Make the ownership decision
Build vs buy webhook intake for Shopify Flow.
Building the endpoint is the easy part. The real question is who will maintain authentication, receipts, replay, diagnostics, support tools, and audit history after launch.
Building it yourself can be the right choice.
The answer depends on whether custom intake is part of your product or simply infrastructure needed to get events into Shopify Flow.
Build when
Build it when the intake layer needs custom behavior that matters to your product—and your team wants to own its security, recovery, support, and operations over time.
Use FlowRelay when
Use FlowRelay when Shopify Flow should remain the workflow engine and your team would rather not maintain the surrounding intake and recovery tools.
Compare the work that remains after launch.
The first successful request is only the beginning. The table below shows who handles the ongoing work.
| Responsibility | If you build | With FlowRelay | Always yours |
|---|---|---|---|
| Intake | Authentication, validation, request limits, and endpoint hardening. | Authentication and validation designed for Shopify Flow endpoints. | Sender quality, source permissions, and what each event means. |
| Evidence | Receipt storage, failure reasons, and searchable history. | Receipt facts for the handoff from FlowRelay to Shopify Flow. | Workflow intent and the business outcome you expected. |
| Recovery | Rules for replay, duplicate handling, approvals, and audit history. | Original receipt context, replay preview, confirmation, and audit trail. | Decisions about downstream side effects and who may approve replay. |
| Support | Redaction, diagnostic reports, documentation, and escalation. | Redacted diagnostics and stable support facts for the FlowRelay handoff. | Shopify Flow logic and support for downstream apps. |
Could the next operator handle an incident?
Assume an important event is missing and the developer who built the receiver is unavailable. Ask these questions for both options:
- Can the next operator show what arrived and whether it was accepted?
- Can they tell why it failed—or what was handed to Shopify Flow?
- Can they decide whether replay is safe and record who approved it?
- Can they give support useful details without sharing payloads, secrets, or broad store access?
FlowRelay is for Shopify Flow intake, not general webhook infrastructure.
Choose FlowRelay when outside events need to reach Shopify Flow and you want receipts, replay context, and safe diagnostics around that handoff. Choose a broader platform when you need to route events to many destinations or build a general event system.
Compare the cost of maintaining it yourself.
If webhook intake is not part of what makes your business different, compare FlowRelay pricing with the engineering time required to keep a custom receiver secure, recoverable, and supportable.