Online Store Launch Checklist: 60 Checks Before Go-Live

An online store launch checklist is the list of things your team confirms before customers can buy: products are correct, every payment method works, delivery costs are right, search engines can find the site, legal pages are in place, the store is secure and you can measure what happens next. Most launch-day problems are small things nobody checked, such as a test payment mode left switched on or a missing redirect. The 60 checks below are grouped into nine areas, so different people can take ownership of each one.

How to use this online store launch checklist

Copy the checks into a shared spreadsheet with four columns: the check, the owner, the status and notes. Start working through it at least two weeks before launch, not the day before. Some fixes, such as correcting product data or waiting for a payment provider to approve your account, take time.

Test on the staging copy of your store first, then repeat the most important checks on the live site immediately after launch. A store that worked perfectly on staging can still fail on the live server because of a missed setting, such as an email service or a payment key.

If you are still at the planning stage, our ecommerce website requirements checklist helps you define what the store must do before the build starts.

Products and content (checks 1–9)

1. Every product has a clear name, price, description and at least one good photo.
2. Variants such as size and colour show the right photo, price and stock.
3. Prices are correct, including sale prices, tax display and currency.
4. Stock levels match what you actually have, or sync correctly from your stock system.
5. Out-of-stock products behave as intended: hidden, shown as unavailable or available to back-order.
6. Categories contain the right products, in a sensible default order.
7. Product weights and dimensions are filled in where delivery costs depend on them.
8. Placeholder text, test products and sample images have all been removed.
9. Spelling and brand names have been checked on the home page, category pages and best sellers.

Checkout, payments and delivery (checks 10–20)

10. A full order has been placed with every payment method, using real cards or accounts where possible.
11. Payment gateways are in live mode, not test or sandbox mode.
12. Successful payments create orders with the correct status in the admin.
13. Failed and cancelled payments show a helpful message and do not create paid orders.
14. Refunds work from the admin and reach the customer's payment method.
15. Guest checkout works, as well as checkout for signed-in customers.
16. Discount codes, gift cards and automatic promotions apply correctly and cannot be stacked by mistake.
17. Delivery costs are correct for each zone, weight band and order value.
18. Free delivery thresholds work exactly at the threshold, not just above it.
19. Taxes are calculated correctly for each country or region you sell to.
20. Order confirmation, dispatch and refund emails arrive, look right on a phone and do not land in spam.

Shoppers who meet problems at checkout often never come back, so this section deserves the most testing time. Our guide on how to reduce cart abandonment explains which checkout details matter most to buyers.

Design, mobile and accessibility (checks 21–27)

21. The store has been tested on real phones, both iPhone and Android, not just a resized desktop browser.
22. Menus, filters and galleries work with touch on small screens.
23. Buttons and links are large enough to tap easily.
24. Pop-ups and banners do not cover products or block the page on mobile.
25. Every image has descriptive alt text, and decorative images are marked as such.
26. The whole checkout can be completed using only a keyboard.
27. Text has enough contrast against its background to be read easily.

SEO and redirects (checks 28–36)

28. Search engines are not blocked: the robots.txt file allows crawling and no live page carries a stray "noindex" tag from staging.
29. Every page has a unique title and meta description.
30. URLs are short, readable and final.
31. An XML sitemap is generated, lists only pages you want indexed and is submitted in Google Search Console.
32. Canonical tags point to the main version of each page.
33. Product structured data includes price and availability, and passes Google's Rich Results Test.
34. If you are replacing an old store, every important old URL redirects permanently to its new equivalent.
35. Redirects have been tested from a list of the old store's top pages, not just spot-checked.
36. Internal links point to final URLs, not redirects or staging addresses.

Redirects are the most common reason stores lose search traffic after a launch. Our e-commerce SEO guide explains why they matter so much.

Legal pages and trust (checks 37–43)

37. Terms and conditions, privacy policy and cookie policy are published and linked from the footer.
38. The returns and refunds policy is clear and linked from product pages and checkout.
39. Delivery information, including costs and times, is published.
40. Company name, address and contact details are shown where local law requires them.
41. The cookie banner works and respects the visitor's choice before non-essential cookies load.
42. Marketing consent boxes are not pre-ticked.
43. Customer service contact options are visible, and someone is ready to answer them.

Your returns policy is also a sales tool. Our guide to writing an ecommerce returns policy shows how to make it clear and reassuring.

Security and performance (checks 44–51)

44. HTTPS works on every page, and the certificate renews automatically.
45. Every admin account uses a strong, unique password and two-factor authentication.
46. Test and developer accounts that are no longer needed have been removed.
47. The platform, theme and extensions are fully up to date with security patches.
48. Automatic backups are running, stored off the server, and a restore has been tested.
49. Uptime monitoring and error alerts are set up and send to someone who will act.
50. Key pages load quickly on a mobile connection, and caching is switched on.
51. The store has been load-tested if you expect a launch campaign or high traffic.

For a deeper review, work through our ecommerce security checklist before launch day.

Analytics, tracking and integrations (checks 52–56)

52. Analytics records page views, add-to-cart, checkout steps and purchases with the correct revenue.
53. Advertising and conversion tags fire only after consent where required.
54. Orders flow correctly into your accounting, ERP or warehouse system.
55. Stock and price updates flow back from those systems into the store.
56. Email marketing sign-ups reach your email platform with the right consent.

Launch day and the first two weeks (checks 57–60)

57. A launch time is agreed, ideally early in the week at a quiet hour, with the developer, host and key staff available.
58. A rollback plan exists: who decides, and how the old site or a maintenance page can be restored quickly.
59. Immediately after launch, a real order is placed on the live store and checked end to end.
60. For the next two weeks, someone checks orders, error logs, payment failures, Search Console and customer messages every day.

What to watch after launch

The first days tell you a lot. Look at conversion rate by device, checkout drop-off by step, payment failures, 404 errors and the questions customers ask your team. A sudden rise in "where is my order?" emails, for example, may point to a missing dispatch email. Keep a short list of issues and fix them in order of how many customers they affect.

The surprises we see most often

Some problems turn up at launch so often that they deserve a special mention. Check these twice:

• Staging settings copied to live. A "noindex" tag, a test payment key or a password-protected page carried over from staging can quietly block sales or search traffic.
• Emails from the wrong address. Order emails sent from an unauthenticated domain often land in spam, so customers think their order failed.
• Delivery rules with gaps. A missing postcode range or country can leave some customers with no delivery option at all.
• Old links in marketing. Emails, social profiles and adverts still point to old URLs that now return errors.
• Nobody watching the inbox. Launch campaigns bring questions, and slow answers on day one cost sales and goodwill.

Each of these takes minutes to check and can take days to notice once the store is live.

Frequently asked questions

Planning a launch or migration? Talk to our team about a pre-launch review, or see how we handle store migrations without losing orders or rankings.