I am an old-school sales guy trying his best to learn all of these new technologies (Gen X’er). My products all have barcodes on them, so I would like to find a barcode scanner (I want the actual hand gun to scan them (if we can use our phones/tablets that’s a bonus), but for our purposes, we would like to simple scan the item to fulfill our orders. I have read many articles on here with others discussing this very topic, but I think it’s confused me more than when I started. For example, why would I need another app. to help me do this? I would think that Shopify has this done already, all I need is a reliable hand-held scanner and I am off to the races? I am hopeful someone can enlighten me on what to do as my head is spinning a bit with what to do.
I think your confusion is because Shopify has many different workflows for many different activities, and each has their own restrictions and guidance.
You are not wrong, and the scanner half is simpler than those threads make it sound. A USB or Bluetooth barcode scanner is a keyboard. It types the digits into whatever field has focus and then presses Enter. No driver, nothing to connect to Shopify. Plug it in, open any text box, scan a product, watch the number appear.
The reason apps exist is the other half. The admin order page has no box that says scan an item to fulfill it, so on the fulfillment screen there is nothing for the scanner to type into. Shopify POS on a phone or tablet does scan, and ship from store covers online orders, but that is POS Pro. So the apps are supplying the missing field, not talking to your scanner.
Before you buy anything, do this. Open one product in the admin, click into the Barcode field on the variant, and scan the physical item. Whatever lands in that box has to match exactly what is stored there. The usual trip-up is a UPC printed as 12 digits where the scanner sends 13 with a leading zero, or the field being empty because barcodes never came across during import. Every scan workflow matches on that field, app or no app, so if it does not line up the app will not save you either.
The scanner itself is usually the easy part; I’d validate the product data and fulfillment flow before choosing hardware.
Pick 10 real products and scan each barcode into a plain text field first, then compare that exact value with the barcode stored on the Shopify variant. Flag blanks, duplicates, leading-zero differences, or cases where one physical item maps to more than one variant. If that mapping is clean, most USB/Bluetooth scanners will work reliably wherever Shopify or an app gives you a scan field.
For fulfillment, I’d test one complete order: open the order, scan every item, verify quantity/variant, then mark fulfillment and confirm tracking/status. That tells you whether Shopify POS/your current plan already covers the workflow or whether an app is only needed to provide the scan-to-verify step.
Roughly how many different SKUs do you fulfill, and are you packing online orders from the same inventory used for in-store sales?
Hello, thank you for the reply. This will be for our online store, specifically online order fulfillment. Really simple, I think. Order comes in, we pull it up, grab the product (we only have 4 of them), scan it, ship it. The scan part (at least in my simple mind) is speed, but I think more importantly helps to keep our inventory correct/eliminate human error. If you were me, what would you do? What type/brand/model of scanner would you buy? Do I need an app, if so, again, if you don’t mind sharing your thoughts I am all ears. It can all me a bit overwhelming for old guys like me. Thank you in advance for your time and thoughts.
It really just depends on what you’re doing, and how much you’re willing to invest.
If your only goal is to scan it to verify, Shopify already has this functionality in Admin’s batch fulfillment. No app, no POS needed.
If you want to do it from Shopify POS, you need to subscribe to POS Pro if you haven’t already, get a tablet, get the POS app and follow the instructions in the first link.
A little confusing, as it sounded like you are saying you only carry 4 products, I’m a little hesitant to say you should invest in a scanner for this at all… If you are just trying to be slightly more efficient, I would not recommend this as a solution. Admin, even with the new UI changes and extra clicks, is going to be much faster if you use batch-fulfillment. Maybe get the Order Printer Pro app or something to assist. Order comes in, we pull it up, print the packing slip, pack the product, print label, ship it.
Zebra is a top brand. All the Walmart and Sam’s Club TCs, scanners, and thermal printers are Zebra. So I personally would recommend the DS2278, though it’s really expensive.
Shopify has a native barcode scanning capability, so you don’t have to get another app. A USB or Bluetooth handheld scanner acting as a keyboard input may be used with Shopify admin or Shopify POS. On phones and tablets, Shopify POS can also scan tags using the device camera. Make sure each variant has a unique barcode entered in Shopify first. Fulfilment, scan an item and it’ll get you right to the corresponding product or order. A simple Bluetooth scanner is usually the simplest setup if you want a physical trigger.