ZonifyCountry blocking
Shopify Country Blocker
Zonify is a country blocker for Shopify. Block the countries you can't serve, or allow only the ones you ship to. Visitors from everywhere else see your message, or go to a page you choose, instead of browsing products they can't buy.
Free to install · No code · Nothing is blocked until you add a rule
243 countries and regions
Block a few, or allow only the ones you ship to.
Every block recorded
See each visit that was turned away, and why.
Never lock yourself out
Always allow your own IP, and no rule can block you.
What country blocking does on Shopify
Country blocking decides which visitors can use your storefront, based on the country they appear to be in. It's a business rule, not a security wall: you use it to keep your store for the places you can actually sell to.
Shopify has no setting for this. Shopify Markets and your shipping settings decide where you sell and which addresses checkout accepts, but anyone can still open your store and browse. A country blocker closes that gap: visitors you can't serve are turned away on the storefront itself.
Zonify checks every visitor on every page of your online store, and records each visit it turned away with the reason.
Block a few countries, or allow only a few
Pick from 243 countries and regions, then choose the mode that matches how you sell.
Block list
Add the countries you want to keep out. Everyone else can visit. Best when you sell almost everywhere, with a few exceptions.
Allow list
Add the countries you serve. As soon as the list has one country, every country not on it is blocked. Before you save, Zonify tells you how many countries will be blocked.
Your message, or a redirect
Blocked visitors see “Store not available” with your message, or go to a page you choose. Set one redirect for every country block, or a different one on each country.
Remove several at once
Select countries in the list and remove them together, after one check. Adding them back takes seconds.
How Zonify works out a visitor's country
Zonify reads the country from the visitor's browser: its time zone first, then its language setting. Only time zones that belong to one country are used. It doesn't call an outside service to look up your visitors.
It's a good guess for most shoppers, but it isn't proof of where someone is. A visitor who changes their device's time zone and language can appear to be somewhere else, and a traveller whose laptop still uses their home time zone is treated as being at home.
When the country can't be told, the visitor is let through the country check, so someone with unusual settings isn't blocked by a rule meant for someone else. The visit is logged with the country as Unknown, and IP rules still apply. The FAQ on country detection has more.
See every visit that was turned away
Analytics in Zonify shows each visit with the country it worked out, the IP address, the device and the rule that decided. Look back 7, 14, 30 or 90 days.
If you see blocked visits from a country you do serve, you'll know your list needs a change. Download the log as a CSV file of up to 10,000 visits at a time.
When a country blocker makes sense
You only ship to some countries
Visitors from elsewhere can't get your products. Turning them away early saves refunds, support emails and disappointed shoppers.
You may only sell in some places
A brand or distribution agreement may limit where you can offer certain products.
You're launching country by country
Open the store in your first markets only, while you get the rest ready.
Trouble keeps coming from one place
Keep visitors from a country you don't sell to away from your product pages.
Set up country blocking in three steps
No code and no developer. The full walkthrough is in how to block countries on Shopify.
- 1
Install Zonify
Install it free from the Shopify App Store. It asks for no access to your orders, products or customers, because it doesn't need any.
- 2
Turn on the app embed
In your theme editor, open App embeds and switch Zonify on. Nothing runs on your store until you do. Zonify's Onboarding page links straight there.
- 3
Add your countries
Open Countries in Zonify, click Add countries, choose Block or Allow only, and tick the countries. You can pick several at once. The rule applies on the visitor's next page load.
Good to know
What country blocking can't do
Knowing the limits helps you set it up well.
We list the limits before you install, so nothing about how Zonify works comes as a surprise later.
The country is a best guess
It comes from browser settings a visitor can change. Use country blocking to decide where you sell, not to protect anything secret.
The first page shows for a moment
Shopify sends the page before any app can check the visitor, so on a first visit the block appears about a second later. Later pages show it straight away.
Checkout isn't covered
Zonify runs on your online store's pages, not on Shopify's checkout. Your shipping settings still decide which addresses checkout accepts.
Search engines are visitors too
Crawlers that run scripts, like Google's, are checked by your country rules like any visitor. Bot rules never block a verified Googlebot, but a country rule can. If you block the country a crawler appears to come from, it may see your block page. Check with the URL Inspection tool in Google Search Console after changing rules.
Questions
Country blocking questions
Can't find your answer? More answers are in the Zonify FAQ, or contact us and we'll reply.
Can Shopify block countries without an app?
Not on the storefront. Shopify Markets and your shipping settings limit which countries checkout delivers to, but they don't stop anyone from visiting. Some stores paste a code snippet into their theme instead, which breaks when the theme changes and keeps no record. A country blocker app like Zonify does it from your Shopify admin, with no code.
Will blocking a country stop orders from that country?
It stops visitors who appear to be in that country from using your storefront. Zonify doesn't run on Shopify's checkout, so keep your shipping settings in step with your country rules: they decide which addresses checkout accepts.
Can I send blocked visitors to another website?
Yes. Add a full web address as the redirect. You can set one default redirect for all country blocks, and a different one on any single country. Visitors see your message for a moment, then go to the page you chose.
Can I block a state, region or city?
No. Zonify's rules work on whole countries. The list of 243 countries and regions includes territories such as Hong Kong and Puerto Rico, but a rule can't cover only part of a country, like a state or a city.