Shopify SMS integration: order and shipping texts from your own phone with Shopify Flow

What you need

• A Shopify store on the Grow, Advanced or Plus plan for the Shopify Flow route. Any plan works with the Zapier, Make or n8n route.
• A textbee account with the Android app installed on the phone that holds the SIM, and an API key from the dashboard.
• A checkout that collects a phone number: in Settings, then Checkout, set the shipping address phone number to Optional or Required. Shopify stores it in E.164 form, which is what the send endpoint expects.
• The textbee app on the phone. Download the app, then create an API key in the dashboard.

Send SMS from Shopify

Shopify Flow runs the workflow when the order event fires and fills the request body from the order with Liquid. The steps below build an order confirmation; the shipping text swaps the trigger and the body.

1. 1

   Create the workflow

   Open Shopify Flow from Apps and create a workflow. Pick the trigger: Order created for a confirmation text, Order paid if you capture payment by hand, or Fulfillment created for a shipping text with the tracking link.

2. 2

   Skip orders with no phone

   Add a condition that checks the phone field is not empty: order.shippingAddress.phone, or order.phone when customers use a phone as their contact method. A request with an empty recipients array is rejected with 400, and this condition keeps it out of the run log.

3. 3

   Add the Send HTTP request action

   Add the action and fill the request. Flow can store the key as a secret so it is hidden in the editor and the run logs; the Send HTTP request reference explains how.

   Field	Value
   HTTP method	Post
   URL	https://api.textbee.dev/api/v1/gateway/send-sms
   Header	x-api-key: YOUR_TEXTBEE_API_KEY
   Header	Content-Type: application/json

4. 4

   Write the body

   The json filter wraps each value in quotes and escapes it, so the body stays valid JSON whatever the customer typed. For the Fulfillment created trigger, read the order through fulfillment.order and add the first tracking link.

   Order created body

   Copy

   {% assign phone = order.shippingAddress.phone | default: order.phone %}
   {% capture text %}Hi {{ order.customer.firstName | default: "there" }}, order {{ order.name }} is confirmed. Total {{ order.totalPriceSet.shopMoney.amount }} {{ order.totalPriceSet.shopMoney.currencyCode }}. We will text you when it ships.{% endcapture %}
   {
     "recipients": [{{ phone | json }}],
     "message": {{ text | json }}
   }

5. 5

   Set the error handling

   For On client error (4XX response) choose Fail, so a wrong key or a bad number shows in the run log instead of retrying for a day. Leave On server error (5XX or 429 response) on Retry.

6. 6

   Test with one order

   Turn the workflow on and place a test order with your own number. The run log shows the request and the textbee response with its smsBatchId, and the text arrives within seconds. Fulfillment created runs once per fulfillment, so a split shipment sends one text per package.

Receive SMS in Shopify

Flow has no trigger for an incoming webhook. A reply goes through a workflow tool that can both receive the textbee webhook and write to Shopify.

1. 1

   Catch the reply

   In Make, Zapier or n8n create a webhook trigger and register its URL in the textbee dashboard for the MESSAGE_RECEIVED event. Each delivery carries sender, message and receivedAt.

2. 2

   Find the order

   Use the tool’s Shopify module to search customers by phone with the sender value, then read that customer’s latest order.

3. 3

   Write it back

   Add the message as a note or a tag on the order, or post it where your support team works. A reply to a shipping text is nearly always a question about that order, so put it next to the order.

4. 4

   Answer from the same number

   A second HTTP step that posts to the send endpoint with recipients set to sender keeps the conversation on the number the customer already texted.

Ask your AI agent to set it up

The prompt below carries the endpoints, the payloads and the Shopify details from this page. Change the line that starts with What I want, paste the prompt into your agent, and it walks you through the setup with your own field names and numbers.

I want to connect textbee to Shopify. textbee is an SMS gateway that sends and receives SMS through my own Android phone. Help me set it up step by step.

Facts about the textbee API. Use only these. Do not invent endpoints or fields.
- Send an SMS: POST https://api.textbee.dev/api/v1/gateway/send-sms with the header x-api-key: <TEXTBEE_API_KEY> and a JSON body like {"recipients": ["+12015550123"], "message": "Hello"}. recipients must be a JSON array of E.164 numbers, even for one number. Optional fields: deviceId, simSubscriptionId, scheduledAt (ISO 8601, in the future). The response is {"data": {"success": true, "smsBatchId": "..."}}.
- Check delivery or read replies: GET https://api.textbee.dev/api/v1/gateway/messages with the same header. Filters: direction=received, smsBatchId=<id from the send>, from and to as ISO timestamps. Each row has a status such as sent, delivered, failed or received.
- Receive an SMS: textbee posts JSON to a webhook URL I register in the dashboard. A MESSAGE_RECEIVED delivery has these top-level fields: smsId, message, deviceId, webhookSubscriptionId, webhookEvent, idempotencyKey, sender, receivedAt. The header X-Signature holds an HMAC-SHA256 hex digest of the raw body, keyed with the signing secret I set on the webhook. Retries reuse the same idempotencyKey.
- Limits: One Android phone sends roughly 10 to 15 messages a minute. Text only, no MMS. Messages over 160 characters are split into segments.

