Shopify Analytics bubble maps show where your sales are concentrated

Shopify has added bubble maps to Shopify Analytics. For merchants who ship orders, they show at a glance where sales are concentrated, without grouping reports by city or region or exporting data to a spreadsheet. If you have ever wanted to see where your customers actually are, this is a quick way to do it.

What it is

A bubble map plots your orders on a map. Shopify groups nearby shipping or billing addresses into bubbles, and the size of each bubble reflects the metric you choose, such as orders or total sales. Larger bubbles mean more of that metric in that area.

Until now, getting a geographic view of your sales usually meant grouping a report by city or region, or exporting data and building a chart yourself. Bubble maps remove that step and give you the picture directly inside Analytics.

How it works and how to access it

You can zoom, pan, or click a bubble to see more detail. There are two ways to get started, according to Shopify:

• Open the new report called Order hotspots by shipping location.
• Add the Shipping address or Billing address field to any report.

Bubble maps are available in reports and dashboard cards for everyone with access to Analytics reports. That means you can pin one to a dashboard and check it regularly, not just open it as a one-off. The Shopify Help Center has a section on bubble maps under selecting visualisations if you want the full detail.

Limits and caveats

The changelog entry does not mention plan restrictions, regional restrictions or usage limits, so we would not assume any, but we also cannot confirm the absence of them. Bubble maps are designed for merchants who ship orders, so if a large share of your sales is not shipped, the map will only show part of the picture.

Remember too that the map reflects the address field you choose. Shipping address shows where goods went, while billing address can differ, for example when customers buy gifts or ship to work. Choose the field that matches the question you are asking.

A bubble map also shows where sales are, not why. A hotspot might reflect a strong marketing push, a single large wholesale order, or a customer base that simply lives in a dense city. Treat it as a prompt for questions rather than an answer.

What it means for merchants

Shopify points to three practical uses: deciding where to keep stock, deciding which location to fulfil orders from, and deciding where to focus regional marketing. For a fashion, streetwear or sportswear brand, each of these has a direct commercial impact.

On stock and fulfilment, knowing where orders cluster helps you think about where inventory should sit to get parcels to customers faster and, potentially, more cheaply. On marketing, a map can reveal areas with strong demand that you are not yet targeting, or areas where you are spending but not seeing orders. It can also help you plan pop-ups, events or local collaborations in places where you already have customers.

Because you can choose the metric, you can compare hotspots by orders and by total sales. An area with many small orders looks different from one with fewer, larger ones, and that difference may shape how you approach it.

What it means for agencies and partners

Bubble maps are an easy way to bring geography into reporting conversations without custom work. Agencies can add them to client dashboards, use them to sense-check paid media geography settings, and use them as a starting point for regional campaign planning or fulfilment discussions.

How we would approach it

1. Open the Order hotspots by shipping location report in Shopify Analytics.
2. Switch between orders and total sales and note where the biggest bubbles sit.
3. Compare the shipping map with a billing address map to spot any gifting or business-address patterns.
4. Check the hotspots against your current ad targeting, stock locations and delivery performance.
5. Pin the map to a dashboard and review it monthly to see how the pattern shifts.

The short version

Bubble maps in Shopify Analytics group nearby addresses into bubbles sized by the metric you choose, so you can see where orders and sales are concentrated. They are available in reports and dashboard cards for everyone with access to Analytics reports. Use them to inform stock, fulfilment and regional marketing decisions, while remembering that they show where sales are, not why.

ETTA provides fractional ecommerce leadership for fashion, streetwear and sportswear brands. If you want a senior view on how this affects your store, get in touch.