Best Shopify Out-of-Stock Apps: Pushy vs Alternatives (2026)
Managing out-of-stock products is one of those Shopify problems that every merchant hits eventually. Products go out of stock, they sit at the top of collection pages, and customers see items they can’t buy.
There are several ways to solve this, from free manual methods to dedicated apps. This guide covers each one with its trade-offs, so you can pick what fits your store.
The approaches at a glance
| Approach | Cost | SEO Safe | Automatic | Difficulty | Best For |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Manual draft/hide | Free | No | No | Easy | Tiny stores (under 20 products) |
| Collection conditions | Free | No | Partial | Easy | Simple filtering needs |
| Liquid code | Free | Partial | Yes | Hard | Developers with custom themes |
| Pushy | Free–$14.99/mo | Yes | Yes | Easy | Most Shopify stores |
| Other sort apps | $5–$20/mo | Varies | Yes | Easy | Stores needing multi-criteria sorting |
Approach 1: Manually set products to draft
The simplest method: go into Shopify admin and switch out-of-stock products from “Active” to “Draft.” The product then disappears from your storefront and its URL returns a 404.
The catch is SEO. You lose whatever equity that product page built, any backlinks pointing to it hit a dead end, and you have to remember to re-publish once the product is back. It doesn’t scale past a handful of products, so it’s really only viable for tiny stores with rare stock changes. For a full walkthrough of this and the other methods, see our guide on how to hide out-of-stock products on Shopify.
Approach 2: Automated collection conditions
Shopify lets you build automated collections with conditions like “Inventory stock is greater than 0,” which excludes out-of-stock products on its own. Products vanish from the collection when they sell out and reappear when restocked.
It’s better than drafting, but it still hurts SEO. Pulling products off the page weakens your internal linking and thins the page content, both of which matter for ranking. Customers also can’t tell you normally carry the item. Our article on how out-of-stock products impact SEO goes into why that matters.
Approach 3: Custom Liquid code
Some merchants edit their theme’s Liquid templates to sort products by availability at render time. In-stock products render first and sold-out ones render last, but only in what the storefront shows.
That’s the problem: it’s display-only. The actual collection order in Shopify’s admin and API never changes. The fix breaks with theme updates, causes pagination issues, and needs a developer to maintain. It works if you have one on hand and a custom theme you don’t plan to touch, but it’s fragile. The full breakdown is in our Shopify collection sorting guide.
Approach 4: Pushy
Pushy was built for this one problem. It pushes out-of-stock products to the bottom of your collection pages and puts them back when they’re restocked.
Setup is three steps: install it from the Shopify App Store, pick which collections to manage, and toggle auto-push on. After that Pushy watches your inventory and re-sorts collections on its own.
A few things set it apart:
- It sorts at the API level, so it changes the real collection order in Shopify rather than just the display. The order stays consistent everywhere.
- It’s SEO-safe. Products stay in the collection, URLs stay live, and internal links are preserved.
- Restocking is automatic. Products go back to their original spot once they’re available again.
- No theme changes. It works with every Shopify theme.
- There’s a free plan for up to 5 collections, with paid plans starting at $3.99/month.
For most Shopify stores it’s the most complete option, since it handles the problem automatically without the SEO trade-offs.
Approach 5: The other dedicated apps, named
Pushy isn’t the only app built for this. Below is the landscape as of July 2026. These listings change often, so verify on the App Store before you decide.
