Storefront integration vs API integration.

A storefront integration is the fulfiller's app on Shopify, Etsy, WooCommerce or TikTok Shop: products sync out, orders import back, and the sales platform owns the checkout. An API integration is a store with no shopfront at all. Printful calls it a manual order / API store, and products published there are visible to nobody until your own code pulls them and renders them. What each one locks in is feature coverage, not just effort: Printful publishes a table of which features work on which integration, and live shipping rates on Shopify need the Advanced or Plus plan, or Grow plus $20/mo. The hosted middle option has its own limits: Printful's Quick Stores are US only, take no custom domain, and are not fully white label. Pick the app because it is quick and you inherit whatever that integration does not support; pick the API because it does everything, and shipping, tax and personalization are now yours to build and maintain.