Shopify’s latest developer changelog removes a key hurdle: trial plan stores can now deploy Hydrogen storefronts to Oxygen. This opens up full‑stack development on a free store, letting you test and showcase custom storefronts without upgrading to a paid plan.
What’s Changed
Previously, Oxygen hosting required a paid Shopify plan. The new update expands Oxygen availability to trial stores, meaning you can spin up a Hydrogen project, push it to Oxygen, and view the live URL—all from a store that’s still on the free trial.
Who Is Affected
This change is aimed at two audiences:
How to Deploy on a Trial Store
shopify login --store your-trial-store.myshopify.com
shopify hydrogen deploy --store your-trial-store.myshopify.com
The CLI will create an Oxygen environment for you and return a preview URL. Because trial stores lack public environments, the URL will always prompt for a store login before rendering the storefront.
Example of an optional oxygen.toml configuration you might add to control the build:
toml
[build]
command = "npm run build"
[environment]
NODE_ENV = "production"
Limitations & Considerations
Next Steps for Developers & Merchants
Conclusion
The ability to run Hydrogen on Oxygen from trial stores removes a major friction point for developers and merchants eager to experiment with Shopify’s next‑gen storefront platform. While the preview URLs remain login‑protected, you now have a fully functional, cost‑free environment to prototype, test, and showcase custom storefronts. Upgrade to a paid plan when you’re ready for public URLs or advanced features, but until then, make the most of this new trial capability and bring your Shopify storefront ideas to life faster than ever.
