How Simple Bundles breaks bundles into individual line items on orders

This article explains how bundle breakdown normally works, whether your bundle's individual items show up at checkout or after the order is created. If your bundle isn't breaking down into its components at all, see Possible reasons why the bundle does not break down when checking out and how to solve them instead.

Whether you're using Simple Bundles 1.0 or 2.0 changes how and when this happens. You can add bundle contents to orders in two ways: the Cart Transform API and order editing. Getting bundle contents into your orders correctly helps you track inventory accurately and avoid fulfillment errors.

• Simple Bundles 1.0
• Simple Bundles 2.0
• Why are both methods used in Simple Bundles 2.0?
• The Cart Transform API method
• The order editing method

Simple Bundles 1.0

In the 1.0 version, child products (the individual items that make up a bundle) are added to the order after checkout, using the order editing method. There's no checkout-time breakdown in 1.0; it always happens once the order already exists.

Simple Bundles 2.0

In the 2.0 version, child products can be added at checkout or after checkout, depending on how the order came in. This dual-method approach, combining the Cart Transform API (a Shopify Function) and order editing, is what makes sure child products get included no matter which sales channel the order came through.

Note: If your only sales channel is your online store checkout, you don't need to think about both methods at all. Only the Cart Transform API applies, and your bundles will break down at checkout every time.

Why are both methods used in Simple Bundles 2.0?

The Shopify API that powers Cart Transform currently only works with Online Store checkout and Shopify POS. Shopify is expected to expand support to more sales channels over time, but until then, order editing is used after checkout to cover everything else, including Shop, Amazon, and third-party subscription apps like Recharge Subscriptions and Skio Subscriptions.

If you sell bundles as subscriptions, you may want to also read How to create bundles with a subscription plan like Recharge, Seal, and Appstle in Simple Bundles 2.0 for more on how that interacts with breakdown timing.

The Cart Transform API method

The Cart Transform API is a Shopify Function. It breaks the parent bundle down into its child products right at checkout. For orders placed through your online store, the child products appear immediately in your Orders tab in Shopify admin, without the parent bundle line at all.

Since only the child products end up on the order, they carry the bundle's price between them, split proportionally (including any price adjustments the bundle applied).

The Cart Transform API method: the order contains only the child products, no parent bundle line. Price is distributed across the child products.

You can manage this setting under App Settings > Advanced Settings > Cart Transform and Order Editing Fallbacks.

• Enabled: bundles expand into their component SKUs right at checkout, for accurate inventory and fulfillment handling from the start.
• Disabled: bundles are broken down after the order is created instead, using your selected fallback method (such as order editing).

Additional Resources

To learn how to use Shopify's Cart Transform Functions, including implementation steps and code examples, refer to the official Shopify documentation: Cart Transform Function API

The order editing method

This method applies to both Simple Bundles 1.0 and 2.0. It breaks the parent bundle down into child products after the order has already been created, so the order needs to be editable for this to work. Once the order exists, Simple Bundles adds the child products alongside the original bundle product. Since the price stays assigned to the bundle line, the child products are added with a 100% discount so nothing is double-charged.

In some cases, an order can't be edited at all. When that happens, Simple Bundles creates an associated order instead, containing the bundle's contents, with a note linking back to the original order number. You can read more about when this happens in Handling orders that cannot be edited by Shopify

The order editing method: the child products, along with the parent bundle, are all added to the order. Price is assigned to the parent bundle; child products are discounted 100%.