| App | Developer | Rating | Free tier | Paid /mo | Push down | Hides | Real-time |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Pushy | Bortor Studio | 5.0★ (10) | 5 collections | $3.99–$14.99 | ✅ | — | ✅ all plans |
| Push Down Hide Out of Stock MB | merchbees | 4.8★ (137) | 50 prod / 100 coll | $4.99–$13.99 | ✅ | ✅ | ✅ all plans |
| StockIQ (formerly Out-of-Stock Police) | EGNITION | 4.9★ (119) | 49 prod / 99 coll | $5.99–$16.99 | ✅ | ✅ | ⚠️ add-on |
| Nada • Hide Out of Stock | Digismoothie | 4.8★ (23) | dev/trial only | $9.99 flat | ✅ | ✅ | ✅ |
| Out of Stock Sold Out PushLast | Awesome Apps | 4.9★ (18) | none | $3.99–$19.99 | ✅ | — | ✅ |
| Outranked: Auto OOS Sorter | kizzle | 5.0★ (3) | scheduled only | $4.99–$19.99 | ✅ | — | ❌ scheduled |
Reading the table:
- merchbees has the deepest track record, with 137 reviews and the most features, including hiding, 301 redirects, and multi-criteria sorting. If you want one app to do everything, start there.
- StockIQ bundles back-in-stock and low-stock alerts, which no one else here does. Real-time sorting is a paid add-on on its lower tiers, though, so the entry price isn’t the whole price.
- Nada is the flat-rate option at $9.99 for unlimited products and collections. There’s no free plan for live stores, so you pay from day one whatever your catalog size, and there’s no exclude-by-tag if you need to pin hero products in place.
- Outranked runs on a schedule rather than in real time: daily and 6-hour on free, hourly at best on paid. Fine for slow-moving inventory, a real gap if your stock churns.
- Pushy is the focused option, and the cheapest up to 100 collections for any store past 50 products. Its free plan is the only one with real-time sorting and no product cap, though merchbees’ free plan is more generous under 50 products.
We’ve written full head-to-heads for Pushy vs StockIQ, Pushy vs merchbees, and Pushy vs PushLast, plus a straight price comparison across all of them.
There are also multi-purpose merchandising and search suites that fold inventory sorting in as one feature among many. They cost considerably more and inventory sorting usually isn’t their priority. If you need to sort by several criteria at once they’re worth a look, but for push-down alone a focused tool is simpler and cheaper.
How to choose
A few questions sort out most of it.
Start with catalog size. If you have under 20 products and stock rarely changes, managing it by hand is fine. Past that, or if inventory turns over often, you need automation.
Do you have a developer? If so, Liquid code is on the table, though it stays fragile. If not, use an app.
Then there’s what you’re actually after. To just push out-of-stock products down, Pushy is the focused tool. For complex sorting across several criteria, look at a multi-purpose app. To remove out-of-stock products from the page entirely, collection conditions do it, as long as you accept the SEO cost.
And if you care about SEO at all, don’t draft products or strip them out of collections. Use Pushy or a similar app that keeps products on the page. If you don’t, manual methods or collection conditions work fine.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is the best free way to handle out-of-stock products on Shopify?
Shopify's automated collection conditions are free but remove products entirely, which costs you SEO. For free automation that's SEO-safe, Pushy's free plan manages up to 5 collections, pushing sold-out items down while keeping them on the page.
Should I hide or push down out-of-stock products?
Push them down for temporary stockouts. That keeps the product page, internal links, and "notify me" sign-ups while showing buyable items first. Only hide or remove products that are permanently discontinued. See our guide to hiding vs pushing down.
Do I need an app to push sold-out products to the bottom?
Effectively, yes. Shopify has no native in-stock-first sort, Liquid code is display-only and breaks across pagination, and manual re-sorting doesn't scale. A dedicated app changes the real collection order automatically.
How much do out-of-stock sorting apps cost?
Most are inexpensive, typically a free tier up to roughly $15–$20/month depending on catalog size and features. Pushy ranges from a free plan (5 collections) to $14.99/month.
Will an out-of-stock app slow down my store?
It depends how it works. Apps that sort at the Shopify API level (like Pushy) don't add theme or page-load overhead, because they change the stored collection order rather than reordering at render time. Liquid-based workarounds can slow pages down.
Get started
If Pushy is the one that fits, install it free from the Shopify App Store. Setup takes less than 2 minutes, so you can see it working before committing to anything.