last verified 3 August 2026
Magistry vs Shopify Sidekick
Use Sidekick first. It is included in your Shopify plan, needs no setup, and handles admin work inside Shopify well. Add Magistry when the work crosses the admin boundary — ad accounts, Merchant Center, the mailbox, chargebacks — or when you want jobs that run on a schedule without being asked, with a rollback on every write.
Magistry is an autonomous operations platform for Shopify stores. Shopify Sidekick is an AI assistant built into the Shopify admin. Every Shopify Sidekick figure on this page is quoted from their own public pages, with the source and the date we read it in the table below. Where they do not publish something, the cell says so instead of guessing.
Magistry and Shopify Sidekick compared, dimension by dimension
Each row is one feature, with the source it was verified against and the date. Rows where Shopify Sidekick does not offer something are marked as not offered, not scored as a failure — the two products overlap on measurement and diverge everywhere else.
swipe to read the full table →
| Dimension | Magistry | Shopify Sidekick | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| What the product is | A platform of always-on agents that decide and execute across Shopify, the ad platforms, Merchant Center and the store mailbox, plus Otto, an assistant you can talk to. | An "AI-enabled commerce assistant" in the Shopify admin, presented as five roles: Designer, Photo editor, Writer, Tech support and Marketer. | Shopify's Sidekick pageretrieved 3 August 2026 |
| What it costs | $99, $249 or $499 a month on top of your Shopify plan, plus a perpetual free Launch tier with 50 AI-credits. | Nothing extra: "Sidekick is included with your Shopify plan." Shopify plans are $39, $105 and $399 a month, or from $2,300 for Plus. | Shopify's Sidekick pageretrieved 3 August 2026 |
| Usage limits | AI-credits per plan: 50 / 1,000 / 2,600 / 5,200. Typical draws are published — around 3 credits for a full CS thread, about 4 for an Otto chat turn — and priced from live model cost rather than fixed per action. | "Features and usage limits vary by plan"; the pricing page shows "Millions of tokens" against the plans. No per-action figure is published. | Shopify's Sidekick pageretrieved 3 August 2026 |
| Setup required | Install the app, connect Google Ads, Meta, Merchant Center and a mailbox as needed. Agents run a 24-hour dry run before they can act. | None: "Open your Shopify admin and click the purple glasses icon. That's it. No setup, no configuration." | Shopify's Sidekick pageretrieved 3 August 2026 |
| Systems it acts on | Shopify, Google Ads, Meta, TikTok, Pinterest, Bing, Google Merchant Center, GA4, Search Console and the store mailbox. | The Shopify admin — Sidekick "has direct access to your Shopify data, understands commerce workflows, and takes action in your admin". Shopify's page does not describe it acting in external ad accounts, Merchant Center or a mailbox. | Shopify's Sidekick pageretrieved 3 August 2026 |
| Whether it works without being asked | Yes. Jobs run on a pg_cron schedule: catalog classification, campaign evaluation, feed rebuilds, inbox triage, dispute assembly. Otto is the conversational surface on top, not the mechanism. | Sidekick is described throughout as an assistant you ask. Shopify's page does not describe scheduled or unattended runs. | Shopify's Sidekick pageretrieved 3 August 2026 |
| Permission model | Per-agent autonomy levels starting at approval-only, per-action rate limits, a per-store kill switch, and margin-tier gating on write actions. | Staff-permission based: "Every staff member can use Sidekick based on their admin permissions. It respects access controls." | Shopify's Sidekick pageretrieved 3 August 2026 |
| Undo on an action it took | Every write stores its rollback operation at write time; the decision log restores it in one click, with the evidence that justified it. | Not publicly stated — rollback behaviour not described on shopify's page | Verified in product |
| Whether it knows your margin | Yes. Product cost, shipping, fees and refund rate are held per SKU and drive classification, bidding and refund decisions. POAS is the value sent back to the ad platforms. | Not publicly stated — cost and margin data are not native shopify admin fields for every store, and shopify's page does not describe margin-aware decisions | Verified in product |
| Languages | Interface in English; generated customer replies follow the thread's language. | "Sidekick adapts to your store's language settings and can help you in multiple languages." | Shopify's Sidekick pageretrieved 3 August 2026 |
| Who else sees your store data | Magistry as processor, plus the LLM providers under zero-retention terms. No training on customer data. | Shopify itself — the platform already holds the data, so Sidekick adds no new processor. | Shopify's Sidekick pageretrieved 3 August 2026 |
Where Shopify Sidekick is better than Magistry
Every comparison page on this site names at least one point where the other product wins. Here are 5.
