Shopify Post-Purchase Emails: Thank You, Upsell, Win Back

Shopify post-purchase emails are marketing automations in Shopify Messaging: a thank-you email after a customer’s first and second purchase, an upsell after the first purchase, an invitation to visit your shop for online-only customers, and a win-back email when a customer hasn’t ordered for a while. Each starts from a template under Apps > Messaging > Automations, goes only to customers subscribed to email marketing, and is set up on a desktop.

Shopify’s Help Center page on creating marketing automations lists the templates and triggers below; we read it on October 23, 2026.

The four post-purchase templates

The retail template uses the Customers near retail locations segment, which covers up to 8 retail locations with a valid address; without at least one valid location, you can’t create the segment. Two more templates sit in the neighboring Customer appreciation group: Celebrate customer birthday, which sends a discount on the customer’s birthday from the birth date metafield, and Welcome VIP customers, which by default greets customers after their third order once they have spent $1,000 USD in total, or when they are tagged VIP. Birthday and VIP emails are covered in Shopify retention emails, and win-back strategy in win-back emails.

Set them up

1. On a desktop, go to Apps > Messaging and click Automations. The mobile app can create only the abandoned checkout, cart and browse automations.
2. Click Create automation and choose the template.
3. Click Edit email, change the text, images and products, and click Send test to see it in your own inbox.
4. Click Turn on, then Turn on again in the dialog, or Save without turning on to finish later.

Timing is part of the workflow. To change when an email goes out, open the automation, click Edit workflow, adjust the wait, and click Apply changes; editing needs a desktop as well. Turning an automation off cancels every workflow in a wait stage, so customers who were waiting for an email won’t get it.

Every post-purchase email counts toward your Shopify Messaging allowance: 10,000 free emails a month on the Basic, Grow, Advanced and Plus plans, then $1 USD per 1,000 up to 300,000. Only abandoned checkout automations are always free. A store with 300 first orders a month that runs the thank-you (two emails per customer over the first two orders) and the upsell uses at most about 900 emails of the 10,000.

What to write in the thank-you and upsell emails

The templates give you the structure. The plan we would write to:

Thank-you after the first order. Lead with something useful about the product they bought: how to use it, how to care for it, what to expect from the first week. Add who to contact if something is wrong. Shopify’s writing guidance for marketing emails applies here too: under 200 words, the important part in the first two scrolls on mobile, at least one link to the store.

Thank-you after the second order. We would use this email to ask for a review, since the customer has now bought twice. Keep it to one request and one link.

Upsell after the first order. One product that goes with what they bought, priced below it. Someone who bought a coffee grinder can use filters or beans; a second grinder makes no sense to them. Use a Product section set to Static and choose the product, so the email shows the product you chose instead of your current best sellers. Give the customer time to receive and use the first order before this one goes out; adjust the wait in Edit workflow.

Win back. Pick the waiting time from your own reorder cycle. If most repeat orders in your store come within 60 days, a win-back at 30 days reaches people who were coming back anyway. Work the gap between first and second orders out from your order history.

Post-purchase emails vs order notifications

These automations are marketing. They go only to customers who agreed to email marketing, through the checkout checkbox, a signup form or their account. The order confirmation and shipping confirmation are customer notifications: Shopify sends them to every buyer when the order event happens, and you edit them under Settings > Notifications. A customer who didn’t subscribe still gets the order confirmation, but none of the emails in this article. That makes the opt-in at checkout worth setting up: in Settings > Checkout, the Marketing opt-in section adds the checkbox. For the full list of automations, including the abandoned cart ones, see Shopify email automation.

Thank-you page offers are a different tool

The search results we checked for “post-purchase upsell” mostly describe an offer shown on the page right after payment or on the thank-you page, before any email. Those offers come from apps built on Shopify’s checkout extensions; Messaging doesn’t place them. If you want that kind of offer, compare cross-sell and upsell apps. Other email guides are collected in the email and popups hub.

FAQ

Does Shopify send a thank-you email automatically? Every buyer gets the order confirmation notification. A separate marketing thank-you email goes out only if you turn on the Thank customers after they purchase automation, and only to customers subscribed to email marketing.

Can I send post-purchase emails to customers who didn’t subscribe? Marketing automations send only to customers subscribed to email marketing. The To: field can be switched to All customers only in the abandoned checkout automation.

When should the upsell email go out? We would send it after the customer has had time to receive and try the first order. You set the wait in the automation’s workflow with Edit workflow.

Do post-purchase emails count toward the free 10,000? Post-purchase automation emails count toward the 10,000 free emails a month. Only abandoned checkout automations are always free.