new builts. But all of them had a few things in common and that's our app tech stack. The set of our favourite and proven Shopify apps that we use and recommend to all our clients.
The average number of installed Shopify apps per store is 37 which may seem like a lot, but don't forget that installed app doesn't mean active (i.e., enabled app embed). In general, I recommend to keep the number as low as possible and these six are a great start for any store.
1. Matrixify & Claude MCP
The way of importing data to Shopify (products, pages, orders, customers, etc.) is crucial for migrations and larger catalog stores. For a long time we have been using Matrixify app which is truly great and gives us all the options we needed to get the customer's data in a required format into Shopify.
But in the recent projects we have replaced Matrixify for Shopify MCP in Claude and the results are amazing. The imports are cleaner, faster, unlimited and you don't need to pay for the app subscription.
2. Candy Rack
Candy Rack became our go-to solution for anything related to conversion and monetization. In some projects we use it solely for the ultimate cart drawer while in others we use its full capability including AI-powered recommendations and upsells throughout the purchase journey.
Besides the app features we also use Candy Rack because it allow us to match client's storefront and provide seamless user experience. This is crucial for us as the overall store experience is something we are very meticulous about.
3. Judge.me
Social proof is one of the key points when it comes to store conversion. There are a lot review apps, but we almost exclusive use Judge.me.
For only $15 per month, the client will get a full suite allowing him to collect and manage customer reviews. That includes PDP widget, automatic e-mails and markets/multi-language support.
There are other more advanced solutions like Yotpo or Loox, but they come at a hefty price for SMB stores.
4. Klaviyo
E-mail marketing should be the cornerstone of every DTC project. And there's no better solution for that on Shopify then Klaviyo thanks to its deep integration and data flowing both ways. It's by the way no surprise as Shopify owns 6% stake at Klaviyo (or 11% including remaining options).
We use Klaviyo to setup the whole marketing funnel, from the welcome flow to automated campaigns like replenishment flow or post-order upsells. Pricing can be quite expensive, but we are using quite strict sunset flow to keep the profiles list at the bare minimum.
5. GitHub
To keep the theme code well organized and versioned, we are always using the Shopify Github app. We have it also connected to our JIRA so once the changes is released, the relevant ticket is automatically updated.
This helps to keep everyone (our team and client's team) on top of things. It's also a complete lifesaver in case we need to do a quick rollback and we can't imagine doing any project without the GitHub integration.
6. "Vibe coded" apps by Sidekick
Most recently, we have also started experiencing with custom vibe coded apps using Sidekick. If project requires some simple tooling, we longer search for it on the App Store we rather build it as a custom app inside the store. And you would be surprised how good Sidekick is and how much costs it can save for the merchant.
The only little drawback is that it requires Grow plan or higher. Sometimes you run out of tokens (app generation limits to be precise) if you are building something more complex or doing lot of change requests.
I don't think the Sidekick app generation will ever replace complex tools like the ones mentioned above, but it's a great solution for replacing single feature apps.
The same stack for every project
Of course we aren't using just these few apps, but this hero-list is what we are using in practically every project. No matter if it's a fresh store on Shopify Basic or migration of an 8-figure brand, they both get the same recommendation from our team.
We plan to keep this list updated if we find any new app (hint: there are already some solid candidates!).
