AM Sooner or later a customer asks for an invoice: a business buyer who needs one for their accounts, a wholesale order agreed by email, or a custom order you took outside your checkout. This generator builds a clean invoice in a few minutes and saves it as a PDF, without an app or an account.
Everything happens in your browser. Your logo, customer details and prices are never uploaded to a server.
How to create an invoice
- Add your logo and business details: business name, address, email, phone and tax or VAT number if you have one.
- Add the customer: name, company, billing address and shipping address if different.
- Set the invoice number, order number and dates. Use your Shopify order number (for example #1042) so the invoice matches the order in your admin.
- Choose the currency the customer paid or will pay in.
- Add line items with description, SKU, quantity and unit price. Totals calculate as you type.
- Add discount, tax and shipping so the total matches what the customer was charged.
- Write notes and payment terms, such as "Due on receipt" or "Net 30", plus bank or payment details.
- Print or save as PDF. In the print dialog, choose "Save as PDF" as the destination to get a file you can email.
What to put on an invoice
| Field | Why it matters |
|---|---|
| Invoice number | A unique, sequential number makes invoices easy to find and is expected by many tax authorities. |
| Order number | Links the invoice to the Shopify order for refunds and support. |
| Invoice and due dates | Sets when payment is owed and starts the payment terms. |
| Business and tax details | Business buyers often need your legal name, address and tax number to claim expenses. |
| SKU per line | Makes returns and reorders easier to match to your catalog. |
| Discount, tax and shipping | Shows how the total was reached, so it matches the payment. |
| Payment terms and notes | Tells the customer how and when to pay, and records anything agreed. |
Rules differ by country. If you are VAT-registered in the UK or the EU, a VAT invoice has required fields such as your VAT number and the VAT rate and amount per line. Check your tax authority's rules or ask your accountant.
Choosing payment terms
For orders already paid through your checkout, write "Paid" with the payment date and method, so the invoice doubles as proof of payment. For orders not yet paid, "Due on receipt" suits one-off customers. "Net 15" or "Net 30" gives business buyers 15 or 30 days from the invoice date, which is common for wholesale. For custom work, many sellers ask for a deposit up front and invoice the balance before shipping.
Your data stays in your browser
The generator runs entirely on this page. Your logo file is read locally, the invoice is drawn in your browser, and the PDF is produced by your browser's print function. Nothing is sent to AM Jarvis or anyone else, which matters when invoices contain customer addresses and prices. Your draft is remembered only in this browser, so you can come back to it on the same device, but it is not backed up anywhere else. Save the PDF for your records.
Tip: Name each file with the invoice number and customer, for example INV-1042-Harper-Design.pdf, and store them in one folder per year. It makes tax time much easier.
What Shopify offers on its own
Shopify does not create formal invoices automatically for every order. Here is what you do get:
- Order confirmation emails. Customers receive these automatically. They work as a receipt for many shoppers, but they are not a formatted invoice.
- Printing an order. You can print a basic order summary directly from an order page in the admin, with no app.
- Packing slips. Built in, printable one at a time or in bulk. You edit the template under Settings > Shipping and delivery > Packing slip template. Packing slips list items but not prices by default, so they are not invoices.
- Shopify Order Printer. A free app made by Shopify that prints invoices, packing slips, pick lists and receipts from order data, including bulk printing of up to 50 orders. Templates are edited in HTML, CSS and Liquid. See Shopify's Order Printer help.
- Draft order invoices. From a draft order you can send an invoice email, which gives the customer a link to pay at checkout. It is a payment request, not a PDF document.
If most of your orders come through Shopify checkout and customers regularly ask for invoices, Order Printer is the better fit, because it pulls data from each order automatically. This generator suits the cases Order Printer does not handle well: orders taken outside Shopify, one-off wholesale deals, custom work and quotes, or when you want an invoice without installing an app or editing Liquid.
Common mistakes
- Totals that do not match the payment. If the customer paid $87.40, the invoice must show $87.40 after discounts, tax and shipping.
- Reusing invoice numbers. Keep one numbering sequence and never restart it.
- Missing tax details. A business buyer who cannot see your tax number or the tax amount may not be able to use the invoice.
- Vague line items. "Order items" tells the customer nothing. List each product with its SKU.
Related tasks
Invoices should show the same prices as your store. When you change prices across many products, Bulk Edit Pro updates prices, compare-at prices and sale pricing on Shopify or WooCommerce with a preview and one-click revert. To check what each order earns after fees, use the Shopify fee calculator. Before you start taking custom or wholesale orders, publish clear policies with the refund policy generator and the privacy policy generator.