The setup in 30 seconds.

• Turn it on: Apps > Messaging > Automations > Abandoned checkout > Turn on automation. It's free and it doesn't count against your monthly email allowance.
• The real decision: native Shopify (3-8% recovery), Shopify Flow for a bit more control, or Klaviyo for a real sequence (15-25%). Table below.
• Built for $10M-$100M Shopify brands who are already losing high-value carts and want more than a single discount email.

Roughly 70% of carts get abandoned. Baymard puts the 2026 average at 70.22%, and that number has barely moved in twenty years (the deeper cart abandonment statistics are worth a read if you want the full picture). So for every ten people who add to cart, seven walk. If you run a $10M-$100M Shopify brand, that's not a rounding error, that's a revenue line, and one of the cheapest conversion wins you have.

The good news: turning on Shopify's abandoned cart email takes about five minutes. The part that actually moves recovered revenue is deciding what comes after it. This guide walks the exact native setup first, then the platform decision (native vs Shopify Flow vs Klaviyo), then the honest bit nobody likes to say out loud about where email stops working.

If you're a founder or Head of CX at a Shopify brand and you already know your abandoned cart numbers are soft, you can skip the reading and book a 30-min call. We'll look at what your store is actually losing on the carts your current setup doesn't recover.

Abandoned cart vs abandoned checkout in Shopify

First, a distinction that trips up almost everyone, because Shopify's wording and merchant wording don't match.

Shopify only emails abandoned checkouts, not every abandoned cart. A checkout is abandoned when someone added a product, started checking out, and entered their contact info, then left before paying. A cart-only abandon (added to cart, browsed, never started checkout) leaves Shopify with no email address, so there's nothing to send to.

That gap matters more than it sounds. A big chunk of your "abandoned carts" never give Shopify an email, which is exactly why apps that capture email earlier (popups, account creation, browse tracking) recover more than the native flow can. We'll come back to that. It's the same reason your broader ecommerce customer service setup matters here: the more channels a hesitating shopper can reach you on, the more of them you keep.

For now, the practical version: the native automation catches the shoppers who got far enough to hand over an email. That's a smaller pool than your full abandonment number, but it's the highest-intent pool. These are people who were one click from buying.

How to turn on Shopify's native abandoned cart email

Shopify moved this setting. If you're a returning merchant hunting for the old checkbox under Settings > Checkout, it's gone. The whole thing lives in the Messaging app now, and the migration is one-way (you can't roll back to the legacy emails once you opt in).

Here's the exact path, per Shopify's own docs:

1. Open the automation. In your Shopify admin, go to Apps > Messaging > Automations. Click View templates and pick the Abandoned checkout template.
2. Turn it on. Review the summary, click Turn on automation, then Continue to confirm.
3. Edit the email. From the automation summary, click Edit > Edit email. Set the To field (it defaults to marketing subscribers only), the subject line, the preview text, and the From address. Then customize the body in the section editor: add your logo, brand colors, the cart contents block, and a discount if you use one.
4. Set the timing. Click Edit and use Shopify Flow to change the wait time before the email sends. New automations default to a 10-hour wait. Most brands pull that earlier, the first touch usually performs best somewhere in the 1 to 4 hour window.
5. Save and turn on the workflow.

The detail most guides miss: abandoned checkout emails are always free and don't count against your 10,000 free monthly emails (per Shopify Messaging pricing). So there's no per-send cost reason to leave this off.

A few things the native flow quietly skips: checkouts that contain only free items, customers who haven't completed a prior purchase (depending on your To setting), and anyone who abandoned a more recent checkout whose wait time hasn't lapsed yet. None of these are bugs, but they explain why your send count is lower than your abandonment count.

That's the baseline. Live in five minutes, zero cost. It just isn't the whole strategy.

Customizing the workflow with Shopify Flow

This is where you go from "an email goes out" to "the right email goes out at the right time."

Because the native automation runs on Shopify Flow under the hood, you can open that workflow and shape it. Flow turns the single fixed reminder into something you can actually tune. The moves worth making:

• Change the wait time. Drop the default 10 hours to 1-4 hours for the first touch while intent is still warm.
• Branch on cart value. Add a condition so a $600 cart and a $40 cart don't get treated identically. High-value carts deserve faster, stronger follow-up.
• Branch on customer tag. Handle VIPs, first-time buyers, and repeat customers differently.
• Add a delay-then-second-action step. You can chain a follow-up, though this gets fiddly fast.

Here's where Flow stops, and it's worth being clear about it. Flow is an automation builder, not an email sequencing engine. It has no built-in A/B testing, no real cohort segmentation, and stitching together a clean three-email sequence with per-step reporting is more work than it's worth. If you want a true sequence with revenue-per-email tracking, that's an email platform's job, not Flow's.

So Flow is the right answer when you want a smarter single touch (better timing, basic cart-value logic) without paying for another tool. Once you need sequences and segmentation, you've outgrown it.

Native Shopify vs Shopify Flow vs Klaviyo: which to use

Three real options, and the right one depends on where your brand is, not on which one is "best."