It is free, and free is a very strong price
Sidekick is included with your Shopify plan at no extra cost. Magistry is $99 to $499 a month on top. For any job Sidekick already does well — writing product copy, editing a theme, building a Flow, answering a question about yesterday's orders — paying for a second tool is worse, not better.
Zero setup, and it is already installed
"Open your Shopify admin and click the purple glasses icon. That's it. No setup, no configuration." Magistry needs an install, OAuth connections to the ad platforms and a mailbox, and a 24-hour dry run before agents can act. That is a real cost measured in a real afternoon.
First-party access nobody else can match
Sidekick is built by the company that owns the admin. Theme editing, Flow creation, metafield configuration and discount setup are native surfaces for it. Magistry works through the public APIs, which are broad but not the same thing, and always trail the admin by some margin.
No additional processor and no new vendor risk
Shopify already holds your store data. Using Sidekick adds no processor, no DPA to review and no security questionnaire. Adding Magistry adds all three, and Magistry is not SOC 2 certified today.
It works in your store's languages
Sidekick adapts to the store's language settings and helps in multiple languages. Magistry's interface is English only.
Choose Shopify Sidekick if…
- The work you want done lives inside the Shopify admin
- Product copy, images, theme changes, Flow automations, metafields, discount codes: these are Sidekick's home turf, they cost nothing extra, and there is no version of this comparison where buying a second tool for them makes sense.
- You want to ask rather than delegate
- Sidekick is an assistant you prompt when you have a question or a task. If that matches how you want to work — you in the driver's seat, AI on request — a platform of scheduled agents is solving a problem you do not have.
- You are early, and volume is low
- Below roughly $10,000 of monthly GMV, most of what Magistry decides is decided on too little data to be worth much — which is why the Launch tier is scoped to that band. Sidekick plus Magistry on Launch is the sensible combination until the numbers mean something.
- Adding a processor is a problem
- If every new vendor triggers a security review in your organisation, the tool that adds no vendor has an advantage that no feature list overcomes.
Choose Magistry if…
- The work crosses the admin boundary
- Campaign budgets in Google Ads, Merchant Center disapprovals, CAPI events to Meta, chargeback evidence in Shopify Payments, inbound mail in your Outlook mailbox. Shopify's Sidekick page describes acting in the admin; these live outside it, and that is where most operational cost actually sits.
- You want the work done while you are not there
- Magistry's jobs run on a schedule: the catalog is reclassified, campaigns are evaluated, the feed is rebuilt, the inbox is triaged, disputes are assembled. An assistant that waits to be asked cannot do that, by design rather than by deficiency.
- Decisions have to be margin-aware
- "Is this product still worth the ad spend, given the refunds it generates and the margin after shipping?" needs product cost, refund history and ad spend in one place. Magistry holds all three per SKU. Cost data is not present for every Shopify store by default.
- You need an audit trail and a way back
- Every Magistry write is appended to a decision log with the evidence behind it and its rollback operation. When a change turns out wrong at 300 SKUs, one click restores them.
Running Magistry and Shopify Sidekick side by side, or moving between them
This is not an either/or, and treating it as one is a mistake
Nearly every Magistry customer also uses Sidekick, because they overlap far less than the category name suggests. Sidekick is the fastest route to a task inside the admin; Magistry is the thing that runs while nobody is asking. The sensible default is to keep Sidekick and add Magistry where the work leaves Shopify.
How to split them without thinking about it
If the task starts and ends inside the Shopify admin, Sidekick. If it touches an ad account, Merchant Center, the mailbox or a chargeback, or it needs to happen every day without being asked, Magistry. That rule holds up in practice and needs no policy document.