What I want: Text the customer from my own phone when a Shopify order is placed and again when it ships, with the tracking link, and get their replies onto the order.

Shopify specifics you should know:
- Shopify Flow is the automation app inside Shopify. Its Send HTTP request action (Grow, Advanced and Plus plans) takes an HTTP method, a URL, key and value headers, and a body written in Liquid. Variables use the Admin GraphQL field names in camelCase: order.name, order.customer.firstName, order.shippingAddress.phone, order.totalPriceSet.shopMoney.amount, fulfillment.order, fulfillment.trackingInfo (a list with url, number and company).
- Apply the json Liquid filter to every value placed in the JSON body, for example {{ phone | json }}, so quotes and line breaks are escaped. Flow supports assign, capture, if and for.
- Shopify stores checkout phone numbers in E.164, but the field is empty unless the checkout collects it (Settings, Checkout, shipping address phone number). Add a condition that the phone is not empty before the action.
- Useful triggers: Order created, Order paid, Order fulfilled, Fulfillment created, Fulfillment order line items prepared for pickup. Flow also has a Wait action for a delayed follow-up.
- Flow cannot receive a webhook. Replies need Make, Zapier or n8n with their Shopify module to add a note or tag to the order.
- On the Basic plan, use a Shopify trigger in Zapier, Make or n8n and the same POST from those tools.

Give me:
1. The exact clicks and field values in Shopify, using its real field labels.
2. The request body or field mapping, with placeholders for my API key and phone numbers. Never ask me to paste the real key into this chat.
3. A test with one number and what a correct result looks like.
4. The three most likely failure causes and how to check each one.

Automations that work well

Order confirmation

Order created trigger, the phone condition, then the request with the order name and total. Shopify sends its own confirmation text only when the customer gave no email, so most customers get nothing without this.

Shipped, with tracking

Fulfillment created trigger. The body loops over fulfillment.trackingInfo and takes the first url. Use the carrier link as it is; shortened links get filtered more often.

Ready for pickup

Fulfillment order line items prepared for pickup trigger, and a text with the store address and opening hours.

Cash on delivery check

Order created with a condition on the payment gateway name, a text that asks for a YES reply, and the receive flow tags the order confirmed when the reply arrives.

Review request

Order fulfilled trigger, a Wait of a few days, then one text with the review link. Keep it to one message and honour STOP.

Why teams move Shopify SMS to their own phone

The bill

SMS apps in the App Store charge a monthly subscription plus a per-message fee, and Shopify Messaging bills per text with a monthly fee per number. A store texting a few hundred orders a week pays every month for traffic a phone sends on a flat plan.

The reply rate

A shipping text from a short code or a rented number is one more notification. A text from the store’s own mobile number, which the customer can answer and call, gets read.

Nothing installed in the store

No app with access to customer data, no sender registration, no theme change. One workflow that calls one endpoint, which you can turn off in a click.

A cloud SMS provider in Shopify vs textbee in Shopify

Per-message prices by provider and country, with sources and dates, are on the provider comparison pages.

What works and what does not

What Shopify charges

Shopify Flow is included with every Shopify plan, but the Send HTTP request action is available on the Grow, Advanced and Plus plans only. help.shopify.com, checked on September 30, 2026. textbee itself charges a flat monthly plan with messages included; see pricing.

Frequently asked questions

Sources

1. help.shopify.com, checked on September 30, 2026
2. help.shopify.com: Using Liquid variables in Shopify Flow, checked on September 30, 2026
3. help.shopify.com: Shopify Flow triggers, checked on September 30, 2026
4. help.shopify.com: SMS notifications, checked on September 30, 2026

Read next

• WooCommerce order texts with one snippet
• Order and delivery notifications with SMS from your own Android number
• Make SMS integration, for the Basic plan
• Tutorial: shipping texts with Shopify Flow
• Webhooks documentation
• WooCommerce SMS integration: order texts from your own phone with one code snippet
• GoHighLevel SMS integration: send and receive texts through your own phone
• All integrations