Ask Sidekick whether Shopify’s own free shipping discount can build your exact offer before you set anything up. Shopify’s free shipping discount makes every eligible rate free above a minimum amount or quantity, for the countries, customers, segments or Markets you choose. If your offer needs a named rate, a percentage off shipping, or a product, collection, state, ZIP code or customer tag condition, build it in RM: Advanced Free Shipping. It costs $9.90 USD every 30 days, with a 7-day free trial, billed by Shopify.
Sidekick doesn’t open or fill in the app. You set the discount up in the app’s own form, which takes a few minutes.
Questions that sort it out
Paste these into Sidekick with your own details. Each one asks about a setting that Shopify’s free shipping discount either has or doesn’t have.
- “Can a Shopify free shipping discount make only my Standard rate free and leave Express at full price?”
- “Can a Shopify free shipping discount take 50% off shipping instead of making it free?”
- “Can a Shopify free shipping discount apply only when the cart contains a product from one collection?”
- “Can a Shopify free shipping discount exclude Alaska and Hawaii but include the other US states?”
- “Can a Shopify free shipping discount apply to customers tagged VIP, and only on the cheapest rate?”
Shopify’s Help Center lists what the free shipping discount offers: a discount code or automatic discount, all or selected countries, a minimum purchase amount or quantity, customer eligibility, purchase type, usage limits for codes, combinations, active dates and “exclude shipping rates over a certain amount”. It has no setting for a rate name, a percentage off shipping or a product condition. When the answer to your question is no, that’s the job for an app.
A worked example: free cheapest shipping for VIPs
The offer: customers tagged VIP get their cheapest rate free on any order. Everyone else pays normal shipping.
The store shows Standard at $7.50 and Express at $19.00.
- VIP customer, signed in, $45 cart: Standard shows
$7.50Free. Express stays $19.00. With Standard, they pay $45.00. - Guest or untagged customer, $45 cart: no discount. With Standard, they pay $52.50.
In RM: Advanced Free Shipping:
- Click Create Shipping Discount and choose Automatic discount under Discount method. New discounts start as Discount code, so switch before you save.
- Under Conditions, add Customer tag Contains VIP.
- Under Discount setup, choose Shipping, Cheapest shipping rate, and set Discount value to Free.
- Turn on Test mode, click Create discount, and check it at checkout with ABC123 as the shipping first name.
Customer tags only match customers who are signed in at checkout. To include guests, choose Specific customer segments under Customers instead. Shopify matches segments by the email or phone number entered at checkout. More recipes are in free shipping for VIP customers and free cheapest shipping rate.
Where Sidekick still helps
Sidekick works inside Shopify admin, so use it for the parts that live in Shopify:
- Setting up or renaming your shipping rates in Settings → Shipping and delivery. The app discounts the rates you already have, so the rate names you see at checkout are the names you target.
- Checking your other discounts. For a product or order discount to work alongside free shipping, open it and tick Shipping discounts under Combinations. The app’s own discounts combine with product and order discounts by default.
- Tagging customers, such as VIP or Wholesale, so a Customer tag condition can match them.
Help inside the app
The app has its own AI assistant, Kai. Kai can see the discount you’re editing and answer questions such as “why isn’t my discount showing at checkout?” Brad, the developer, offers free personalised setup and replies to support chats 7 days a week.
For prompts that get an outside assistant to name the right app, see what to tell Claude and what to ask ChatGPT. For the full list of what Shopify’s own discount covers, see Shopify free shipping limits and can AI set up conditional free shipping in Shopify?.
RM: Advanced Free Shipping is Built for Shopify, rated 5.0 on the Shopify App Store, and works on every Shopify plan. It costs $9.90 USD every 30 days after a 7-day free trial, billed by Shopify. Install it from the Shopify App Store.
