Adly Compare Best Shopify apps for marketing
Buyer's guide for Shopify merchants
Best Shopify apps for marketing: one app per job, no double billing
Shopify marketing apps are add-ons from the Shopify App Store that help a store get seen, collect emails, earn trust with reviews and win repeat orders.
Most lists hand you ten email tools and call it a stack. The real problem for a small store is simpler. You pay for apps that overlap, and you still have nothing new to post or advertise this week. This guide picks one app per job, shows the overlaps and gives you an install order.
Prices, plan limits and app facts checked November 2026Which Shopify marketing apps do I actually need?
Most small stores need four apps: one for creative and ads, an email platform with built-in signup forms, a reviews app and, once people buy twice, a loyalty app. With no traffic yet, start with creative and ads, because nothing else works without visitors. With traffic but few sales, add reviews. With repeat buyers, add email flows and loyalty. Adly for Shopify fits the first job: it turns catalog photos into ads and posts.
The verdict table, job by job
| Funnel job | Pick | Starting price (as of Nov 2026) | Install it when | Overlap to watch | Details |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Get seen: ad creative, posting, Meta ads | Adly for Shopify | Free plan. Paid from $19 per 30 days, billed by Shopify | Day one. You need ads and posts before anything else can work | Covers ad designs, UGC videos, scheduling and purchase ads in one app | Adly section |
| Get seen: retargeting | AdRoll | Check the live App Store listing | You have steady traffic to bring back | Ad spend is billed on top of the app fee | Get seen |
| Capture: popups and forms | Forms in your email app, or Privy | Inside your email plan, or check the Privy listing | Your first visitors arrive | Klaviyo and Omnisend already include signup forms | Capture |
| Convert: reviews | Judge.me or Loox | Check the live App Store listing | You have traffic and first orders | Growave and Yotpo also offer reviews | Convert |
| Bring back: email and SMS | Klaviyo, Omnisend, Shopify Messaging or Mailchimp | Grows with your contact list; check the listing | You have a list worth writing to | Pick one. Two email platforms means two bills and split data | Bring back |
| Bring back: loyalty and referral | Smile, Growave or UpPromote | Check the live App Store listing | Customers start buying a second time | Loox and Growave include referral features | Loyalty |
Prices of other apps change often, so read each live Shopify App Store listing before you budget. Product names belong to their owners. Adly is not affiliated with them.
How every app was judged
Each app, Adly for Shopify included, was held to the same six questions.
- Job covered. Which funnel job does it actually do?
- Price at your size. What does it cost at 500, 5,000 and 50,000 contacts or outputs?
- Setup time. Can a solo owner get a first result in one afternoon?
- Store speed. Does it add scripts or widgets to your storefront?
- Data you keep. Can you export contacts, reviews or creative if you leave?
- Billing. Is it on your Shopify bill or a separate card charge?
Adly for Shopify: product photos in, ads and posts out
Best for: solo founders and small teams with a catalog but no designer, and stores that want to run Meta purchase ads without building each one in Ads Manager.
What is Adly for Shopify? Adly for Shopify is a marketing app installed inside the Shopify admin. It went live on the Shopify App Store in November 2026, and it needs no Adly account or extra sign-up. You pick products from your catalog, one at a time, by collection or many at once. Adly then makes creative in your store's style: Image Studio ad designs from the product photo, UGC creator videos with a different line per product, Animate clips that turn a photo into a short video, Scene Studio multi-scene product films and Meta catalog designs. One click adds a result to the product's Shopify media, and an image can become the main photo. You can post or schedule any result to your Facebook Page, Instagram, TikTok, LinkedIn and X (X on paid plans) with a caption Adly writes. With a Meta ad account connected, "Run as ad" launches a Meta Sales campaign optimized for purchases with your Meta pixel. Meta bills the ad spend. Adly never charges for ads.
What it makes from your catalog
- 1Install from the Shopify App Store. It opens inside your Shopify admin with an English interface. It writes and speaks 60+ languages and picks your store's language from its country.
- 2Pick products. Search the catalog, choose a collection, or select many products at once.
- 3Choose what to make. Ad designs, UGC creator videos, Animate clips, Scene Studio films for a hook, product and call to action across several scenes, or Meta catalog designs where one approved template is applied to every product.
