# How to Create a Shipping Experiment This guide walks you through the full setup process for a shipping experiment in Elevate — from configuration to launch. > **Plan requirement:** Shipping experiments require access to third-party carrier-calculated shipping rates. See Getting Started for plan details. *** ### Step 1: Create an Experiment From your Elevate dashboard, go to **Experiments** and click **New Experiment**. Select **Shipping Experiment**. If this is your first shipping experiment, Elevate will check that your store has the required shipping permissions and carrier service enabled. Follow any prompts to grant permissions — this is a one-time setup. ### Step 2: General Info Enter your experiment details: * **Name** — Something descriptive like "Free Shipping $50 vs $75 Threshold" or "Flat Rate $4.99 vs $7.99" * **Description** — What you're testing and why * **Hypothesis** — What you expect to happen For example: > *"Lowering our free shipping threshold from $75 to $50 will increase conversion rate and average order value, as more customers will add items to reach the free shipping minimum."* Choose your **experiment goal**. Revenue Per Visitor is the default and usually the best choice for shipping experiments, since it captures both conversion rate and order value changes. ### Step 3: Select Shipping Profile and Zones This step connects your experiment to your existing Shopify shipping configuration. #### Select a Shipping Profile Choose which shipping profile to test against. Most stores have a "General" profile that covers all products. If you have multiple profiles (e.g., for heavy items or special product types), select the one relevant to your test. #### Enable Shipping Zones You'll see all the shipping zones within the selected profile. Toggle on the zones you want to include in the experiment. For each enabled zone, you'll see its existing shipping rates. Select which rates you want to override with your test variations. > **Important:** Shipping experiments apply store-wide — they cannot be limited to specific products or collections. All products within the selected shipping zones will use the test rates. ### Step 4: Configure Shipping Rates Select the rates you want to test within the zones you enabled. The existing rates in your zone are shown, and you choose which ones to include in your experiment. The rates you select here become the baseline for your variations — you'll customize the actual prices, thresholds, and conditions in the next step. ### Step 5: Set Up Variations Each variation represents a different set of shipping rates that a group of visitors will see at checkout. **Control** — Your current live shipping rates. Automatically populated from your Shopify configuration. **Variations** — For each variation, configure the shipping rates you want to test. For every rate in the variation, you can set: * **Rate name** — What the customer sees at checkout (e.g., "Standard Shipping," "Free Shipping") * **Price** — The shipping cost * **Free shipping threshold** — The cart total above which shipping becomes free (for free shipping threshold rates) * **Delivery time** — Min and max delivery day estimates * **Description** — Optional text shown at checkout alongside the rate #### Conditional Rates (Optional) For more advanced setups, you can enable **conditional shipping** on individual rates. This lets you set different prices based on: * **Cart price** — Different rates based on the order total (e.g., $9.99 shipping for orders under $50, $4.99 for orders $50–$100, free for orders over $100) * **Order weight** — Different rates based on total weight (e.g., free shipping for orders under 5kg, $12.99 for heavier orders) You can add multiple rates per variation to offer customers different shipping speed/price options (e.g., "Standard" and "Express" within the same variation). ### Step 6: Edit Content (Optional) This step lets you customize on-page content for each variation using Elevate's visual editor. This is typically needed when: * You're testing a **free shipping threshold** and display that amount across your site (e.g., "Free shipping on orders over $75") * You have **shipping banners or messaging** that reference specific shipping prices or offers * You want the **on-page messaging to match** the shipping rates the visitor will see at checkout If your site doesn't display shipping-specific messaging, you can skip this step. > Need help with content setup? Click **Request Shipping Content Setup** and the Elevate team will assist you. ### Step 7: Traffic Allocation Set how traffic is split between your variations. The default is an even split. Adjust as needed — percentages must add up to 100%. ### Step 8: Add Audience Targeting (Optional) Narrow your audience if needed — by device, location, traffic source, visitor type, or UTM parameters. For the full list of targeting options, see [Audience Targeting](https://docs.elevateab.com/elevate-helpcenter/experiment-setup/audience-targeting). ### Step 9: Review and Launch Review your experiment configuration — double-check that each variation has the correct rates, prices, and thresholds. Then click **Create Experiment** to submit. The experiment moves into review status. Once you've completed QA, click **Launch Experiment** to go live. *** ### After Launching * **QA your experiment** — Place a test order and verify the correct shipping rates appear at checkout for each variation. See the Shipping Test QA Checklist. * **Monitor results** — Check the Results tab to track performance. Shipping experiments include shipping revenue in the revenue calculations. * **Wait for significance** — Let the experiment run until it reaches a definitive status. See Statistical Significance. * **End the experiment** — When ready, see Ending an Experiment --- # Agent Instructions: Querying This Documentation If you need additional information that is not directly available in this page, you can query the documentation dynamically by asking a question. Perform an HTTP GET request on the current page URL with the `ask` query parameter: ``` GET https://docs.elevateab.com/elevate-helpcenter/shipping-testing/how-to-create-a-shipping-experiment.md?ask= ``` The question should be specific, self-contained, and written in natural language. The response will contain a direct answer to the question and relevant excerpts and sources from the documentation. Use this mechanism when the answer is not explicitly present in the current page, you need clarification or additional context, or you want to retrieve related documentation sections.