BFCM 2026: the Shopify changes to act on in the final month

Black Friday is Friday, November 27 this year, and Cyber Monday is November 30. That gives you a little over three weeks, and Shopify has shipped a surprising amount in the last two weeks alone.

Most of it is small. A few pieces change how you should set up your sale. Here is the short list, grounded in Shopify's own changelog, plus what we would do with it.

1. Schedule your whole sale in Rollouts

Rollouts now handles more than themes. Since October 2 you can schedule discounts and test them against your current offer on a share of traffic. Since October 23 you can also schedule catalog changes, meaning product availability and pricing per market, to go live at a set date and time.

Combined with theme scheduling and end dates, you can line up the theme, discount and catalog for Black Friday in one rollout, and have the store revert on its own when the promotion ends.

Merchant move: build your BFCM rollout this week, not the night before. Go to Markets > Rollouts. If you have time, test two offers on part of your traffic before Black Friday and keep the one that converts.

2. Check what your outbound links do now

On October 20 Shopify added a confirmation screen when shoppers leave your store. Shopify updated it on October 23: now only links to sites Shopify flags as malicious are blocked, suspicious ones ask for confirmation, and everything else goes straight through. Connected domains and supported Shopify and social sites never trigger it.

This came after three apps were used to send shoppers to fake checkouts this month. Our earlier story covers what to check.

Merchant move: click every outbound link on your live store, especially gift guides, Amazon buttons or a separate blog. If a site you own shows a warning, connect that domain to your store.

3. International sellers: look at guaranteed shipping

The biggest change for cross-border brands landed October 24. Managed Markets can now set your international shipping rates and guarantee label costs. Buy qualifying prepaid FedEx or DHL Express labels through Managed Markets and you are not billed for later carrier adjustments.

The trade-offs are real. Duty-inclusive pricing is required, you cannot edit the rates, and part of the shipping cost moves into your international product prices. The help center also says flat rates are in early access for certain merchants, so you may not see it yet.

Merchant move: go to Markets, open a market and find the Managed Markets section. Use the preview of prices, checkout totals and payouts before you switch anything on. If you are close to the sale, decide this week or leave it until January.

4. UK orders over £135 may stop charging VAT

Since October 23, VAT for Great Britain follows the fulfillment location your order routing picks. If an order is over £135 before tax and shipping and routes to a location outside the UK, it is treated as an import and VAT is not charged at checkout, even if you have a UK location.

Merchant move: if you sell to the UK, check your order routing so those orders go to your UK location, or collect duties and import taxes at checkout. A surprise import charge on a gift order is how you lose a customer.

5. Do a fresh checkout test

Checkout looks a little different this season. Since October 22, payment methods show as tiles when you offer four or fewer and meet certain display criteria. Since August, signed-in customers get their last-used payment method pre-selected where saved payment methods are on.

Merchant move: place a real test order on mobile, signed in and signed out. Screenshot checkout so your support team knows what customers see.

6. Leave yourself notes in analytics

Since October 1 you can add your own annotations to time-series reports, like a campaign launch or an email send. January you will thank November you.

Merchant move: add an annotation for every BFCM send, discount change and influencer post as it happens.

Quick hits

• Sidekick makes transparent images. As of October 23, Sidekick can generate graphics with transparent backgrounds for banners and badges.
• Shoppers can now buy inside AI chats. Google AI Mode and Gemini checkout is rolling out to eligible stores. Read our agentic checkout explainer for what to fix first.
• Tag your discounts. Discount tags make it easier to find and clean up every BFCM code afterwards.

Want help pressure-testing your setup before the 27th? That is what Nstruct Launch is for. And if you would rather swap BFCM war stories in person, our next Toronto and NYC events are here.