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DSers Tutorial for Shopify: Install the App, Link AliExpress, Prep Your Products, Place and Pay for Orders, Track Packages, and What the Free Plan Won't Do

Vincent Fredet·Founder of Scale Ova
Updated on ·16 min read
DSers Tutorial for Shopify: Install the App, Link AliExpress, Prep Your Products, Place and Pay for Orders, Track Packages, and What the Free Plan Won't Do

Without a tool, selling an AliExpress product on Shopify means copying each customer's address into AliExpress by hand, picking the right variant, paying order by order, then coming back to paste the tracking number into Shopify.

DSers does it for you: it fills in the address, places up to 100 orders in one click and sends tracking back. On the Shopify App Store, the app shows a 5.0 rating across 6,260 reviews as of September 24, 2026, and it has been listed there since October 26, 2018. DSers describes itself as the official AliExpress, Alibaba and 1688 dropshipping partner. Menu names below are in bold, exactly as they appear in the app.

This tutorial follows one example from start to finish: a store selling an insulated water bottle in three colors, shipped to the US. The amounts in the example are made up; the menu paths come from the DSers Help Center.

What you need before you start

  • A Shopify store, even if it's not published yet, with its shipping zones and rates set up (you'll see below why DSers depends on them). If you don't have one, you can generate it with Scale Ova from your product, then set up shipping and payments.
  • An AliExpress buyer account with a saved payment method. That's the account you'll pay suppliers with.
  • Google Chrome, if you want the import extension.
  • The product you want to sell, spotted on AliExpress. If you're still choosing, how to find a supplier helps you sort through them.
  1. In your Shopify admin, open Apps, search for "DSers" and pick DSers: Dropship+AliExpress+AI. Click Install, then accept the permissions: DSers needs your products and orders to sync them.
  2. DSers offers to create your account with your Shopify store's email, or to log in to an existing DSers account. Pick the free plan (Basic): the DSers Help Center calls it enough to get started.
  3. Check the connection in Settings > Application Management > Sales channel: your store should show Connected.
  4. Link AliExpress in Settings > Application Management > AliExpress: click Add Accounts, log in in the window that opens, then click Authorize. Use the account that will pay for orders.
  5. If you work in Chrome, install the DSers extension from the Chrome Web Store and log it in to your DSers account.

One DSers account manages up to 3 stores on the free plan.

Step 2: set the ship-to country before you import

An AliExpress supplier can show a different price depending on where the order ships. If DSers imports the price for another country while you ship to the US, your whole margin math is off from the start.

  • Before your first import, set DSers's default country ("Price for ship to country") to United States. DSers then fetches the US price and shipping for every product you import.
  • Afterwards, avoid changing it: switching the country on products already linked can break the link to the supplier (the mapping, explained below), and your orders stop going through.

Step 3: import your product

Two ways, under 30 seconds each according to the DSers Help Center:

  • By link. Copy the product page URL on AliExpress, paste it into the Import List bar, then confirm.
  • With the extension. On AliExpress, click Add to DSers on the product page. From a search results page, you can check up to 10 products and import them in one go.

The product arrives with its title, photos, variants and supplier price. It isn't in your store yet: it waits in Import List, where you'll prep it. The free plan allows 500 imports a day and 3,000 products in total.

Step 4: prep the product before you push it

This is the step most people rush, and it's the one that separates a credible store from an AliExpress copy. Click the product card in Import List: the Edit Product Detail editor opens with four tabs.

  • Products, for the title. The example's supplier titles it "2026 New Stainless Steel Water Bottle Vacuum Insulated Sports Thermos Cup". Replace it with a name your customer understands: "Insulated Water Bottle 24 oz".
  • Variants, for colors and prices. Rename the variants in plain words ("Green#01" becomes "Sage"), uncheck the ones you don't want to sell, and type your selling price in the Price column. The table shows the product cost and the shipping cost for the chosen country right next to it.
  • Description. Delete the supplier's: it's machine-translated and identical on hundreds of stores. You'll rewrite it with the method from the product page that converts.
  • Images. Uncheck photos with Chinese text, a watermark or another shop's logo. Keep 3 to 5 sharp ones. The free plan doesn't let you upload your own photos in DSers: you'll add them in Shopify after pushing.
The DSers Edit Product Detail editor, Variants tab: shipping to the United States, three insulated water bottle colors (Black, Sage, Sand) with product cost, shipping cost and a $29.90 selling price
The example's Variants tab: ship-to country set to the United States, variants renamed, product and shipping cost next to the selling price. Made-up example.

