Platform migrations are among the most complex Shopify Plus engagements. The successful ones make the platform decision look easy in retrospect; the failed ones make it look harder than it should be. Studying the successful migrations of recent years grounds strategic planning for brands considering a migration of their own.
This piece is a curated set of notable Shopify Plus migration stories from 2023-2025. Brands that migrated from various platforms (Magento, BigCommerce, custom, Salesforce Commerce Cloud) to Shopify Plus, what made the migrations work, what the impact was, and what patterns recur across the most successful examples.
How this list is curated
Three filters narrowed the field. Migrations completed in 2023-2025 with stable production state in 2026. Public or semi-public documentation of the migration (case studies, press, conference presentations, agency portfolios). Notable scale or complexity (mid-market and above; complex integration; significant brand or commercial impact).
The result is a curated set rather than a definitive list. Migrations are sometimes private; the most interesting ones don't always get published. The list represents what's known and notable in 2026, not an exhaustive ranking.
Twelve notable migration stories
Listed alphabetically with brief notes on what each migration demonstrates.
Aje (AU fashion)
Australian premium fashion brand migrated from Magento to Shopify Plus. The migration demonstrates the Magento-to-Plus pattern at premium fashion scale: significant content migration, complex product variant handling, premium brand identity preservation. Multi-region setup post-migration spans AU, UK, US.
Allbirds
Migrated through multiple platforms over the years before landing on Shopify Plus with Hydrogen. Demonstrates that the right platform decision sometimes takes iteration. The current Hydrogen build hits top-tier performance and design quality.
Boll & Branch
US bedding brand migrated from Magento to Shopify Plus. Demonstrates the consumer-DTC migration pattern at premium home goods scale. Strong content migration preserved SEO during transition.
ButcherBox
Subscription meat delivery brand migrated to Shopify Plus from a previous custom platform. Demonstrates subscription-heavy operations on Shopify Plus + Recharge. Strong customer retention through migration.
Death Wish Coffee
CPG brand with significant subscription and DTC operations on Shopify Plus. The migration story illustrates the headless transition pattern: from standard theme to Hydrogen with maintained brand identity and improved performance.
Glossier
Long migration journey across platforms before landing on Shopify Plus. Demonstrates the strategic platform decisions at high-growth DTC scale. The migration involved significant content, customer data, and operational pattern preservation.
Heinz
One of the most public Hydrogen launches. Demonstrates Shopify Plus at large brand scale with strong art direction and configurator-driven shopping. The launch was a meaningful signal for Hydrogen's enterprise readiness.
Liquid Death
High-growth CPG brand on Shopify Plus. Migration from previous platforms preserved the bold brand voice while building operational depth. Demonstrates that brand identity translates cleanly through platform migrations when handled deliberately.
Magic Spoon
Cereal brand DTC operation on Shopify Plus. Migration from custom platform preserved subscription operations and customer data through transition. Demonstrates the mid-market DTC migration pattern.
Olipop
CPG soda brand on Shopify Plus. Strong subscription operation with Recharge. Demonstrates the CPG migration pattern from earlier platforms to Shopify Plus with subscription depth.
Reformation
Premium sustainable fashion brand migrated to Shopify Plus from custom platform. Demonstrates the fashion vertical migration at premium scale with strong brand and design preservation.
Staples Canada
Large retailer with significant B2B operations on Shopify Plus. Demonstrates the enterprise migration pattern with B2B depth, multi-region considerations, and complex catalog handling. One of the larger publicly-documented Plus migrations.
What patterns recur across successful migrations
Five patterns recur across the strongest examples.
Senior leadership involvement throughout
Not just at kickoff and launch. Senior involvement during discovery, scope decisions, mid-project pivots, content strategy, go-live readiness, and post-launch hypercare. Migrations are strategic projects and need strategic leadership engagement throughout.
Phased approach rather than big-bang
The strongest migrations launch in phases: regional rollouts, channel-by-channel, category-by-category, or audience-by-audience. Phased approaches let operational learnings inform later phases. Big-bang cutovers concentrate risk and rarely deliver better outcomes.
Investment in content and SEO migration
Most migration regrets we hear come from brands that lost meaningful organic traffic through poor URL preservation or content migration. The strongest migrations invest in content audit, URL mapping, 301 redirect strategy, and content quality preservation alongside platform work. Underspending here costs more than underspending almost anywhere else.
Realistic timeline budgeting
Buffer for unexpected issues. Migrations always surface unexpected complexity: data quality issues, integration patterns that need rework, content edge cases, operational workflow surprises. Brands that budget for the unexpected ship on time. Brands that don't ship late.
Post-launch hypercare
The 30-60 days after launch are the highest-risk period. Issues that surface post-launch need fast response. The strongest migrations sustain team engagement through this period rather than treating launch as the finish line.
What the failures look like
The migrations that don't make these lists usually exhibit multiple anti-patterns.
Underscoped discovery. Discovery compressed to 1-2 weeks, exception cases unmapped, integration complexity undiscovered until build phase. Result: scope changes, timeline slip, surprise costs.
Unrealistic timelines. Aggressive timelines that don't budget for the unexpected. Result: late delivery, compressed testing, post-launch issues that should have been caught earlier.
Big-bang cutover without phased rollout. All channels, all regions, all customers cut over simultaneously. Result: amplified launch risk, harder rollback if issues emerge, operational team overwhelm.
