Quick answer: Shopify Sidekick is the AI assistant built into your Shopify admin — the purple glasses icon at the top. Instead of clicking through menus, you just ask in plain English ("create a 15% off code for my Summer collection for 2 weeks") and Sidekick does it. It can create discounts, build automations, draft content, and answer questions about your own data. It's free on every Shopify plan (usage limits vary), needs no setup, and works best on clear, one-goal requests. One honest caveat: always double-check anything tax- or legal-related — it can get those wrong.
If you run a Shopify store and you're still doing everything by hand, Sidekick is the fastest quality-of-life upgrade you have — and you're already paying for it. Here's how to actually use it.
What is Shopify Sidekick — and how is it different from Shopify Magic?
They're both AI, but they do different jobs:
| Shopify Sidekick | Shopify Magic | |
|---|---|---|
| What it is | A conversational assistant that does tasks across your store | AI baked into specific fields in the admin |
| How you use it | Chat: "set up a BOGO on my hoodies" | A "Generate" button inside, e.g., a product description box |
| Best for | Multi-step actions, questions, automations | Quick text drafts right where you're working |
Think of Magic as a helper inside individual tools, and Sidekick as a co-pilot you can hand a whole task to. Both are free across Shopify plans as of 2026 (Shopify).
How do I open Sidekick?
Log into your Shopify admin and click the purple glasses icon near the top of the screen. That's it — no install, no configuration. A chat panel opens where you type requests in normal language. It's available on every plan, though how much you can use per month depends on your plan.
What can Sidekick actually do?
Here's what it genuinely handles today (not hype — real, documented capabilities):
- Multi-step tasks in one prompt. "Create a 15% discount for the Summer collection, valid two weeks, then draft an announcement email" — Sidekick coordinates the discount, the collection, and the email draft in one go.
- Build automations (Shopify Flow) from plain English. "When a product's inventory drops below 10, tag it and email me" — Sidekick builds the workflow; you don't touch the Flow editor.
- Answer questions about your data. "Which products sold best last month?" or "What was my conversion rate on mobile last week?" — in plain English, no report-building skills needed.
- Draft content. First drafts of product descriptions, emails, and social posts, using your store's context.
- Set up discounts and promotions — codes, usage limits, expiry dates — in seconds.
The theme: anything that used to mean digging through settings, you can now just ask for.
Step by step: your first 5 Sidekick tasks
Try these to get a feel for it (copy the prompt, then review what it did before confirming):
- A quick sale: "Create a 10% off discount code called SUMMER10 for all products, valid for 14 days, one use per customer."
- A data answer: "Show me my top 5 best-selling products in the last 30 days."
- A content draft: "Write a short, benefit-focused product description for [product name]."
- An automation: "When an order is over $200, add a VIP tag to that customer."
- A store fix: "Which of my products are missing images or descriptions?"
Golden rule: one clear goal per prompt, and always review the result before you accept it. Sidekick shows you what it's about to change.
What is Sidekick Pulse?
The newer, more proactive side of Sidekick. Instead of only answering when asked, Pulse watches your store in the background and surfaces opportunities and warnings — e.g., flagging a product whose sales are spiking, or an issue worth your attention — by combining your store data with broader trends. It turns Sidekick from "a tool you ask" into "a tool that tells you."
What Sidekick can't do yet (the honest limits)
Use it with eyes open:
- It doesn't see everything. Sidekick can't read data locked inside third-party apps (e.g., your Klaviyo flows) or external Google Sheets yet — it works within Shopify's own data.
- It can be confidently wrong on tax and legal questions. For anything with financial or legal consequences, verify with a real professional — don't act on Sidekick's word alone.
- Review before you trust. For bulk changes (pricing, deleting, publishing), read what it proposes before confirming. It's an assistant, not autopilot.
None of this makes it less useful — it just means you stay the decision-maker.
Sidekick runs your store — but does AI recommend your store?
Here's the important distinction. Sidekick helps you operate your store faster. It does not make ChatGPT or Perplexity recommend your products to shoppers — that's a completely different job called AI visibility (GEO/AEO), which depends on your product data, schema, and being readable by AI shopping assistants.
If your real goal is showing up when a shopper asks an AI "what's the best [your product]?", read our step-by-step guide: How to get your Shopify store recommended by ChatGPT, Gemini & Perplexity. That's where our app AIRank Xpert fits — it auto-generates the optimized product data, schema and AI-discovery files that make your store AI-readable (Sidekick doesn't do that).
Sources
Related reads:
- How to get your Shopify store recommended by ChatGPT, Gemini & Perplexity
- How to make your Shopify store buyable in ChatGPT
- Shopify Spring '26 Edition: the features that matter
- Why your Shopify store isn't ranking on Google (and AI)
Xpertshire builds AI-ready Shopify stores, automations, and conversion-focused builds. We also publish AIRank Xpert — which makes your catalog discoverable to ChatGPT, Gemini and Perplexity by auto-generating optimized product data, schema and AI-discovery files.
