What a stocktake discrepancy actually cost you, after Stocky

Counting stock without Stocky is straightforward. Knowing what the difference cost you is the part that went missing, and it is the part the count was really for.

Stocky's stocktake ended with a file that said, line by line, how many units were expected, how many were found, and what the gap was worth — its export carried "the listed retail price and cost price, and inventory information such as expected stock, the actual stock, and adjustment totals and costs." One number told you whether this quarter's shrinkage was a nuisance or a problem.

Shopify's native tools give you the first two columns and not the third. Here is how the counting works now, and how to get the money back.

How you count, natively

There is no stocktake record in Shopify — the word only describes the job. There are two ways to do it, and both are Shopify's own.

On a POS device, in zones. "Staff scan or search for products on a Shopify POS device and enter the on-hand quantity." It is built for working through a shop floor a section at a time — "Each Quick count session supports up to 1,000 variants, so plan to submit each session as soon as a zone is complete."

As a spreadsheet, for the whole lot. Export your on-hand stock, count offline, and import the counted quantities back. Shopify describes the POS route as being for "quickly spot-checking specific products or zones", so a full annual count usually goes this way.

Two details from Shopify's own counting guidance are worth adopting as rules rather than reading past. "For any variant with a variance greater than 5%, recount the product physically to confirm the new quantity." And the one that explains most of the small, maddening differences: "If a sale happens between the time staff counted a product and the time the session was submitted, then a small discrepancy displays in the adjustment." Count during opening hours and some of your variance is not missing stock at all.

Where the discrepancies go

Every change is recorded. "After staff submit their Quick count sessions, you can review the adjustments and follow up on discrepancies by using the Inventory adjustment changes report." You can also build your own view of adjustments by product, location and reason.

Here is the gap. Those reports measure two things, and Shopify defines both: an adjustment change is "A change in inventory quantity." and an adjustment count is "An amount of times an inventory adjustment was made." Units, and how often. There is no money in either.

So "we were twelve short on the blue glaze" is in Shopify. "That cost us €186" is not.

Need the stocktake in money, not units? Describe what each count should tell you →

Getting the value back

The sum itself is simple, and it is the one Stocky used to do for you: the units missing, multiplied by each product's cost. Export the adjustment report for the count, bring in each variant's Cost per item, multiply, and total.

Two things decide whether that total is right.

A product with no cost recorded drops out silently. It adds nothing to the sum and nothing warns you. If you imported your catalogue or added products in a hurry, check how many have no cost before you trust the figure — the same trap catches Shopify's own inventory value reports, and it has its own page.

The cost is today's cost, not what you paid. Shopify keeps one cost per variant, and a count six months after a price rise values last season's stock at this season's price. For a shrinkage figure that is usually close enough; for the accounts it is worth knowing which one you are looking at.

Three things that changed around the history

How far back you can see. "You can view only the last 180 days of inventory adjustment history for a product or variant." That was 90 days until 8 November 2024. Shopify's newer adjustment history reports go further back — but only "on a go-forward basis" from July 2025, so they do not reach counts done before then.

Whether you can record why. Shopify's help lists seven reasons you can attach to an adjustment — Correction, Count, Received, Return restock, Damaged, Theft or loss, Promotion or donation — and Count is the one for a stocktake. Some merchants reported in spring 2026 that the reason selector was missing from the new admin, and one said Shopify Support told them it had been left out. That is a merchant's account, not something Shopify has said. Check it in your own admin before you plan a count around filtering by reason.

What the reports are counting changed on 1 October 2026, and your year-end comparison is the place it shows. Shopify's inventory reports used to measure available stock. They now measure on hand. Shopify's help centre says it in three sentences, and each one matters for a count: "Starting October 1, 2026, inventory reports measure stock by On hand quantity instead of Available quantity." — "On hand includes every unit at a location, including Committed and Unavailable units, so reported quantities can be higher than before." — "Data before October 1, 2026 still displays Available quantity, so historical numbers don't change." That last one is what makes this awkward rather than reassuring: a year-end figure for 2026 sits in the same report as last year's comparative on a different basis, so closing stock can rise with no transaction behind it. Note what Shopify's sentence does and does not say — it says inventory reports, without naming which ones, so if one particular report carries your year-end number, put a pre-October figure next to a post-October one before you rely on it. Worth a sentence to your accountant before they ask.

Which route is yours

What Shopivibe does

For the counting itself, use Shopify's own tools. Quick count and the adjustment report are Shopify's own and they work — though whether Quick count is included in your POS subscription is a question for your POS plan, not for this page.

Where this becomes worth asking for is the number at the end: "after every count, tell me what the shortfall was worth, by product and in total, and flag anything with no cost so it does not vanish from the sum." That is a calculation Shopify's reports do not make, done the same way every time instead of rebuilt in a spreadsheet each quarter.

Two things to say plainly. The costs come from you — the adjustment report carries units and not money, so the valuation is built around the cost figures you keep, with any product that has no cost flagged rather than silently dropped. And the reason on each line stays whatever your count wrote — the valuation reads the adjustments, it does not make them. A person here takes it on straight away and has it working in your store within 24 hours.

Shopivibe solves the problem in your store and keeps what it adds maintained, including when Shopify changes something underneath. Shopivibe is free during early access, with 3,500 credits included. Credits beyond the included 3,500 cost $0.06 each.

Know what your last count should have told you? Describe it in your own words →