- 4Use the results. Results land on a Results page, newest first. Add any of them to the product's Shopify media, or post and schedule them. Posts are tracked on a Posts page.
- 5Run as ad. Set the budget, countries and end date. The app shows spend, purchases and return on ad spend. "New campaign" builds full Meta campaigns with up to 5 ad sets and 6 ads, or catalog shopping campaigns from a Meta catalog. The Ads page lists every campaign in your ad account with its results.
Catalog ads have their own playbook. Our design Meta catalog images from a product feed workflow walks through the steps, and the Confect.io vs Adly catalog ads comparison shows how Adly sits next to a specialist catalog editor. If you are weighing stills against motion, the guide on how to turn product images into videos covers when a short clip earns its place.
Plans and what they cover (as of November 2026)
| Plan | Price per 30 days | Images | Video units | UGC videos (2 units each) | Price per image if you use only images |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Free | $0 | 5 | 4 | Up to 2 | $0 |
| Starter | $19 | 25 | 16 | Up to 8 | $0.76 |
| Growth | $49 | 70 | 40 | Up to 20 | $0.70 |
| Pro | $99 | 150 | 80 | Up to 40 | $0.66 |
The last column ignores the video units, so treat it as a ceiling. If you use both allowances, each output costs less. Usage comes back automatically when a result fails, and you can report a result that is not right within 14 days to get its usage back. Ad spend is separate and billed by Meta.
Worked example: a candle shop with 12 products on Growth ($49)
This is an illustrative plan, not a forecast of results.
- Pick the "Fall scents" collection and make one Image Studio ad design per product. That uses 12 of 70 images.
- Add the three strongest designs to their products' Shopify media, and make one of them the main photo.
- Make UGC creator videos for the 4 best sellers, each with its own line. That uses 8 of 40 video units.
- Schedule 3 posts a week for 4 weeks to Instagram, Facebook and TikTok, using Adly's captions. That is 12 posts from 16 assets.
- Run the design you like most as an ad: a small daily budget, the US as the country and an end date 7 days out. Meta bills that spend.
- You still have 58 images and 32 video units for the cycle: room for up to 16 more UGC videos, or a mix with Animate clips and a Scene Studio film.
Why steady creative output matters more than adding apps
Small stores rarely stall because they lack one more widget. They run out of things to post and advertise. Adly's own platform data shows the pattern clearly.
2
Median published posts per active month across 1,218 brands on Adly (Adly data, Mar to Nov 2026).
- Starting is fast. The median brand published its first post on day 0, and 93% of posts were scheduled ahead.
- Keeping going is the hard part. Even so, the median brand published 2 posts per active month.
- Retail lags. Retail brands averaged 4.4 outputs in their first 7 days, against 6 across all brands, with a median of 1 published post per active month.
- The product photo is the raw material. 25% of everything brands made were designs built around a product photo, and 23% for retail brands.
- Fixing output is rare. 11% of designs were revised before use, and 8% for retail brands.
These are Adly customers across many sectors, and most of the sample works in Arabic. They are not all Shopify stores. Read the numbers as a pattern, not a forecast for your store.
What it means for your stack: judge a creative app on one question. Does it keep you posting every week? A long feature list does not help if your calendar stays empty. For a store with a catalog, starting from product photos is the shortest path to a full week.
A multi-channel example from Adly customer data
Aquara Water (مياه أكوارا), a water desalination plant in Jordan, has used Adly since April 2026. It published its first post 1 day after joining. Since then it has made 323 designs and 52 videos and published 231 posts through Adly to Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn, X and TikTok, about 28.9 posts per active month. Its main formats are single post designs, designs built around a product photo and short videos. It is not a Shopify store or a US business. It shows what posting to five networks from one tool looks like, and nothing more.
