Best free Shopify spy tools in 2026 (and how to actually use them)

Shopify spy tools answer one question: what are stores like mine selling, and is it working? The 2023 versions of this list recommended tools that no longer exist (Oberlo was retired in 2022), so here’s what actually works in 2026 — free first, and with the honest limits of each.

The free stack

• Koala Inspector (Chrome extension) — open any Shopify store and see its theme, apps, product count, and new launches. The free tier covers most research needs.
• PPSPY — store analysis plus estimated sales and live-ish order signals; treat revenue estimates as directional, not gospel.
• The best-sellers URL trick — append /collections/all?sort_by=best-selling to almost any Shopify store’s domain and you see their catalog ranked by what sells. Free, built-in, and the single highest-value trick on this page.
• Meta Ad Library — every active Facebook and Instagram ad a store runs, searchable by name. Ads running for 60+ days are usually paying for themselves.
• BuiltWith / Wappalyzer — the tech and app stack behind any store, useful for seeing which upsell or review apps winners rely on.
• SimilarWeb (free tier) — rough traffic ranges and channel mix for bigger stores.

How to run a useful spy session

1. Find 5–10 stores in your niche (Google site:myshopify.com [niche], or work backward from ads in the Ad Library).
2. Pull each store’s best-sellers with the URL trick; note products appearing on several stores — that’s demand, and also where the gaps hide.
3. Check the Ad Library for how long their creatives have run — longevity beats view counts as a signal.
4. Read their recent reviews for shipping and quality complaints; recurring complaints are your differentiation spec.

What spy tools can’t tell you

Whether the store you’re copying makes money. You can’t see their product cost, their ad prices, or — decisive in 2026 — whether their pricing survives Section 301 and Section 122 duties. Validate any spied product with your own numbers: landed cost, then break-even ROAS. A free sourcing quote turns a spy-tool hunch into an actual margin calculation. For ad-level spying across TikTok and Facebook, see our companion guide to dropshipping spy and product research tools.