Frequently Bought Together on Shopify: Your Options

Shopify doesn’t have a single “frequently bought together” switch. You build it from one of four options: free complementary products from Shopify’s Search & Discovery app, a discounted bundle, a dedicated frequently bought together app, or custom code.

The right choice depends on two things. Do you want a discount on the pair? And do you want to pick the pairs yourself, or have them chosen from order data? This guide covers each option, how to set it up, and where it falls short.

What does “frequently bought together” mean on Shopify?

On marketplaces, it is the box under a product that says “customers also bought” with two or three items, checkboxes and one button to add them all. On Shopify, the idea maps to two different things:

• A suggestion. Show matching products near the add to cart button so the shopper can add them. No discount.
• An offer. Sell the matching products together at a lower price, so there is a reason to add them now.

Shopify’s own word for the first is complementary products. Its help center describes them as “products often bought in addition to a selected product”, as opposed to related products, which are similar items a shopper might buy instead.

Which options do you have?

The next sections walk through each one.

How do you add complementary products with Search & Discovery?

This is the free, native route. Search & Discovery is made by Shopify and listed as free on the Shopify App Store. The steps below follow Shopify’s product recommendations help page.

1. Install Search & Discovery from the App Store.
2. In your admin, go to Apps > Search & Discovery, click Product recommendations, then Add recommendations.
3. Select a product.
4. Choose up to 10 complementary products for it. You can also set up to 10 related products here.
5. Click Save.
6. Open your theme editor, go to the product page template and add the complementary products block. In some themes, it is a block inside the product information section, so look there if you don’t see it in the app blocks list.
7. Set the heading, such as “Pair it with”, and how many products to show.

Two things to know before you rely on it. First, complementary products are manual. Shopify generates related products automatically from purchase history, product descriptions or collections, but you pick the complementary ones yourself. Second, your theme decides the layout. Shopify says the block “is only available in compatible themes”, and “you can have only one complementary product block on a product page at a time.”

Why might the block show nothing?

Shopify hides a recommended product when it is out of stock, not active, not published to the Online Store, priced at $0.00, a gift card, unlisted, or already in the shopper’s cart. If the block is empty, check your picks against that list first.

What does the native block not do?

• No discount. It shows products at their normal price.
• No “add all” button. Shoppers add each item on its own. Your theme may offer a quick add button on each card.
• No automatic pairs. With 300 products, you set up 300 lists, or bulk edit the complementary products metafield.

How do you add a discount for buying products together?

A suggestion is easy to ignore. A small saving on the pair gives shoppers a reason to act. You have three native or bundle-based ways to do it.

Buy X get Y on the second product

Create a buy X get Y discount where the customer buys product A and gets product B at a percentage off. Shopify lets you run it as a code or as an automatic discount.

The catch: “The free or discounted ‘get’ item is never automatically added to the cart.” Shoppers have to find and add product B themselves. Pair the discount with the complementary products block and a short line in the product description, so they know the deal exists. For the full set of native discount limits, see Shopify bundles app vs native bundles.

A fixed bundle

A fixed bundle sells the pair or trio as one offer at one price. Shopify’s free Shopify Bundles app creates fixed bundles and multipacks on all plans, according to its help center page. Each bundle becomes a product you publish, so shoppers find it on its own page rather than on the page of the item they came for.

A bundle app can put the set on the product page instead. In Sam Bundles, our app, a fixed bundle can include up to 30 products at a percentage off, an amount off, or a price you type. Turn on Show on included products page under Placement, and the bundle appears on the page of every product in it. Shoppers pick options such as size for each item and add the whole set in one click.

“Complete the bundle” on a quantity tier

If shoppers already buy your product in 2s and 3s, you can attach the add-on to a tier instead. In a Sam Bundles quantity breaks offer, Complete the bundle adds other products to a bar at that bar’s discount. For example, a “Duo” bar for a shampoo could include the matching conditioner.

With Sam Bundles, you choose the products in each offer yourself. It does not build pairs from your order history.

When do you need a frequently bought together app?

Search the Shopify App Store for “frequently bought together” and you’ll find many apps. They tend to add some mix of:

• Automatic recommendations based on order history or product data.
• A checkbox list with the main product and its add-ons, plus one button to add them all.
• A discount shown on the suggestion itself.
• Cart or post-purchase placement, not just the product page.
• Reporting on the revenue the suggestions bring in.

An app makes sense when you have a large catalog and don’t want to set pairs by hand, or when you want the marketplace-style box. Before you install one, check the listing and docs for:

1. How picks are made. Can you override automatic suggestions on key products?
2. How the discount applies. Does it use Shopify’s own discount system, and does it combine with your other discounts the way you expect?
3. Theme fit. Does it work as an app block you can place, and does it match your theme on mobile?
4. Page speed. Does the script load asynchronously?
5. Pricing limits. Free plans often cap orders, views or features. Read them before you build around one.

Can a developer build it with custom code?

Yes. Shopify’s developer docs on complementary products show how a theme can request recommendations with a complementary intent through the recommendations object and the Product Recommendations API. The example labels the result “Pair it with” and suggests placing it near the top of the product page.

Custom code gives you full control of the layout, such as a checkbox list with one button. It still uses the products you picked in Search & Discovery. A pair discount is a separate job, through a native discount or a discount app.

How do you choose which products to pair?

Good pairs are products customers already buy together, or items that complete the main product. Some ways to find them:

• Read your orders. Export recent orders and look for products that often appear on the same order.
• Think about use. What does a shopper need to use the product on day one? A camera needs a memory card. A plant needs a pot.
• Check your support inbox. Questions like “does this come with a charger?” point to a missing pair.
• Keep the add-on cheaper. An add-on that costs more than the main item feels like a second purchase, not a complement.
• Keep it short. Two or three suggestions are easier to scan than ten.

Our product bundling strategy guide has a checklist for picking items that belong together. If you add a discount, work it out from your margin first. The bundle pricing strategy guide shows how.

Which option should you pick?

Start on your best-selling product. Run the option for a few weeks, compare order value and profit with the weeks before, then roll it out to the next product. For the wider picture of bundle types and when each one fits, read our product bundles guide, or see how to create bundles on Shopify for step-by-step setup.