How to schedule a sale on Shopify that starts and ends on its own

Before you schedule

• Write down the start and the end. One date and time for each, used everywhere: the discount, the announcement, the emails, the countdown.
• Use your store’s time zone. Shopify starts and ends discounts in the time zone set in your admin, under Settings → General. Check it before you pick dates.
• Decide what shoppers see after. When the sale ends, the message should go with it, and your everyday message should come back.
• Test it the day before. Confirm the discount’s dates, then preview the store to see what shoppers will see when the sale starts.

What Shopify schedules on its own

The discount

Every Shopify discount has Active dates. Go to Discounts, open or create the discount, and in Active dates pick the start date. Click Set end date to choose when it ends. Without an end date, a discount doesn’t expire; for a one-day sale, the Help Center says to pick the same day for both. This works for automatic discounts and discount codes alike. See Amount off discounts.

New products, collections and pages

A product or collection can be scheduled to appear on your online store: in its Publishing section, click the calendar beside Online Store, then Schedule publishing. A product must be Active for it to publish. Pages and blog posts take a visibility date instead. See Future publishing.

Everything at once, on Shopify Plus

Shopify’s Launchpad app schedules a whole event: price changes, theme changes, product releases and discounts, switched on and back off. It’s available only to stores on Shopify Plus. See Launchpad.

The part that doesn’t schedule itself

On most plans, the message about the sale is the part left to you. An announcement bar or a banner in your theme says whatever it said last, so “30% off ends Sunday” stays up on Monday until someone edits it, and the sale’s announcement has to go up the moment it starts.

There are three common ways to handle it:

• Edit the theme by hand at the start and the end. It costs nothing and needs someone at the keyboard at both moments.
• A popup or bar app with a schedule. It switches on and off with the dates you give it, and covers or pushes down the page while it shows.
• A scheduled drawer. The sale’s announcement, code and countdown sit in a drawer that turns on and off with its dates, behind one button that never covers the page. This is how Promo Drawer works. Shoppers see the offer when they open the drawer, so a one-line announcement in your theme is a good partner for it.

Schedule a sale with Promo Drawer

Install Promo Drawer from the Shopify App Store and turn on its app embed in your theme editor; Getting started walks through both. Then:

1. Schedule the discount in Shopify. Set its Active dates as above. Promo Drawer shows the offer; the discount itself is Shopify’s.
2. Make a drawer for the sale. An announcement card for the offer, a discount code card shoppers apply in one tap, and a countdown card if the end is real.
3. Give the drawer the same start and end. Times are in your store’s time zone, wherever the shopper is, and stay right across daylight saving time.
4. Put it above your everyday drawer. Only one drawer shows per page: the highest in your Drawers list that fits the page, the device and the schedule. During the sale, the sale drawer shows; when it ends, your everyday drawer comes back by itself.
5. Count down to the end. A countdown card can count to the end of its drawer’s schedule, so the timer and the sale end together. See How to add a countdown timer to Shopify.
6. Check the time zone and the dates. Your store’s time zone is in Shopify’s Settings → General. The Drawers list shows each drawer’s dates as it goes, like “Starts Nov 27” or “Showing until Nov 30”.

Or ask Shopify’s Sidekick: “Make me a Black Friday drawer from November 27 to November 30, with 30% off using BF30 and a countdown to the end.” It builds the drawer for you to review and save. See Sidekick.

Scheduling, page targeting, the countdown card and the discount code card are on Basic and Pro, each with a 30-day free trial. The Free plan has one drawer with announcement, image and follow cards on your home page.

Sales worth scheduling ahead

• Black Friday to Cyber Monday. One drawer for the whole weekend, or one for each day, stacked in your Drawers list so each takes over on its date. The Black Friday checklist has the rest of the season’s steps.
• A weekend flash sale. Friday evening to Sunday night, set on Wednesday.
• A holiday shipping deadline. A drawer that ends on your last day to order for delivery, with a countdown to it.
• A launch. The product scheduled to publish, and a drawer scheduled to announce it at the same moment.

Questions merchants ask

Does Promo Drawer change my prices or start the discount?

No. The discount and any price changes are Shopify’s. Promo Drawer shows the sale, with its code and countdown, on the dates you set.

Which time zone does the schedule use?

Your store’s, the same one Shopify uses for discounts. A sale that starts at midnight starts at midnight in your time zone for every shopper.

What happens when two drawers’ dates overlap?

The one higher in your Drawers list shows. Put the sale drawer at the top and it wins for its dates; when it ends, the next one down shows again.

Can I schedule a sale on the Free plan?

Scheduling is on Basic and Pro. On the Free plan, your one drawer shows on your home page until you turn it off.