The recovery-rate gap is real. Native single emails land around 3-8% recovery. A sequenced Klaviyo flow recovers 15-25% with stronger open and click rates, roughly 2-3x the native flow, because it sends multiple touches, segments by behavior, and tests its way to better copy. One agency comparison estimated a $50K/month store recovers about $15,120 more per year on Klaviyo than on the native email, against roughly $480 in annual platform fees.

How to choose, in plain terms:

• Choose native if you're just getting a reminder live and don't want another subscription. It's free and it works enough to be worth turning on today.
• Choose Flow if you're on a plan that supports it and you want smarter timing and basic cart-value branching without a new tool.
• Choose Klaviyo (or a Klaviyo alternative) once you're sending real volume and the difference between 5% and 20% recovery is a number your CFO would notice.

WashCo, a Shopify brand we launched recently, generated $22,664 in attributed revenue in the first 7 days post-launch once we added a recovery channel on top of email. The point isn't the tool, it's that the carts you're not recovering are worth more than the platform fee to recover them. Run the numbers on your own average order value and abandonment volume before you decide what to spend.

Where email stops working (and what high-AOV brands add)

Now the honest part.

Across the Shopify brands we run phone support for, email recovery plateaus around 5-8% no matter how good the copy or the timing gets. Even a polished Klaviyo sequence tops out in the teens. That means even your best email setup leaves the large majority of abandoned carts unrecovered. The question for a $10M-$100M brand isn't "is my email good," it's "what happens to the other 80-90%."

Two layers extend past email's ceiling, and they matter most on high-value carts:

• SMS catches mobile abandoners that email misses. Most carts now abandon on mobile (Baymard puts mobile abandonment at 80%), and a permission-based text gets seen faster than an inbox.
• A phone call is the one that moves the needle on high-AOV carts. For a $200+ cart, a real conversation handles the actual objection (a sizing question, a shipping worry, a "is this legit" hesitation) that a static discount email can't. Abandoned cart recovery calls recover far more on high-value carts than a fourth email ever will, because the connection rate and the attention are in a different league.

This is the layer most brands skip because staffing a team to call abandoners by hand doesn't pencil out. That's the gap Ringly.io fills. Ringly is AI phone support for Shopify brands: it answers inbound calls and, on the recovery side, follows up on high-value abandoned carts by phone and SMS without you hiring a single rep. Across 50+ brands the AI resolves 73% of calls autonomously, and the recovered revenue shows up attributed in the dashboard. It sits in front of your existing Shopify customer service app and phone number, so nothing in your current stack changes.

The same agent that recovers a high-value cart also handles the inbound side, the WISMO calls and order questions your team answers fifty times a day. For Shopify Plus brands running at real volume, that's one system covering both the leak and the load.

If your email is on and you still feel the leak, book a 30-min call and we'll do the math on your store.

Frequently asked questions

Are Shopify abandoned cart emails free?

Yes. Abandoned checkout automations are always free and they don't count against your 10,000 free monthly emails on Basic, Grow, Advanced, and Plus plans. There's no per-send reason to leave the native email turned off.

Where did the old abandoned cart email setting go?

Shopify moved it out of Settings > Checkout and into the Messaging app. Go to Apps > Messaging > Automations and use the Abandoned checkout template. The migration is permanent, so you can't switch back to the legacy emails once you opt in.

How many abandoned cart emails should I send?

The native flow sends one. A solid sequence is three: a reminder around 1-4 hours, a nudge at about 24 hours, and a final touch at 48-72 hours. More than three usually trains shoppers to wait for a discount rather than recovering more revenue.

What's the best timing for the first email?

Somewhere in the 1 to 4 hour window after abandonment. The product is still fresh, the intent is still warm, and the email reads as timely rather than automated. The native default is 10 hours, which is usually too late, change it in the Shopify Flow workflow.

Can I send multiple abandoned cart emails without an app?

Partly. You can extend the native automation in Shopify Flow with wait steps and conditions, but Flow isn't a true sequencing engine and has no A/B testing or deep segmentation. For a real multi-email sequence with reporting, you'll want an email platform like Klaviyo or a Klaviyo alternative.

Why is my abandoned cart recovery rate so low?

Usually because you're relying on a single native email, which recovers 3-8% at best. The bigger reason is that email caps out around 5-8% even when it's good, so the carts you're not recovering need other channels, SMS for mobile and a phone follow-up for high-value carts.

Should I use Shopify Email or Klaviyo?

Start native because it's free and live in minutes. Move to Klaviyo (or an alternative) once you're sending real volume and the jump from ~5% to ~20% recovery is a number worth $20-100+/month to you. Most $10M+ brands are well past that line.

Talk to us

If you run a $10M-$100M Shopify brand and your abandoned cart emails are on but the recovered revenue still feels thin, a 30-min call is the fastest way to see what the other 90% of those carts are worth. We'll look at your real numbers, not a generic benchmark.

The 3-layer guarantee.

1. Live in 14 days or it's free until launched.
2. 65% resolution in 90 days or we refund the last 3 months of subscription fees.
3. We keep working free until we hit 65%.

Ruben (Ringly co-founder) takes these calls personally.

Book a 30-min call →