When it's ready, click Push to Store. DSers lets you publish the product right away or create it as a draft. Pick the draft: you'll finish it in Shopify, with your photos and your description.

Step 5: work out your real cost, duties included

The price on AliExpress isn't what you pay. Two lines get added to it.

  • Shipping. On r/dropshipping, one merchant found out while setting up their store: a $19 product, $42 shipping by DHL with no other carrier offered, for a $44 selling price. Every sale would have lost money.
  • Import duties. Since August 29, 2025, the US no longer exempts low-value parcels from duties (the "de minimis" rule), for every country. U.S. Customs and Border Protection made the suspension indefinite in rules announced June 24, 2026: every shipment valued at $2,500 or less now owes the applicable duties, except genuine gifts of $100 or less.

When you order, DSers shows an estimate (Product Cost, Est. Shipping, Tax & Fee). The DSers Help Center says these amounts are for reference only: the final amount is the one on the AliExpress order page. Your test order gives you the real number, to plug into the profit margin calculator.

So Shopify knows that cost, turn on the Send product and shipping cost to Store setting. DSers then puts the product and shipping cost in each product's Cost per item field, and your Shopify margin reports come out right.

Step 6: set shipping once and for all

Each AliExpress product offers several shipping methods, with different delivery times and prices. That choice decides the delivery time you can promise. Rather than picking it order by order, set it in Settings > Shipping Settings, under Add Global shipping method based on Condition. Two modes:

  • Basic: you list the shipping methods for the United States in your order of preference. If the supplier doesn't offer the first one, DSers takes the next.
  • Advanced: you set your limits (online tracking required, maximum delivery time, maximum cost), and DSers picks the cheapest or the fastest method that fits them.

At the very least, require online tracking: a parcel without a tracking number is a customer emailing you.

The delivery time shown is a promise from nobody. The r/dropshipping merchant quoted above had negotiated 5 to 10 days with their supplier, while DSers showed 6 to 21 days. Always compare with your own test order: that's the one that counts.

Step 7: tell the supplier what goes in the parcel

Your customer should receive your product, not an AliExpress invoice with the real price on it. In Settings > Order Settings, the Leave a message to Suppliers option adds a message to every order. You can also write one per product, which takes priority.

On r/dropship, a merchant about to open their store shared the message they settled on:

"Please use plain packaging and do not include any paper receipts or other papers such as packing slips. Please do not have any branding."

On r/dropshipping, another merchant adds a caveat: unless you have an agent, there's "no way to really insure it's being followed." The only check is to order yourself.

Step 8: place and pay for orders

When a customer buys from your store:

  1. The order shows up in Open Orders, under the Awaiting order tab, with the customer's address already filled in. DSers also fixes common address errors, free plan included.
  2. Check the shipping method, select the order (or all pending ones) and click Place order to AliExpress.
  3. Choose how to place it. Order via API, the default, is the fastest. Order via Chrome Extension is slower, but applies the AliExpress coupons you've collected. On r/dropshipping, a DSers user confirms it: the automation won't use AliExpress store coupons, "you have to manually change those orders sometimes."
  4. Click ORDER. DSers creates the orders on AliExpress, unpaid, and moves them to the Awaiting payment tab.
  5. Click Make Payment: DSers sends you to the AliExpress unpaid orders page, where you click Pay Now.
The DSers Awaiting order tab: order 1042 for a Sage insulated water bottle sold at $29.90, supplier product at $6.40, AliExpress Selection Standard shipping, $12.00 estimated total cost and an ORDER button
An order from the example in the Awaiting order tab: your listing on the left, the supplier's product on the right, the shipping method and the estimated total cost. Made-up amounts.

