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How to keep available products first in Shopify collections

Automatically move sold-out products below the products shoppers can buy. PushLast does this for the collections you enable, without removing products or unpublishing their pages.

By PushLast Updated

Why are sold-out products appearing first?

A collection’s order doesn’t necessarily change when a product sells out. A popular item can stay near the top, leaving shoppers to scroll past products they can’t buy.

This matters when your ads or emails send people straight to a collection. Stock-based sorting keeps available products ahead of sold-out ones on that landing page.

Shopify’s default sort options include price, title, date and best-selling, but no automatic in-stock-first option. You can reorder manually or use an app to maintain the order as inventory changes. Shopify’s sorting options ↗

The same collection, reordered

Before sorting

  1. Studio mugSold out
  2. Everyday toteIn stock
  3. Weekender bagSold out
  4. Linen capIn stock
  5. Cotton teeIn stock
  6. Canvas pouchIn stock

Available products first

  1. Everyday toteIn stock
  2. Linen capIn stock
  3. Cotton teeIn stock
  4. Canvas pouchIn stock
  5. Studio mugSold out
  6. Weekender bagSold out
In this example, all six products stay in the collection. The four available products come first.

Keep available products first with PushLast

Start with one collection you send shoppers to regularly.

  1. Open PushLast in Shopify Admin

    Install PushLast from the Shopify App Store and complete the app’s setup. Find the collection you want to manage in the collections table.

  2. Enable sorting and choose the available-product order

    Turn on the collection’s Auto sort status. Under Available Items Sort, choose how available products should be ordered: title, price, date created, or Recently In Stock. Sold-out products go below them.

    Enabling PushLast changes the collection’s order. Turning it off later stops future sorting; it does not restore the order you had before.

  3. Save your changes

    Click Save in the app’s save bar. PushLast processes the collection in the background, then responds to relevant inventory changes. A successful save does not mean the storefront has finished updating; large collections can take multiple passes.

  4. Open the collection as a shopper

    Follow the collection link you use in your ads, emails or navigation. Check that available products appear before sold-out products. Your theme must use the collection’s managed order; a different sort chosen by the shopper or included in the link can change the result.

What counts as sold out?

PushLast checks product inventory. A product that tracks inventory can be pushed down when none of its variants has stock above zero. By default, a product with any variant set to continue selling when out of stock is exempt. You can change that preference in PushLast’s settings.

Which approach fits your collection?

ApproachSold-out productsWhen stock changes
Manual sortingYou move them to the end.You rearrange the collection again.
Shopify inventory conditionExcluded from eligible automated collections.Collection membership updates with inventory.
PushLastKept in the collection, below available products.Order updates in the background.

Move sold-out products down manually

In Shopify Admin, open Products → Collections and select a collection. Set its default sort to Manually, move sold-out products to the end, and save. You’ll need to revisit the order when inventory changes. Manual sorting steps ↗

Exclude sold-out products with an inventory condition

For an automated collection, Shopify documents an Inventory stock greater than 0 condition with Match all conditions and inventory tracking enabled. Check the existing conditions before changing them: switching from “any” to “all” can change which other products qualify. Shopify’s inventory-condition guide ↗

This removes sold-out products from that collection until stock returns. Their product pages can remain published.

Still seeing sold-out products near the top?

  • Check the saved setting. Confirm that the collection is active in PushLast and your changes were saved.
  • Check the storefront order. Use the collection’s default view. Theme settings, other sorting apps, filters and shopper-selected sorts can affect what appears.
  • Check the product’s variants. One variant with stock, or a continue-selling variant under the default setting, can keep a product from being pushed down.
  • Allow the update to finish. Sorting is asynchronous. A recent inventory change may still be processing.

Available-first doesn’t always mean a first page with no sold-out products. If a page holds 24 products and only 10 are available, sold-out products can still fill the remaining places.

Need help with a collection that still looks wrong? Contact PushLast support.