Updated October 2, 2026. Shopify renames menus and templates from time to time, so names may differ slightly in your admin.
What you'll build
A free automation in Shopify Flow that emails you when a product's stock drops to a number you choose. Flow is Shopify's own automation app and comes at no extra cost.
The quick way: use a template
- In your Shopify admin, open Apps, then Flow. Install it from the Shopify App Store if you don't have it.
- Click Browse templates and search for "low inventory" or "inventory is low." Pick the template that emails you when a product variant's inventory is low.
- Open the condition step and set your threshold, for example 10 units.
- Open the email step, add your email address, and check the message includes the product name and SKU.
- Turn the workflow on.
Building it yourself
- In Flow, click Create workflow.
- Trigger: choose Product variant inventory quantity changed. It runs whenever a product's stock changes.
- Condition: inventory quantity is less than or equal to your threshold.
- Action: choose Send internal email, and include the product title, variant, SKU, and current quantity.
- Name it something clear, like "Low stock: 10 or fewer," and turn it on.
Test it
Go to Products, then Inventory, and lower one product's available quantity to your threshold. You should get an email within a few minutes. Then set the quantity back.
Make it smarter
- Not every product needs the same number. A fast seller with a long lead time needs a much higher threshold than a slow one. You can add conditions by product type, collection, or tag, or build a separate workflow for each group.
- Use a real reorder point, not a guess. The right threshold is daily sales times lead time, plus safety stock. Our reorder point guide shows the math.
- Watch out for noise. A busy product can trigger an email on every sale once it's below the threshold. A daily summary is often easier to act on than one email per sale.
What Flow alerts don't do
A Flow alert tells you a number has been crossed. It doesn't know your supplier's lead time, what's already on order, or how many to buy, so the threshold you set by hand goes out of date as sales change.
How Posto helps
Posto works out each product's reorder point from its own sales and its supplier's lead time, keeps it current, and counts stock already on order. Optional daily or weekly emails list everything at or below its reorder point, with how much to order, in one message instead of one per sale.
Sources
Shopify Help Center pages on Shopify Flow and migrating from Stocky, which recommends Flow for low-stock alerts, checked October 2, 2026.