Shopify Partner Program Tiers: What's Changing in 2027

On November 4, 2026, Shopify announced a major update to its Partner Program, changing how agencies and freelancers are ranked. The existing Select, Plus, and Premier tiers are being replaced by four new tiers, with all partner rankings set to be recalculated on January 1, 2027.

Whether you run a Shopify agency, work as a freelancer, or hire Shopify partners, these changes could affect your business. Some partners may move up, others may move down, while some will retain their current standing. Here’s what’s changing, what the new requirements mean, and what partners should focus on over the next eight weeks.

This guide is based on Shopify’s official Partner Program announcement and the Partner Program help page, where you can review the complete details.

The Short Answer

Effective from January 1, 2027, Shopify will be discontinuing its partner tier program and introducing new earned tiers, which include Registered, Silver, Gold, Platinum, and Diamond. Select, Plus, and Premier tiers will be discontinued on the same date, and Shopify asserts that your tier for January 1, 2027, will be based on the new requirement list and not a conversion from your existing badge.

Four things worth doing before the switch:

• Check your projected 2027 tier in the Dev Dashboard, available since November 4, 2026.
• Add up attributed GMV and attributed shops from the last four years.
• Fix attribution on any client store you launched or transferred but never claimed.
• Watch the Partner Directory on November 9, 2026, when it relaunches showing today's tiers.

Shopify Partner Program 2027: Official Tier Changes Announced on November 4, 2026

Shopify officially announced updates to its Partner Program on November 4, 2026, introducing a new tier structure for service and agency partners. These changes will take effect on January 1, 2027, replacing the existing Select, Plus, and Premier tiers with four new earned levels: Silver, Gold, Platinum, and Diamond.

The updated program also changes how Shopify evaluates partner performance. Instead of quarterly tier promotions, partners will receive daily tier updates based on two key requirements: attributed gross merchandise volume (GMV) and the number of attributed shops.

Partners can already check their projected 2027 tier through the Shopify Dev Dashboard. The current tier structure and benefits will remain unchanged until January 1, 2027.

What The Shopify Partner Program is

The Shopify Partner Program is the free program Shopify runs for companies that sell, build on and support its platform. Two groups sit inside it. Service and agency partners design, build and market stores. Technology partnership apps and themes.

So what is a Shopify partner, in practice? A business that makes money helping merchants run on Shopify, and gets paid for launches, referrals and app sales. Membership costs nothing. Partners earn instead. Since August 10, 2026, the standard build-and-transfer deal pays 20% of the merchant's subscription fee plus 0.1% of eligible online GMV for four years, per Shopify's earning model announcement. Referring an existing merchant who upgrades to Plus pays a one-time $2,500. The legal ground rules live in the Shopify Partner Program Agreement.

Tiers sit on top of the money. They decide your badge, your Partner Directory listing, your support model and your access to co-marketing funds. A bigger badge does not change your payout rate, because payouts and tiers run on separate tracks, as the Help Center's earnings page lays out.

If you want the build side in plain English, our Shopify development guide covers what a Shopify agency partner actually does day to day.

What Changes on January 1, 2027

Three things move: the names, the numbers and the clock.

Four details around that table matter. Shopify names Select, Plus and Premier as the retiring tiers, so no agency keeps an old badge name. The January 1 tier is calculated fresh against the new thresholds, which means you can move up, move down or stay put. Shopify retires the "Plus Partner" name partly because merchants confused it with the Shopify Plus plan. And the Partner Directory relaunches November 9, 2026 with today's tiers, then switches to the new tiers on January 1.

Technology partners sit outside all of this. Shopify says the tier model applies to service and agency partners, while app and theme developers work through the App Store program and the changes Shopify made there in early 2026. If you are still mapping old badges to the new partner levels, skip the name game and look at your two numbers instead.

The Four New Tiers Explained

Registered

Where every partner starts, with no GMV or shop minimum. You get partner tools and Dev Dashboard access. No tier badge, no Directory listing.

Silver

$25,000 in attributed GMV, 1 attributed shop, measured across 365 days. A Silver partner gets the tier badge, Partner Directory eligibility and advisory support. It's the first rung where the badge starts doing sales work for you.

Gold

$5M in attributed GMV, 5 attributed shops, measured across four years. Gold adds co-marketing funds on a one-off, needs-based basis. For an established agency with a steady pipeline, this is the realistic landing spot on day one.

Platinum

$50M in attributed GMV, 20 attributed shops, four years. A Shopify Platinum partner gets strategic support, which means personalized planning and regular business reviews, plus quarterly recurring co-marketing campaigns.

Diamond

$500M in attributed GMV, 25 attributed shops, four years. Diamond brings embedded support, where Shopify works as an extension of your team, and large integrated co-marketing programs.

The Tier Requirements Table

The new Shopify partner requirements ask for both numbers, not one. Shopify's Help Center is explicit that every tier above Registered needs the GMV target and the shop count, and that a shop counts the same whether the merchant runs Basic or Plus. That second rule shapes strategy: ten small merchants fill a shop count quickly while leaving GMV thin, and one large merchant does the reverse.

What Counts as Attributed GMV and Attributed Shops

Jargon first. Attributed GMV is the total sales your attributed shops generate, net of refunds, across every channel: online, POS and B2B. It is not what clients pay you. It is what their customers spend.

An attributed shop is a store you launched for a merchant or transferred to them. From there, the rules get specific:

• Development, test, staff and sandbox stores never count.
• Collaborator access alone does not count, and neither does a referral submission by itself. You still get paid for the referral, but you get no tier credit.
• Cancelled or paused shops keep counting inside the measurement window, along with their GMV.
• Shops you launched or transferred in the last four years count from day one, so older work is not lost.
• If you add POS or B2B to an existing client, you get that product's GMV from the date you added it, not the shop's full history.
• Running several partner IDs? Shopify combines them on request, and the tier applies across all approved IDs.

