Building Custom Shopify Apps with the Admin GraphQL API

Custom Shopify apps are one of the highest-leverage things you can build for a merchant. Here is how I approach them.

Talk to the Admin API in GraphQL

The Admin GraphQL API lets you fetch exactly the fields you need in one round trip — a big win over the REST API for embedded apps where latency is visible to the merchant.

query Products($first: Int!) {
  products(first: $first) {
    edges {
      node {
        id
        title
        totalInventory
      }
    }
  }
}

Polaris for a native feel

Building the UI with Polaris means your app looks and behaves like part of the Shopify admin — merchants trust it immediately and you write far less CSS.

Ship the smallest app that solves a real merchant problem, then iterate from real usage.