You open Settings, Customer accounts and start a login inventory: the header sign-in link, the cart chip, the third-party social buttons on the old register page, the membership popup, and the checkout email field. Two of those still write a customer profile on your domain. The rest now send the shopper to Shopify's hosted passwordless screen, and the loyalty tag that used to fire on register never writes.
That inventory is the job: map each live Shopify login path against New Customer Accounts, choose native Google or Facebook, Shop, a Plus identity provider, or stay on classic, and list the theme or app surfaces you must rebuild before sunset.
Introduction
This article teaches you to map each live Shopify login path against New Customer Accounts, choose native Google or Facebook, Shop, a Plus identity provider, or stay on classic, and list theme or app surfaces to rebuild before sunset. Whether Plus is the right plan for checkout, B2B, and fees belongs in Choosing the Right Shopify Plan.
Hosted account pages you cannot theme sit next to hosted checkout in How to Fix Shopify Accessibility Bugs That Block WCAG AA. Another 2026 platform sunset, the Additional Scripts cutoff, is covered in Shopify Additional Scripts Cutoff on 26 August 2026.
Merchant and developer threads keep returning to the same fork. A store switches to New Customer Accounts, a social-login app that depended on classic Liquid or custom OIDC goes quiet, and registrations fall in the same week. The useful move is a path-by-path map, not a blanket revert or a Plus upgrade bought for two buttons.
Map each live login path
Walk the store as a first-time buyer and as a returning customer. Record every place a shopper can create or resume an account, including paths marketing still promotes in email and ads.
Use this list as the worksheet:
- Header or drawer Sign in / Account link
- Cart or checkout Sign in chip
- Theme pages that still point at
/account/loginor/account/register - Third-party social buttons (Google, Facebook, Apple, SMS) injected by an app
- Membership, loyalty, or wholesale portals that host their own login
- Mobile app deep links that used Multipass or a shared token
- Popups and landing pages that promised "create an account" and wrote tags or metafields
For each row, write four facts: the URL or app, whether it still works after a New Customer Accounts switch, which customer profile fields it writes, and what enrolment side effect it owned (newsletter, loyalty, B2B company). Shopify's help centre treats a customer profile in admin as an account already: anyone with that email can request a one-time code. A broken button can still leave an order, so measure new member registrations and first-time checkout completion separately from paid-order count.
This reflects patterns we see regularly across the Shopify merchant and developer community: the drop shows up in membership and CRM reports first, then someone blames traffic mix.
The decision merchants face
Shopify now ships two account products with the same admin label.
Classic customer accounts (legacy) render login, register, and account pages from theme Liquid. Shoppers use email and password on your domain. Apps and custom CSS can attach to those templates. Multipass on Plus can mint a session from an external system.
New Customer Accounts host sign-in and the account area on Shopify's domain. The default method is a six-digit email code. Sessions can last up to 365 days. Optional methods are Sign in with Shop (when Shop Pay is on) and native Google or Facebook social sign-in. Shopify Plus can replace that whole experience with your own identity provider.
From February 2026, Shopify deprecated classic accounts for new stores and for stores that were not already using them, and feature updates plus technical support for the legacy version have stopped. A sunset date is due later in 2026, after which the legacy Liquid files will be locked and then removed, and a brand-new store has no classic toggle.
The decision is therefore one of four paths:
- Stay on classic if the store still has that option, and put a rebuild date on the calendar before sunset.
- Switch to New Customer Accounts and turn on native Google or Facebook plus email codes (and Shop if you already run Shop Pay).
- Switch and accept email codes or Shop only, then rebuild enrolment that used to live on the register page.
- Connect a Plus identity provider when you need Apple, SMS from an app, Multipass-style mobile SSO, or any OIDC source Shopify does not list.
Customer accounts decision
Criteria that actually matter
Five facts decide the row, and none of them is "we like the old password box."
1. Which identity methods your buyers already use. Native social on New Customer Accounts is Google and Facebook only. Apple, SMS OTP from a login app, and a corporate IdP sit behind Plus. Shop sign-in is available when Shop Pay is active, and it can prefill checkout.
2. What the old register page wrote besides a password. Native social syncs the email onto the customer profile. It does not replay an app hook that tagged VIP, opted the shopper into a list, or created a loyalty wallet. If that hook paid for itself, budget a replacement before you switch.
3. Whether you still own the HTML. New account pages are hosted. You can change branding in Settings and add Customer Account UI extensions. You cannot restyle customers/login.liquid once you leave classic. Brands that treated the login page as a campaign landing page lose that canvas.
4. Headless, Hydrogen, and Storefront API tokens. Shopify is moving customer-scoped data and authenticated actions to the Customer Account API. Storefront API customer mutations are on a deprecation path. A Hydrogen password form that called customerAccessTokenCreate needs a new OAuth plan, not a theme tweak.
5. Plan economics versus identity scope. Plus for a custom IdP is the same gate Multipass always had. If you already need Plus for checkout UI extensions or B2B, fold identity into that contract. If the only gap is Google and Facebook, native social on a lower plan closes it. The fee and checkout half of that call lives in the plan framework, not here.
