How to automate tasks after a customer's order is updated on Shopify Flow?

Topic summary

Shopify Flow currently lacks native triggers for updated orders, draft orders, customers, and products—a limitation users find frustrating, especially since third-party tools like Zapier support these events.

Workarounds discussed:

  • Use scheduled time triggers (every 10 minutes) + “Get data” action to query recently updated records via updated_at field
  • Leverage existing triggers like “Customer tags added/removed” for specific scenarios
  • Employ third-party apps (Arigato Automation, Flow Companion) that provide update triggers

Key limitations:

  • Update events don’t specify what changed, requiring merchants to store previous values for comparison
  • “For each” loops in Flow restrict actions per item
  • Risk of infinite loops if workflows trigger themselves (e.g., order updated → update order metafield)
  • No events yet exist for metafield or tag updates

Common use cases:

  • Tracking order edits for operational workflows
  • Updating delivery time calculations on draft order changes
  • Triggering notifications when order tags indicate production milestones

Shopify’s position: A staff member explains that while update events exist technically, they lack contextual information needed for most automation scenarios. The team is gathering use cases to inform better design decisions. The discussion remains open with no timeline for native trigger implementation.

Summarized with AI on October 25. AI used: claude-sonnet-4-5-20250929.

I can’t seem to find the other thread on this topic. Was it removed?