Can merging duplicate customers in Shopify really be that complicated?

Shopify Discussion

Topic summary

Merchants requested the ability to merge duplicate customer profiles, especially when POS (point of sale) and online orders create separate accounts due to different or mistyped emails.

Impacts reported: returns/exchanges without receipts are cumbersome; loyalty program points and order histories are split; reporting (customer lifetime value, acquisition growth, wholesale spend) is inaccurate; customers can’t access consolidated purchase history.

Shopify’s interim stance: email is the unique identifier; POS shouldn’t duplicate unless different emails are used; Shop Pay accounts are separate from store customer accounts. Staff gathered detailed use-cases and submitted feature requests, directing users to the Shopify Changelog for updates.

Workarounds: a third‑party app (Doppelganger) can link, but not merge, duplicate profiles; initially free.

Latest update: Shopify released Merge Customer Profiles. Identify duplicates by overlapping attributes (name, phone, email), open a profile in Admin > Customers, use the Customer Data section to “Merge customer,” search/select the target profile, and complete the merge.

Limitations: not all profiles can be merged; specifics are in the Help Center. Outcome: feature launched; thread locked with feedback redirected to a dedicated topic. Unresolved details depend on feature limitations and ongoing feedback.

Summarized with AI on February 5. AI used: gpt-5.
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Hi, @alexxduvall . Thanks for reaching out and for answering the questions from earlier in this thread. It really helps to know exactly how being able to merge customer accounts would impact your business; I have passed along your answers and submitted a feature request on your behalf for it now too.

I completely understand your concerns about being able to merge customer accounts. Please know that the Shopify developers are continuously working on improving the platform for both the merchant and customer experience. As you can imagine, they receive a lot of feature requests on a daily basis, and they are doing their best to evaluate and prioritize those improvements that would be most impactful to as many merchants as possible. So, thanks again for your feedback on this, and I’m hoping and advocating for this upgrade as well. The best way to stay up to date on all platform updates is through the Shopify Changelog, so keep checking it!