Benefits by Tier

Shopify partner benefits scale with the badge, mostly in support and marketing money.

Advisory means best practices, resources and group guidance. Strategic means Shopify plans with you proactively. Embedded means Shopify plugs into your team. Co-marketing starts at Gold, with one-off needs-based funds there, quarterly recurring campaigns at Platinum and large integrated programs at Diamond.

The partner badge itself is downloadable from Organization settings in the Dev Dashboard starting January 1, 2027, so you can put it on your site, proposals and pitch decks.

Daily Promotions And The Six-Month Lock

From January 1, 2027, Shopify updates tiers daily. Cross a threshold and the system promotes you automatically, with the new tier showing in your Dev Dashboard right away. No application, no review call.

Then the lock. Once you earn a tier, you hold it for at least six months, even if GMV drops or a client leaves. You can still move up during the lock, and an upward move starts a fresh six-month clock. When the lock expires, Shopify reviews your numbers: keep the tier if you still qualify, drop a level if you don't.

Practical read: one slow quarter won't strip a badge mid-pitch. A slow year will.

How to Check Your Projected Tier in The Dev Dashboard

Shopify's Help Center gives the exact path. Sign in at dev.shopify.com/dashboard, open Organization settings, then click Partner program. Since November 4, 2026 that screen shows your projected 2027 tier and your progress against the thresholds.

Your current tier and benefits stay untouched until January 1. If the projection looks wrong, you have eight weeks to find the missing attribution instead of discovering it in February.

What this means for your agency

Small agencies and solo builders

Silver is the first real milestone, and $25,000 in GMV from a single shop over a year is reachable. One solid launch can clear it. The trap is attribution: if you built the store as a collaborator and never took the transfer, you get zero credit. Build that habit now, before the daily counter starts.

Growing agencies

Gold is the swing tier, and $5M over four years reads very differently from $5M a year. Shopify measures the threshold across the full four-year window, so you compete with your own track record instead of one annual sprint. Put your energy into clients who grow: a merchant moving from Basic to Plus, or off another platform, compounds GMV faster than ten small builds. When clients start weighing that move, our Shopify Plus migration guide covers the transfer without losing SEO or order history.

Enterprise and Plus partners

Platinum and Diamond reward scale, and the shop counts get demanding: 20 shops for Platinum and 25 for Diamond, on top of $50M and $500M in GMV. Shopify Plus agency partners with a handful of very large merchants usually clear GMV first and struggle on shop count. Agencies with dozens of small retainers hit the opposite wall. If your growth plan leans on Plus and enterprise accounts, our breakdown of the best Shopify Plus agency in the USA is a useful benchmark for how that positioning gets sold.

How to qualify for a higher tier

Shopify partner eligibility comes down to two numbers, so manage them like pipeline instead of hoping they improve.

• Claim every launch. Launch or transfer the store in your dashboard rather than working as a collaborator only.
• Add POS and B2B where they fit. GMV credit on those products starts from the add date.
• Consolidate partner IDs. Shopify combines them on request, which lifts you faster than running separate accounts.
• Keep four years of records. Shops from the last four years count immediately, so older work fuels Gold and above.
• Grow merchant revenue, not just store count. GMV is your clients' sales, so conversion, speed and search visibility move your tier. Our Shopify SEO guide covers the store-performance basics that turn traffic into GMV.

Not a partner yet? Becoming a Shopify partner takes a free signup at shopify.com/partners, which puts you on the Registered tier while you build the two numbers.

Final Thoughts

The 2027 partner program rewards partners who can prove they moved stores, not partners who can name the biggest logo. Two numbers decide your badge now: attributed GMV and attributed shops. Clean up your attribution in the next eight weeks and January 1 becomes a formality. Leave it until January and you'll spend the first quarter explaining a badge you can't get back for six months.

FAQ

When do the new Shopify partner tiers start?

January 1, 2027. Until then, Shopify says your current tier and benefits stay exactly as they are.

Will my old tier convert automatically?

No. Shopify calculates January 1 tiers against the new requirements, so a Select, Plus or Premier partner can land anywhere from Registered to Platinum.

How do I check my Shopify partner tier?

Go to the Dev Dashboard, open Organization settings, then click Partner program. Previews of the 2027 tier opened on November 4, 2026.

Does every client store count as an attributed shop?

Only stores you launched or transferred to a merchant. Development, test, staff and sandbox stores are excluded, and collaborator access alone doesn't qualify.

Is attributed GMV online only?

No. Shopify counts total sales net of refunds across online, POS and B2B.

Do app and theme developers get these tiers?

No. The four tiers apply to service and agency partners. Technology partners participate through the App Store program.

Can I lose a tier before six months?

No. Shopify holds an earned tier for at least six months. You can move up inside that window, and upward moves restart the clock.

Does a higher tier change my commission?

No. Payouts follow the earning model, 20% of subscription revenue plus 0.1% of eligible online GMV for four years, whatever badge you carry.

Sources

• Shopify Partners blog: How we're evolving the Shopify Partner Program for agencies, November 4, 2026
• Shopify Help Center: About the Shopify Partner Program
• Shopify Help Center: How partners earn on Shopify
• Shopify Help Center: Eligibility for the Shopify Partner Directory
• Shopify Help Center: Overview of the Partner Dashboard and Dev Dashboard
• Shopify Partners blog: A new partner earning model, July 7, 2026
• Shopify Partner Program Agreement
• Shopify Partner Directory