Adly for Shopify vs stitching three tools together
The usual way to get ads and posts is a design tool, a scheduler and Meta Ads Manager, each opened separately. Here is the same week of work both ways.
| Task | Adly for Shopify | Design tool + scheduler + Ads Manager |
|---|---|---|
| Ad from a product photo | Pick the product in your catalog; Adly designs it in your store's style | Download the photo, build the design from a template, export it |
| UGC-style video | UGC creator videos from catalog products, a different line per product | Record yourself or hire a creator |
| Product page media | One click adds the result to Shopify media | Download, then upload to the product |
| Posting | Post or schedule to Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, LinkedIn and X with an Adly caption | Upload to the scheduler and write each caption |
| Purchase ad | "Run as ad" with your Meta pixel; you set budget, countries and end date | Build the campaign in Ads Manager |
| Results | Spend, purchases and return on ad spend in the app | Read in Ads Manager |
| Billing | One Shopify charge every 30 days; Meta bills ad spend | Separate subscriptions; Meta bills ad spend |
Product names belong to their owners. Adly is not affiliated with them.
What you gain and what you trade
You gain
- Creative that starts from the catalog you already keep up to date.
- New product page media and new ads from the same result.
- One line on your Shopify bill for creative, posting and ad setup.
You trade
- Output follows your plan's usage limit, and video uses more of it: a UGC video takes 2 video units.
- Ad spend is an extra cost, paid to Meta.
- You still review each result and choose when it posts. Clean, well-lit product photos give the best ads.
Get seen: the other apps for ads and traffic
Adly for Shopify covers the creative, the posting and the purchase ads. Two other apps often sit next to it.
Facebook & Instagram by Meta
Best for: every store that will advertise on Facebook or Instagram
Meta's own sales channel app. Stores use it to sync products to a Meta catalog and set up the Meta pixel. That setup pays off twice in Adly: "Run as ad" uses your store's Meta pixel, and catalog shopping campaigns build from a Meta catalog.
AdRoll
Best for: stores with steady traffic to bring back
AdRoll runs retargeting ads that follow past visitors across channels. With little traffic, there is little audience to retarget, so it usually comes after your first purchase ads are running. Check the live listing for the current price.
Who pays for ad spend
Every ad app splits money the same way. The ad platform bills your spend, and the app bills its own fee. With Adly for Shopify, Meta bills the spend and Adly never charges for ads. If your brand also wants message and lead campaigns or an AI audit of the ad account, the AI Facebook ads manager for e-commerce on the Adly web app covers that work.
Capture: popups and email signup apps
A popup app is often the first double bill in a Shopify stack. Check what your email app already does before you add one.
Use the forms you already pay for
Klaviyo and Omnisend both include signup forms and popups. Shopify Messaging pairs with Shopify Forms. If you use one of these, start there.
Privy
Best for: stores that want popups and capture first, with email and SMS in the same app
Privy is built around popups, flyouts and signup forms, and it also sends email and SMS. Pick it as your email platform, or skip it. Running Privy plus a second email platform means two places to manage contacts.
US text messages need consent first
In the US, marketing texts need clear, express consent from the subscriber before you send them. Use your SMS app's own signup flow, keep the consent records it stores, and do not upload a list of phone numbers you collected at checkout for order updates.
This is general information, not legal advice. Check your SMS provider's compliance guide or a lawyer before you launch texts.
Convert: reviews and social proof
Once visitors arrive, reviews help them decide. One reviews app is enough for almost every small store.
Judge.me or Loox: do you need both?
No. Both collect product reviews and show them on your product pages. Judge.me suits stores that want text and photo reviews with plenty of display options. Loox leans on photo and video reviews and adds referral features. Two reviews apps mean two widgets on each page and two review request emails to the same customer.
If you already pay for Growave or Yotpo, check your plan. Both offer reviews, so a third app may be a duplicate.
Getting found on Google without another app
Before paying for a search ranking app, fill in what Shopify already gives you: a clear page title and description for each product, and alt text on product images. Adding fresh designs to product media gives each page more to show.
Bring buyers back: email, SMS and loyalty
This is where most lists repeat themselves. You need one email platform. The choice is about how deep you want to go.
Klaviyo, Omnisend, Shopify Messaging or Mailchimp
Shopify Messaging
Best for: a first email setup inside the Shopify admin
Shopify's own email tool. It lives in your admin and uses your store data directly, so it is the simplest place to start.
Klaviyo
Best for: stores that want detailed segments and automated flows
Email and SMS with deep use of Shopify order and browsing data. Strong when you plan to build many flows and segments.
