Alva Digital Downloads vs Digital Assets
Alva Digital Downloads is a Shopify app that delivers files, license keys and private URLs automatically after purchase — with fraud protection, branded email, multi-channel delivery, and unlimited bandwidth on every plan. Digital Assets (published by Kestrel, also marketed as Fileflare) is a Shopify digital-downloads app positioned around unlimited bandwidth, PDF stamping and tiered storage. Here's how they compare feature by feature.
Side by side at a glance.
| Feature | Alva Digital Downloads | Digital Assets |
|---|---|---|
| Starting price | Free · paid from $8.99/mo | Free (1 GB) · paid $19 / $29 / $39 per month |
| Max single file size | Up to 20 GB on paid plans | No stated file size limit |
| AI fraud protection | 40+ signals · Shopify Risk API · 0.4% false positives · on every paid plan | Fraud detection on Growth ($29/mo) and Premium ($39/mo) tiers |
| License keys | Auto-generate, pool import, revoke on refund | Not listed as a primary feature |
| Multi-channel delivery | Email · thank-you · order status · customer account | Email + download page · customer accounts on Premium ($39/mo) |
| Custom email sender domain | Included on every paid plan (Postmark Domain API) | Custom sender email on Premium ($39/mo); email customization from Growth |
| Branded / editable delivery emails | Edit every line · 14 dynamic variables | Email customization from Growth ($29/mo) |
| Shopify POS support | Digital + in-store bundles | Not listed as a primary feature |
| Made-to-order / personalized files | Per-order upload, production workflow | Personalized products listed from Basic ($19/mo) |
| Shopify Flow integration | 14 Flow actions & triggers | Not listed as a primary feature |
| Bandwidth | Unlimited on every plan | Unlimited on every tier |
| PDF stamping / watermarking | PDF stamping supported | PDF stamping & watermarking from Basic ($19/mo) |
| Streaming (video/audio/PDF) | Supported file types; delivery via CDN | Streaming on Premium ($39/mo) |
| IP / download limits | Download limits & link expiry on every plan | Download limits from Basic; IP limitations on Premium |
| Built for Shopify | Yes | Yes |
| Admin languages | 35 languages | English-focused |
Digital Assets' exact feature list and pricing may change. For the latest, see the Digital Assets app listing.
When storage isn't the bottleneck.
Digital Assets sells a clean story: unlimited bandwidth, no file size ceiling, tiered storage. That works for shops whose only problem is "we have big files." It stops being the right tool the moment fraud, license keys, Shopify POS, or a unified customer-account portal enter the picture. Four concrete reasons merchants move to Alva:
Alva scores every paid order against 40+ fraud signals via Shopify's Risk API before the download URL is released — on the $8.99/month Basic plan. Digital Assets' fraud detection appears on Growth ($29/mo) and above, so merchants on lower tiers carry chargeback risk unprotected. A single chargeback on a $40 software licence typically costs more than a year of Alva's Basic plan.
Auto-generate per order or bulk-import an existing pool, assign only after fraud approval, revoke and reissue on refund, receive low-stock alerts. Alva also supports pending assignments when the pool runs dry and a "Pending License Key Assignment" buffer — license key management is not a primary feature of Digital Assets.
Emails can bounce, land in spam, or be deleted. Alva places the download link in four places: the branded email, the thank-you page, the Shopify order status page, and the Shopify customer account portal — so the customer always has at least one live path to their files. Digital Assets covers email and portal but Alva adds the thank-you and order status surfaces natively.
Alva supports Shopify POS for in-store sales of digital goods, 14 Shopify Flow actions and triggers for automation, and a full made-to-order production workflow. Digital Assets is primarily a download-delivery engine — merchants who need POS, Flow or a made-to-order pipeline typically stack additional apps.
Three differentiators, in detail.
Fraud protection on every paid tier, not just the expensive one
Digital Assets' pricing structure treats fraud detection as a premium feature — it appears from the Growth plan ($29/month) and up. That's a defensible choice for a storage-tiered product, but it leaves the merchants most exposed (small shops selling higher-AOV digital goods) paying for storage they don't need to unlock the protection they do.
Alva inverts the pricing logic. Every paid plan — Basic at $8.99/month included — runs every order through Shopify's Risk API with 40+ signals: AVS mismatch, VPN and proxy detection, device fingerprint, chargeback history, email age, CVV. High-risk orders hold pre-delivery, licenses stay unassigned until approval, and the full approve/reject audit trail is captured. Across Alva's merchant base the false-positive rate is 0.4%.
- Fraud signals
- 40+ per order · Shopify Risk API
- Included from
- $8.99/month (Basic tier and up)
- Licence key flow
- Auto-assign only after fraud passes
- Audit trail
- Approve / reject actions logged
The feature surface — POS, license keys, Flow, made-to-order
Digital Assets is built around a file-delivery engine with storage tiers. That covers a big slice of use cases — ebooks, PDFs, audio packs — but stops at the edges of digital fulfilment on Shopify. License keys (auto-generate, import pool, revoke on refund) are not a headline feature. Shopify POS for in-store digital sales is not listed. Shopify Flow actions and triggers are not emphasised. Made-to-order production workflows are mentioned but the depth of the pipeline varies by tier.
Alva covers these edges in a single app. License-key management is built in from the Basic tier up. Shopify POS supports digital + in-store bundles. 14 Shopify Flow actions and triggers let merchants automate resend, grant access, revoke access, approve/reject high-risk orders and more. