Can someone explain to me what Index Filters actually do in an Index Table?

Technical Q&A

Topic summary

Developers are struggling to understand how Shopify’s IndexFilters component works due to incomplete documentation and non-functional code examples.

Main confusion points:

  • Whether clicking filter tabs (e.g., “unpaid”) should filter existing data client-side or trigger new GraphQL API calls
  • What the built-in search bar’s “searching in all” refers to (all filters vs. all products)
  • The purpose and destination of the “save” functionality
  • How custom user-created filters (e.g., naming one “snowboard”) should be implemented

Current status:

  • Multiple developers confirm the official Polaris documentation lacks working examples
  • One user managed to implement search functionality but still cannot get filters working
  • No resolution or working examples have been identified
  • Community is requesting Shopify’s dev team provide clarification or update examples with functional implementations
Summarized with AI on November 1. AI used: claude-sonnet-4-5-20250929.
1

I’m working off this guide here: https://polaris.shopify.com/components/selection-and-input/index-filters?example=index-filters-with-no-filters

But since the logic in the example is incomplete, I’m not sure exactly how it’s supposed to work. If I click on unpaid, for example, it should show all the unpaid orders, right? But does it do this by filtering the existing list or should I make a new graphql api call? Should I be making new calls every time someone clicks a different tab? If I use the built in search bar, which says “searching in all”, does this mean all filters or all products? Also why does it say save, and what are you saving? And where am I supposed to save it to? Also if a user makes a new filter and names it “snowboard”, for example, where does the logic for this new filter come from? None of this makes any sense. Is there a working example somewhere?

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2

I puzzled with the example also, and checked all the documents I could find. I can’t find any useful information.

3

I don’t know why Shopify is so bad with docs, they create code examples that do not work, or work partially, doesn’t make any sense.

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4

The IndexFilter example is the worst. Nothing works in that example with respect to manipulating the data shown (search, filter, sort). Managed to get Search to work but now having trouble with Filters.

Can someone from Shopify dev team please explain how to get the filters working please? Or at least update the examples with actions that work as intended.

1 Like