DSers doesn't pay for you and doesn't draw on your Shopify balance. A user on r/dropshipping sums it up: "it's like a semi-auto process", where DSers creates the order and you pay yourself. Your customer paid you; you pay the supplier with that money. Place your orders every day: each day of waiting adds to your customer's delivery time.

Step 9: tracking comes back on its own

When the supplier ships, DSers fetches the tracking number (it checks AliExpress 5 times a day) and sends it to Shopify. Shopify marks the order as fulfilled and sends your customer the shipping confirmation email, with their tracking link.

  • In a hurry? In Open Orders, click Sync AliExpress Order, then Sync via API. It doesn't make the supplier ship faster: no shipment, nothing to fetch.
  • Want to delay or turn off the shipping email? That's in Settings > Fulfillment Settings.
  • The supplier changes the number after the fact (placeholder number, corrected mistake)? DSers watches for those changes for 7 days on the free plan, 14 days on Advanced and 21 days on Pro.

Keep an eye on orders that still have no tracking after a few days: it's often the sign of a slow supplier, to chase or replace.

Mapping: when you need to go back to it

Mapping is the link between each variant in your store and the supplier's variant. When you push a product with Push to Store, DSers creates it on its own. You come back to it in three cases:

  • You added a variant in Shopify. It has no link. From the Shopify product page, click More actions > Edit in DSers, then the Mapping icon, and match it to the supplier's option. Renaming an existing variant, on the other hand, keeps the link.
  • The supplier changed their variants (a color renamed, a size removed). Turn on the SKU Changes alert in Settings > General Settings > Notification. The affected product then shows a red badge in My Products: click the Mapping icon and redo the link.
  • Another tool rebuilt your listing. On r/dropship, a merchant spent hours on shipping and mapping errors before finding the cause: the listings pushed by DSers worked, the ones rebuilt with a product page builder lost their link, with the same supplier. If a tool recreates your listing or its variants, redo the mapping right after, through Edit in DSers.

Basic mapping also takes a backup supplier per variant: if the first one is out of stock, DSers orders from the second. Both have to come from the same platform, AliExpress with AliExpress.

Stock and prices: what the free plan doesn't do

On the free plan, DSers checks your suppliers every 24 to 36 hours and can alert you to a stockout or a price increase. But it doesn't touch your store. A beginner found out on r/dropship: "the automatic inventory update setting is a paid feature. Product that is out of stock on DSers isn't going out of stock on the Shopify store."

  • Alerts are free. In Settings > General Settings > Notification, turn on Inventory changes. Alerts show on the product card in My Products and under the bell, for 30 days.
  • Automatic updates start on the Advanced plan. You set them in Settings > Product Settings > Automatic Inventory Update, and they run once a day, at 10 a.m. China time (10 p.m. Eastern the day before, in summer). Four questions await you: product out of stock, variant out of stock, mapping lost, stock changes. All four are set to Do nothing by default. Paying for the plan isn't enough: you have to change those settings.

Without a subscription, check your products' stock and price at the supplier yourself, at least once a week.

Products showing "Sold out" on Shopify

It comes up a lot on the Shopify Community forum: the product imported by DSers has stock, but the store shows "Sold out", or refuses to ship to the customer's address.

The cause is on the Shopify side. To send tracking back, DSers assigns ordered products to its own location, DSers Fulfillment Service (its order window says so). Shopify puts a location created after your shipping profile in the Not fulfilling from section, with no zones or rates. A product stocked only there can't ship anywhere.

The fix: in Settings > Shipping and delivery, open your shipping profile and add the DSers location to the group that holds your zones and rates. In the Shopify Community thread about this problem, the answer that got several merchants unstuck fits in one sentence: "you need to set up the shipment zones and costs in your Shopify store."

Free or paid plan?

The first three plans, from the DSers pricing page as of September 24, 2026:

Basic Advanced Pro
Price Free $19.90/mo $49.90/mo
Stores 3 10 25
Products 3,000 20,000 75,000
Bulk orders Yes Yes Yes
Tracking to Shopify Yes Yes Yes
Auto stock sync No Yes Yes
Auto price sync No Yes Yes
Your own photos No Yes Yes

Paid plans come with a 14-day free trial, which starts the day you switch to the paid plan, not the day you sign up. Paid yearly, they cost 20% less: $190.80 a year for Advanced. An Enterprise plan at $499.90 a month targets very high volumes.