Underbudgeted content and SEO work. Content migration treated as a secondary priority. Result: SEO loss that takes months or years to recover from, content quality issues that hurt customer experience.
Absent post-launch support. Team disengagement after launch. Result: issues that should have been caught and fixed in week 2 are still being addressed in month 4.
What this means for brands planning migration
If you're planning a migration to Shopify Plus, three takeaways from the patterns above.
The platform decision is the easy part. The platform comparison work that occupies most of the pre-migration conversation matters less than the implementation discipline that determines whether the migration succeeds. Most platforms can succeed; few migrations actually do at the highest level.
Content and SEO investment is the highest-leverage spending. Brands underestimate this consistently. The cost gap between minimal content migration and thorough content migration is small relative to the SEO impact. Spend the extra here.
Senior involvement and phased approach matter more than they sound. Both feel like project management overhead during scoping. Both pay back materially during execution. Don't compress either to save budget.
Where to start if you're planning your own migration
If you're planning a Shopify Plus migration, four moves order the work.
One: read the broader platform comparison pieces. Our Adobe Commerce, Magento, BigCommerce, and Salesforce Commerce Cloud comparisons cover the decision framework.
Two: scope the migration carefully. Real discovery (3-5 weeks), thorough content audit, integration mapping, data quality assessment, operational readiness planning.
Three: budget realistically. Most brands underestimate by 40-100%. Plan for the realistic timeline and cost rather than the optimistic version.
Four: choose your agency carefully. Migrations are among the most complex Shopify Plus engagements. The agency's specific migration experience matters more than general Shopify Plus experience. We covered agency selection in our piece on Top Shopify Plus Agencies 2026 and the questions to ask in 12 questions to ask every Shopify Plus agency.
Talk to our team if you want help scoping a migration to Shopify Plus. We've shipped migrations from Magento, BigCommerce, Salesforce Commerce Cloud, and custom platforms across mid-market and lower-enterprise scale. The patterns are consistent enough that the early conversations save significant downstream rework.
Why are migration stories useful to study?
Two reasons. First, migration economics are hard to estimate from a blank page. Real migration stories with disclosed timelines, costs, and outcomes ground the planning conversation. Second, the patterns that recur across successful migrations are the same patterns that brands planning migrations need to follow. Studying successful migrations short-cuts the strategic learning.
What's the typical Shopify Plus migration timeline?
4-8 months for mid-market brands with no major complications. Simpler migrations (limited customisations, standard B2C) land at 4-5 months. Complex migrations (heavy customisation, ERP integration, B2B operations, multi-region) land at 8-14 months. Enterprise migrations (full re-platforming with extensive integration) can run 14-24 months.
What's the typical Shopify Plus migration cost?
$60K-$300K for typical mid-market migrations. Enterprise migrations $300K-$2M+. The wider variance is driven by complexity (custom code migration, ERP integration, multi-region, data quality issues) more than by platform size. Brands underestimating migration cost usually do so by 40-100%.
What gets lost in migration?
Three things consistently. Custom platform code from the previous platform (rarely portable, usually needs rework). Some SEO traffic during the transition (typically 15-30% drop, recoverable over 6-12 months with proper redirects and content preservation). Integration customisations from the previous platform (apps, extensions, custom code) need replacement or recreation on Shopify.
What's the success pattern across these migrations?
Five patterns recur. Senior leadership involvement throughout (not just at kickoff and launch). Phased approach rather than big-bang cutover. Investment in content and SEO migration alongside platform work. Realistic timeline budgeting with explicit buffer for unexpected issues. Post-launch hypercare period with sustained team engagement.
What's the failure pattern in unsuccessful migrations?
Underscoped discovery, unrealistic timelines, big-bang cutover (without phased rollout), underbudgeted content and SEO work, and absent post-launch support. These compound. Migrations that fail usually exhibit multiple patterns rather than a single issue.
How important is the agency choice in migration outcomes?
Very. Migrations are among the most complex Shopify Plus engagements. The agency's track record with specific migration patterns (Magento-to-Plus, BigCommerce-to-Plus, custom-to-Plus) matters more than for new builds. We covered the broader agency selection landscape in our pieces on agency selection.
Should I publish my migration story?
If you have a successful migration story worth sharing, yes. Migration case studies are commercially valuable for the brand (positions the team as experienced) and operationally valuable for the broader ecosystem (helps other brands plan their own migrations). Most brands underpublish their migration learnings.
A Shopify Plus Agency for Strategic Design & Advanced Engineering
Building something ambitious?
- Migrations are among the most complex Shopify Plus engagements. The successful ones make platform decisions look easy in retrospect; the failed ones make them look harder than they should be.
- Twelve notable migration stories from 2023-2025: Aje, Allbirds, Boll & Branch, ButcherBox, Death Wish Coffee, Glossier, Heinz, Liquid Death, Magic Spoon, Olipop, Reformation, Staples Canada.
- Five patterns recur in successful migrations: senior leadership involvement throughout, phased approach, content and SEO investment, realistic timeline budgeting, post-launch hypercare.
- Failed migrations usually exhibit multiple anti-patterns: underscoped discovery, unrealistic timelines, big-bang cutover, underbudgeted content work, absent post-launch support.
- Three takeaways for brands planning migration: platform decision is the easy part, content and SEO investment is highest-leverage spending, senior involvement and phased approach matter more than they sound.
- Most brands underestimate migration cost and timeline by 40-100%. Plan realistically rather than optimistically.