What Shopify shipping more AI would mean
Shopify keeps expanding what Sidekick does, and some of what Magistry does today will land in the admin eventually. The honest answer is that this is a real risk to a third-party tool, and the parts most exposed are the single-store, inside-admin ones. The parts least exposed are cross-platform execution, margin-aware decisioning and the audit trail — Shopify has little reason to optimise your Google Ads account for you.
Questions about Magistry and Shopify Sidekick
Is Shopify Sidekick enough on its own?
For work inside the Shopify admin, often yes. Sidekick writes product copy, edits themes, builds Flow automations, sets up metafields and discounts, and answers questions about your store, at no extra cost. It becomes insufficient when the work lives outside the admin — ad accounts, Merchant Center, the mailbox, chargebacks — or when you want the work to happen on a schedule rather than on request.
Does Sidekick cost anything?
No. Shopify's own page states "Sidekick is included with your Shopify plan" and adds that "Features and usage limits vary by plan". Shopify plans are listed at $39, $105 and $399 a month, with Plus starting at $2,300, and the pricing page shows "Millions of tokens" against them.
What does Magistry do that Sidekick does not?
Three things, on the evidence of Shopify's own pages. It acts outside the Shopify admin — Google Ads, Meta, TikTok, Merchant Center, GA4 and the store mailbox. It runs on a schedule without being prompted, reclassifying the catalog, rebuilding feeds, triaging mail and assembling chargeback evidence. And it stores every write with its rollback operation and the evidence behind it, so a bad change at scale is one click to undo.
Will Shopify eventually build what Magistry does?
Partly, and pretending otherwise would be dishonest. Shopify keeps widening Sidekick, and the most exposed parts of any third-party tool are the single-store, inside-admin ones. The least exposed are cross-platform execution against ad accounts Shopify does not own, margin-aware decisioning that depends on cost data Shopify does not require, and an audit trail across systems. That is where Magistry's work concentrates, which is a deliberate choice rather than a coincidence.
Can I use Sidekick and Magistry together?
Yes, and most stores should. They do not conflict: Sidekick works in the admin session you are already in, Magistry runs its own scheduled jobs through the APIs. A simple split works — inside the admin, ask Sidekick; outside it, or unattended, let Magistry run.
Does Magistry replace Shopify Flow?
No, and it is not trying to. Flow is a rules engine: when this happens, do that. Magistry decides what should happen from the store's own performance distribution and then executes it, which is a different mechanism for a different problem. Stores commonly run both, with Flow handling deterministic plumbing and Magistry handling judgement calls.
Which one is safer to let act on my store?
Both are conservative, in different ways. Sidekick acts within the staff permissions of whoever is using it and respects those access controls. Magistry ships its deep agents in approval-only mode with a 24-hour dry run, applies per-action rate limits, gates writes on margin tier, stores a rollback operation with every write, and has a per-store kill switch that stops all writes. Sidekick's safety comes from a human being present; Magistry's has to work when nobody is.
How this comparison was made
Every Shopify Sidekick figure was read off the public pages listed below on the retrieval date shown, and is quoted rather than summarised. Nothing about Shopify Sidekick on this page comes from a third-party review, a sales conversation or an estimate. If a value is not published, the table says so.
Magistry’s own figures are taken from the product’s billing configuration and the modules named in each row, not from our marketing copy. Prices are the same numbers the application charges.
This page is comparative advertising under Dutch and EU law (art. 6:194a BW, implementing Directive 2006/114/EC). It compares products serving the same need on material, relevant, verifiable and representative features including price, names at least one point where Shopify Sidekick is better, and does not denigrate Shopify Sidekick or its marks. Found something wrong? Mail hello@magistry.io and we will correct it — including if you work at Shopify Sidekick.
Vendor pricing changes. A verification job re-fetches every source below and reports when a quoted value disappears from the page, so a stale claim surfaces as a task rather than sitting here. Lastfull verification: 3 August 2026.
sources
- Shopify's Sidekick page — https://www.shopify.com/magic, retrieved 3 August 2026
- Shopify plan pricing — https://www.shopify.com/pricing, retrieved 3 August 2026
- Magistry pricing — https://www.magistry.io/pricing, retrieved 3 August 2026
More on the Magistry side of this comparison: Otto · Pricing · All comparisons