Omnisend
Best for: email and SMS with ready-made automations
Email, SMS and signup forms with prebuilt flows, such as welcome and abandoned cart, that a small team can switch on quickly.
Mailchimp
Best for: owners who already know it
A familiar email marketing tool with signup forms. Worth a look if you have used it before and want to keep your templates.
How the email bill grows with your list
Email and SMS apps usually price by contact count and messages sent. A popup that works well can push you into a higher tier within weeks. Do this math before your trial ends:
- Find your plan's price at today's contact count.
- Find the price at 2 times and 5 times that count.
- Check whether SMS is charged per message on top of the plan.
- Check whether unsubscribed or inactive contacts still count toward your tier, and clean them out if they do.
Loyalty and referral: Smile, Growave, UpPromote, Yotpo
Smile runs points, referrals and VIP tiers. Growave combines loyalty, reviews, referrals and wishlists in one app. UpPromote runs affiliate and referral programs. Yotpo sells reviews, loyalty and SMS as separate products.
Wait until customers buy a second time. A points program with no repeat buyers is a widget nobody uses. When you launch one, explain it in a short video post, which Adly for Shopify can make from your products.
Overlap check: what you may already pay for
Read the row for each app you already have. Skip the extras it lists until you have a reason.
- Klaviyo or OmnisendAlready includes signup forms and SMS. Skip a separate popup app and a separate SMS app at first.
- PrivyAlready covers popups, email and SMS. Skip a second email platform.
- GrowaveAlready covers loyalty, reviews, referrals and wishlists. Skip a separate reviews app.
- YotpoReviews, loyalty and SMS are separate products. Check which ones are on your bill before adding Judge.me or Smile.
- LooxAlready includes referral features. Skip a separate referral app until you need affiliate payouts.
- Adly for ShopifyAlready covers ad designs, UGC videos, product videos, Meta catalog designs, posting to five networks and Meta purchase ads. Skip a separate scheduler and a separate ad design tool for product ads.
Product names belong to their owners. Adly is not affiliated with them.
What a marketing app stack costs per month
Adly prices below are as of November 2026. Other apps change prices often, so each budget gives you an amount to spend and tells you what to check on the live listing.
$0 starter stack
Enough for about one new design a week and up to 2 UGC videos per cycle. Good for testing, thin for posting three times a week.
Lean stack around $100
Check that your email tier still fits at twice today's list. On Starter ($19) the email and reviews budget grows to $81.
Growing store stack
The email line is the one that grows. Recheck it every time your list doubles.
Ad spend is not in any of these totals. Meta bills it directly when you run ads.
Which apps to install first, by store stage
Install one app at a time, so you know which one moved your numbers.
- Stage 1No traffic yet
Adly for Shopify plus the forms in your email app. Make a week of designs and UGC videos from your catalog and start posting. The number to watch: posts published per week.
- Stage 2Traffic, few sales
Add one reviews app. Put your best Adly designs on product pages as media. Run your strongest creative as a small Meta purchase ad.
- Stage 3Repeat buyers
Build email flows: welcome, abandoned cart and after purchase. Then add a loyalty or referral app.
- Stage 4Already running ads
Refresh creative weekly with UGC videos and Scene Studio films, try Meta catalog designs, and add retargeting once traffic is steady.
Making and posting content from your iPhone
Adly for Shopify runs inside the Shopify admin. If you also want to make and post content from your phone, Adly for iPhone is on the App Store as "Adly: AI UGC & Video Ad Maker". It signs in to an Adly account, the same account as getadly.com, so a plan bought on the website works in the app and work made in the app shows on the website.
It is free to download, needs iOS 17 or later and also opens on iPad. Plans in the app are billed by Apple: Spark $18.99, Launch $28.99 and Solo $48.99 per month, as of November 2026. Monthly plans start with a 3-day free trial for new subscribers.
- UGC videos with real-looking people holding your product and talking about it.
- Designs built around your product photo, in your brand colors and fonts.
- Publish now or schedule to Instagram, Facebook Pages, TikTok and LinkedIn on every plan, and X on Solo.
- Meta ad results, such as spend and people reached, without opening Ads Manager.
- An AI video editor: raw clips in, an edited Reel with captions and music out.
- Push notifications when a video is ready or a post goes live.
