When a Shopify store grows, orders, stock and customer data start living in two places: Shopify and the ERP that runs the rest of the business. Keeping them in sync by hand works for a while, then it causes overselling, late shipments and month-end reconciliation headaches. This guide explains how to connect Shopify to your ERP — NetSuite, QuickBooks, SAP or another system — the integration options available, and what to plan before you build.
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What a Shopify–ERP integration should sync
Start by deciding which system owns each type of data. That single decision prevents most integration problems.
| Data | Usual source of truth | Direction |
|---|---|---|
| Products and prices | ERP (or a PIM) | ERP → Shopify |
| Inventory levels | ERP or warehouse system | ERP → Shopify |
| Orders | Shopify | Shopify → ERP |
| Customers | Shopify for retail, ERP for B2B accounts | Usually both ways |
| Fulfilment and tracking | ERP or 3PL | ERP → Shopify |
| Refunds and returns | Shopify | Shopify → ERP |
Two systems both trying to own the same field is how stock counts drift and prices get overwritten.
Your three integration options
1. A ready-made connector
Many ERPs have a connector in the Shopify App Store or their own marketplace. QuickBooks Online, for example, has several. Connectors are quick to set up and cheap to start, and they work well when your processes are standard.
They struggle when you have custom fields, several warehouses, B2B price lists, bundles or unusual tax and accounting rules — and you depend on the vendor to fix problems.
2. An integration platform (iPaaS)
Platforms such as Celigo, Boomi or Make provide pre-built flows plus a visual editor for customisation. They suit mid-sized businesses that want flexibility without a full custom build. Costs are usually a subscription that grows with the number of flows and transactions, and complex logic can still need a developer.
3. A custom integration
A custom integration is a small service built for your systems. It listens for Shopify webhooks, calls the ERP’s API, applies your business rules and logs every transaction. You own it, there is no per-transaction fee, and it handles whatever logic your business needs. It costs more upfront and needs maintenance as APIs change.
How a custom Shopify–ERP integration works
- Orders: Shopify sends an
orders/createororders/paidwebhook. The integration maps the order to the ERP’s sales order format — customer, line items, tax, shipping, discounts — and creates it through the ERP API. - Inventory: on a schedule or when the ERP changes, the integration reads stock levels by location and updates Shopify’s inventory levels through the Admin API.
- Products and prices: changes in the ERP are pushed to Shopify, including variants and metafields.
- Fulfilment: when the ERP or 3PL ships an order, the integration creates the fulfilment in Shopify with tracking, which triggers the customer’s shipping email.
- Errors: every failed call is logged, retried and, if it still fails, raised as an alert so someone can fix it before it becomes a customer problem.
Notes for popular ERPs
- NetSuite: offers SuiteTalk REST and SOAP web services plus RESTlets for custom logic. Expect to map custom records and subsidiaries carefully, and to respect concurrency limits.
- QuickBooks Online: has a well-documented REST API. It is primarily accounting software, so inventory and multi-location needs often require extra tooling.
- SAP Business One and S/4HANA: integrations usually go through the Service Layer or OData APIs, often with middleware. Plan more time for discovery and testing.
- Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central: provides REST APIs and supports custom API pages for data that is not exposed by default.
Plan these before you build
- Field mapping: a written document listing every field, its source and its transformation.
- SKU discipline: SKUs must match exactly in both systems. Clean them up first.
- Taxes and discounts: decide how Shopify’s calculated tax and discount allocations are recorded in the ERP.
- Sync frequency: real-time for orders, near real-time for inventory on fast-moving products, scheduled for less critical data.
- Rate limits: both Shopify and most ERPs limit API calls. Bulk operations and queues keep large syncs within limits.
- Historic data: decide whether past orders and customers need to be migrated.
- Monitoring: a dashboard or alerts showing failed syncs, so problems are visible.
Which option should you choose?
- Standard processes, one warehouse, small team: start with a ready-made connector.
- Several systems to connect and some custom rules: consider an integration platform.
- B2B pricing, multiple locations, custom fields or high order volume: a custom integration usually pays for itself through reliability and the absence of per-transaction fees.
If you go custom, our Shopify development services and custom API development services cover the full build. For deciding between a custom app and an App Store app, see our guide on Shopify custom apps vs. public apps.
Frequently asked questions
How long does a Shopify–ERP integration take?
A connector can be live in days. A custom integration covering orders, inventory, products and fulfilment typically takes several weeks, depending on the ERP and the amount of custom logic.
Can inventory sync in real time?
Near real time, yes. Most integrations update stock within minutes of a change, which is enough to prevent overselling for most stores.
What happens if the ERP is down?
A well-built integration queues the changes and retries when the ERP is available again, so no orders are lost.
Do I need Shopify Plus?
No. The Admin API and webhooks used for ERP integrations are available on all Shopify plans. Plus adds higher API limits and B2B features that some integrations use.