One thing to know: the plan table in the DSers Help Center, checked the same day, doesn't say the same thing. For example, it reserves address fixing and automatic tracking for paid plans, and the DSers overview for beginners mentions 50 orders a month on the free plan. The pricing page and the App Store listing agree with each other, and the table above follows them. Your test order will tell you what your plan really does.

To start, the free plan is enough. On r/dropship, a DSers user puts it plainly: "The free plan is probably more than enough so go for it." Move to Advanced when a supplier stockout or price increase costs you more than $19.90 a month. A single refunded order can be enough.

What merchants say

  • To get started, the tool does the job. On r/dropship: "DSers is fine. It connects your store to AliExpress […]. You are not sitting there typing in addresses."
  • The limits come from suppliers. Another merchant says everything was fine with a handful of products, then delivery times and stock became unpredictable as they added more. One reply in the thread sums it up: "the inconsistency with DSers isn't really a platform problem. you're dealing with 5 or 10 different suppliers each running their own carrier arrangements."
  • Stockouts break the automation. On r/dropshipping, a user who moved to a competitor mentions tracking issues and orders that broke whenever a supplier went out of stock. Hence the backup supplier and stock alerts above.

The mistakes that cost money

  • Importing without setting the ship-to country. The cost shown is then another country's.
  • Publishing the supplier's description as is. It's identical on hundreds of stores.
  • Leaving shipping and duties out of your price.
  • Never ordering yourself. You know neither the real delivery time, nor the packaging, nor the quality.
  • Paying for Advanced and leaving stock settings on Do nothing.
  • Rebuilding a listing with another tool without redoing the mapping.
  • Letting orders sit. Every day of waiting adds to your customer's delivery time.

FAQ

Is DSers free?
Yes, the Basic plan is free: 3 stores, 3,000 products, bulk orders, address fixing and tracking sent back to Shopify, according to the pricing page as of September 24, 2026. Automatic stock and price updates start on the Advanced plan, at $19.90 a month, with a 14-day trial.
Is DSers only for AliExpress?
No. DSers also handles 1688, Alibaba and sourcing agents, and its App Store listing says it works with Amazon, eBay and TikTok Shop. For CJdropshipping or print on demand, use each one's own app, compared in how to find a supplier.
Is DSers an official AliExpress app?
DSers describes itself as the official AliExpress, Alibaba and 1688 dropshipping partner, and its App Store listing as the official Alibaba group partner. The app is published by DSers, whose listed address is in Hong Kong. It works with your own AliExpress account.
Is DSers trustworthy?
On the Shopify App Store, DSers has a 5.0 rating across 6,260 reviews as of September 24, 2026, with 98% five-star reviews and 60 one-star reviews. On Reddit, the tone is more mixed: the tool is seen as good for getting started, and the trouble mostly comes from suppliers.
Is DSers the same as AutoDS?
No, they're competing tools. DSers has a free plan and stays focused on AliExpress. AutoDS has no free plan: on its App Store listing as of September 24, 2026, the first plan costs $26.90 a month for 200 products, with a 3-day trial for $0.99, and price and stock monitoring starts on the $39.90 plan. AutoDS shows a 4.5 rating across 1,277 reviews there.
Does DSers pay for orders for me?
No. DSers creates the orders with the supplier, but you pay for them on AliExpress. You can pay them in a batch rather than one by one. DSers takes nothing from your Shopify balance.
Why do my DSers products show "Sold out" in my store?
Most often, the DSers Fulfillment Service location has no zones or rates in your shipping profile. Add it to the group that holds your rates, in Settings > Shipping and delivery.
Can my customer tell they're buying from AliExpress?
Not in your store or in Shopify emails. They might guess from the packaging, an invoice in the parcel or the tracking, which shows a departure from China. Leave a message for the supplier (step 7) and check with your test order.

Sources

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