Before you install: speed, data and billing
- Test speed before and after. Run the same free page speed test on your home page and one product page, then again after install. Apps that add storefront widgets are the usual cause of slowdowns.
- Clean up after uninstalling. Check your theme for leftover app blocks or code snippets.
- Export before you switch. When changing email apps, export contacts with their consent status and tags first.
- Set up SMS consent first. Collect US phone numbers only through a consent form.
- Know where billing happens. Some apps charge through your Shopify bill and some charge a card separately. Adly for Shopify bills through Shopify every 30 days.
Test any app in 14 days
Pick one number per app on day 1 and write it down. Check it again on day 14, before the trial or first bill.
| App type | Number to watch | How to read it |
|---|---|---|
| Creative and ads | Posts published per week, and how many outputs you had to fix | Across Adly brands, 11% of designs were revised before use (Adly data, Mar to Nov 2026). If you fix most outputs, the tool is costing you time. |
| Popups and forms | Signup rate: signups divided by visitors | Compare the same 14 days before and after the form went live. |
| Reviews | Share of review requests that get a review | A low share often means the request goes out too early, before the product arrives. |
| Email and SMS | Revenue the app attributes to flows, against its price | Look at flows first. They keep running after you stop sending campaigns. |
| Loyalty | Share of orders from returning customers | Give it longer than 14 days if your products are bought every few months. |
| Meta ads | Return on ad spend shown in the app | Compare it with your margin, and stop ads that spend without purchases. |
Which tool is right for you?
- Brand-new store on a tight budget
- Adly for Shopify Free plus your email app's free tier, if it has one. Get a week of posts live before you spend on ads.
- Solo founder with no designer
- Adly for Shopify Starter ($19) or Growth ($49). Choose Growth if you want weekly UGC videos: it covers up to 20 a cycle.
- Store already spending on Meta ads
- Adly for Shopify Growth or Pro for fresh creative each week, "Run as ad" and New campaign for launches, and Meta's Facebook & Instagram app for the pixel and catalog.
- Repeat-purchase and subscription brands
- One email and SMS platform first, such as Klaviyo or Omnisend, then Smile or Growave for loyalty. Use Adly for Shopify to make launch and restock content.
- Agencies and freelancers managing several stores
- Install Adly for Shopify in each client's store, so billing stays on that store. For running one creative across many brands, multi-brand mode is on the Adly web app from Growth up, and the AI landing page generator covers campaign pages outside the store theme.
If you have products but nothing new to post this week, start with the creative job. Install Adly for Shopify, pick five products and make your first designs and UGC videos today.
Questions Shopify merchants ask about marketing apps
What are the best free Shopify marketing apps?
Start with free plans that cover different jobs. Adly for Shopify's Free plan gives 5 images and 4 video units every 30 days for ads and posts. Add the free tier of one email app and one reviews app if their listings offer one. Free plans cap volume, so check the limit before you build a habit on them.
How many marketing apps should a Shopify store use?
Usually four: creative and ads, email with forms, reviews, and loyalty once you have repeat buyers. Add a fifth only when one of your numbers shows a gap.
Do marketing apps slow down a Shopify store?
Apps that add scripts or widgets to storefront pages can. Apps that mostly work inside your admin, such as creative and posting tools, have less to load on the storefront. Run a speed test before and after either way.
Which Shopify app makes ads and social posts from my products?
Adly for Shopify. You pick products from your catalog, and it makes ad designs, UGC creator videos, Animate clips, Scene Studio films and Meta catalog designs. You can then post or schedule them to Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, LinkedIn and X, or run them as Meta ads.
When should I start paid advertising?
Once your Meta pixel is set up, your product pages have clear photos, and you have a few posts that people respond to. Start with a small daily budget and an end date, and watch return on ad spend.
Does Adly charge for my Meta ad spend?
No. Meta bills the ad spend directly. Adly for Shopify charges only its plan, billed by Shopify every 30 days.
Can Shopify marketing apps work together?
Yes, because they all read the same Shopify customer and order data. Trouble starts when two apps do the same job, such as two popups or two review requests going to one customer.
How do I move from one email app to another?
Export your contacts with their consent status and tags. Rebuild your main flows in the new app, then switch off the old flows before you cancel, so no customer gets the same email twice.