How to Write a Cookie Policy for a Shopify Store

A Shopify store sets cookies before you've installed a single app. Cart persistence, checkout, and fraud checks all depend on cookies Shopify's own platform creates automatically, and then every marketing or analytics app you add on top brings its own. A cookie policy copied from a generic template describes neither layer, because it has no way of knowing what's actually running on your specific store.

Here's how to write one that covers both: the cookies Shopify sets by default, and the ones your installed apps add through Shopify's tracking APIs.

The cookies Shopify sets without any app installed

Every Shopify store runs a baseline set of cookies the platform needs to function, cart contents, checkout state, and basic fraud prevention. A few of the most common:

• cart and related cart cookies track what's in a visitor's shopping cart between page loads, so items don't disappear if they navigate away and come back.
• _secure_session_id and _shopify_s handle session identification, keeping a visitor's browsing session consistent across your store's pages.
• _shopify_y persists longer than the session cookies and supports Shopify's own store analytics, tracking a visitor across multiple sessions in aggregate.
• _orig_referrer and _landing_page record where a visitor first arrived from and which page they landed on, used for attribution reporting inside your Shopify admin.
• _shopify_sa_p and _shopify_sa_t support cross-domain analytics when a customer clicks through from an ad or another Shopify-connected surface.

These are largely strictly necessary or close to it, cart and session cookies especially, but "necessary" still means "needs naming," not "safe to omit." A cookie policy that lists only your marketing apps and skips Shopify's own platform cookies is describing an incomplete picture of what's actually being set.

Where app-installed tracking comes from

The second, larger source of cookies on most Shopify stores comes from installed apps: the Meta pixel, TikTok pixel, Google Analytics and Google Ads tags, review apps like Yotpo or Judge.me, loyalty and rewards programs, and affiliate or referral tracking tools. Each of these sets its own cookies or uses browser storage to track visitor behavior for its specific purpose, ad retargeting, on-site personalization, review solicitation timing, and so on.

Since 2023, Shopify has pushed app developers toward its Web Pixels API (surfaced in your admin as Customer Events, under Settings > Customer Events), which lets apps register tracking through a sandboxed, consent-aware channel instead of injecting arbitrary scripts directly into your theme. Apps built correctly against this API respect whatever consent state a visitor has set through your store's privacy banner automatically, an app-registered pixel simply doesn't fire for a visitor who hasn't consented to marketing cookies. Not every installed app has fully migrated to this pattern, though, so it's worth checking each app's own documentation for how it handles consent rather than assuming API-level compliance by default.

Configuring consent through Settings > Customer Privacy

Shopify's built-in consent management lives under Settings > Customer Privacy in your admin. This is where you configure the cookie banner shown to visitors, decide which regions trigger it (typically the EU and UK under GDPR's opt-in requirement), and set up the "Do Not Sell or Share My Personal Information" mechanism CCPA and CPRA require for California visitors. It's also where you review which apps have registered themselves as data processors through the Customer Events system, giving you a starting inventory of what's actually tracking visitors on your store.

Getting these settings configured correctly matters directly for your cookie policy, the policy should describe the consent mechanism you've actually built, not a generic description of "a cookie banner" that doesn't match what a visitor actually sees and clicks through on your store.

Writing the policy by category, not as one long list

A cookie policy reads clearest organized by category rather than as a flat list of every cookie name. A workable structure for most Shopify stores:

• Strictly necessary: cart, session, and checkout cookies Shopify sets by default, explain these can't be turned off without breaking core store function.
• Analytics: Shopify's own store analytics cookies plus any Google Analytics or similar tool you've added, named specifically.
• Marketing and advertising: the Meta pixel, TikTok pixel, Google Ads tag, and any affiliate tracking, each named by vendor since these are the cookies a consent banner actually needs to gate.
• Functional: reviews, loyalty programs, and personalization apps that aren't strictly necessary but also aren't advertising-focused, worth their own middle category rather than forced into marketing or necessary.

For each category, note roughly how long the cookies persist and how a visitor can opt out, through your consent banner for the categories it covers, and through browser settings as a fallback for anything outside it.

Keeping it current as your app stack changes

A Shopify store's app list changes more often than the underlying platform cookies do. Installing a new retargeting pixel, switching review apps, or adding a loyalty program all add new entries a cookie policy needs to reflect. Treat your Customer Events list as the source of truth, and revisit your cookie policy whenever it changes rather than waiting for an annual review to catch drift between what's disclosed and what's actually running.

Get a Shopify-accurate cookie policy without starting from scratch

Writing an accurate cookie policy means separating Shopify's own platform cookies from whatever your installed apps add, then keeping both current. Our Cookie Policy Generator builds a policy organized by category and named vendor from your actual answers, so the document your consent banner links to matches your real app stack instead of a generic list.

For the related document covering your store's broader data handling, not just cookies, see our Shopify privacy policy guide, or read privacy policy vs cookie policy if you're deciding whether your store needs both documents or just one.

The information in this article is for informational purposes only and should not be construed as legal advice on any matter, and does not create a lawyer-client relationship.