Checkout that stalls before payment is a different map: start with How to Fix Shopify Checkout Abandonment When Your Funnel Looks Healthy. Plus checkout display versus logic is covered in When to Use Checkout UI Extensions vs Shopify Functions.
Framework
Score each inventoried path against the four options. A path that fails more than one "must have" on native social is a rebuild or a Plus row, not a hope that the app vendor will catch up.
| Need | Stay on classic | New accounts: native social + email + Shop | New accounts: email or Shop only | Plus identity provider |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Available on a brand-new store (from Feb 2026) | No | Yes | Yes | Yes, on Plus |
| Email and password on your domain | Yes | No (email one-time code) | No | Only if your IdP offers it |
| Google or Facebook one-click | Via a third-party app | Native, all plans | Off unless you connect them | Your IdP, or native plus IdP |
| Apple, SMS, or custom OIDC | App-dependent | No | No | Yes |
| Theme Liquid login and register files | Yes, until sunset | No | No | No |
| Loyalty or list enrolment at signup | Often via app on register | Email only unless you rebuild | Must rebuild | Depends on IdP claims and extensions |
| Mobile app shared login (old Multipass) | Plus Multipass | No | No | Plus IdP |
| Shopify support and feature updates | Stopped Feb 2026 | Current product | Current product | Current product |
To turn native social on, open Settings > Customer accounts > Authentication, connect Google or Facebook with credentials from Google Cloud Console or Meta for Developers, and complete a sign-up on a phone from the old button's URL. Old /account/register links often land on a plain sign-in screen because New Customer Accounts have no separate register page: the first successful code creates the profile.
List theme and app surfaces to rebuild
Write the rebuild list before you flip the toggle, because the admin switch takes minutes while recovering enrolment and SSO after a quiet week takes a rebuild sprint.
On the theme, replace hardcoded /account/login and /account/register copy with the shopify-account web component, or the current theme account link that already uses it, and remove CSS and scripts that targeted classic customer templates. Theme Store submissions are moving to that component as a requirement, so a Dawn or custom theme that still ships the old files will force an upgrade when you change themes.
On apps, list every integration that injects a login button, a register form, or a customer Access Token. Third-party social login that needed custom OIDC on classic will stay broken on New Customer Accounts unless you are on Plus and the vendor rebuilt against the Customer Account API. Loyalty and form apps that only listened on customers/register.liquid need a Customer Account UI extension or an owned form. App subscriptions that no longer fire are cost without a job: treat them like the unused seats in The Hidden Cost of Running a Shopify Store When 12 Apps Quietly Eat Your Margins.
On headless and custom storefronts, plan the Customer Account API OAuth flow before you promise a date. Embedded apps that used Storefront API @inContext with a classic customerAccessToken need a documented client for the new API, and you should confirm the current Partner path for your app type rather than assuming the Headless or Hydrogen channel is the only way to get credentials.
On analytics, annotate the switch date and compare 14 days before and after on new customer registrations, first-time checkout completion, and loyalty enrolments. Paid-order volume can stay flat while membership acquisition falls, which is the pattern that makes teams revert classic too early or stay on classic until the files lock.
On staff comms, password reset emails and "create your account" flows in your ESP still describe the old page, so update those templates the same week you switch or support tickets will recreate the old URL for you.
Recommendation by scenario
Scenario A: non-Plus store, Google and Facebook cover the audience
Stay on the current plan. Connect native Google and Facebook, keep email codes, and turn on Shop sign-in if Shop Pay is already live. Rebuild any register-page enrolment as a Customer Account UI extension or a post-login form. Classic is a delay tactic here, not a destination, because sunset will still arrive.
Scenario B: non-Plus store, the social app also enrolled loyalty or SMS login
Do not buy Plus on the first meeting. Measure whether native Google and Facebook recover registrations over two weeks. If the missing piece is Apple, SMS, or a wallet created at the old button, either rebuild that wallet on a page you own or put Plus IdP on the same roadmap as other Plus work. Revert to classic only when the admin still offers the toggle and you need weeks to rebuild, with a written sunset date on the ticket.
Scenario C: Plus store, mobile app or enterprise IdP
Treat New Customer Accounts as the default and book the identity-provider project as the Multipass replacement. Shared login between iOS, Android, and the storefront is an IdP job, not a Liquid job. Customer Account UI extensions cover order history, profile blocks, and branded account pages that classic Liquid used to fake. Checkout branding still does not automatically paint the account header: budget account branding separately from checkout UI extensions.
Scenario D: new store, or a store that never used classic
You have no classic path. Inventory the same way, then choose native social plus Shop or a Plus IdP. Spending a sprint hunting for a hidden legacy toggle wastes the week you should spend on the rebuild list.
Conclusion
You can now map each live Shopify login path against New Customer Accounts, choose native Google or Facebook, Shop, a Plus identity provider, or stay on classic, and list the theme or app surfaces to rebuild before sunset. Classic remains a holding pattern for stores that still have the toggle. New Customer Accounts are the product Shopify will keep, and the work is the inventory plus the enrolment rebuild, not a debate about passwords.
If the map shows a social-login app, a Hydrogen token, and a Plus IdP question in the same stack, book a Shopify stack assessment and we will turn the worksheet into a sequenced rebuild. For a discovery call that starts from the login inventory, use contact.
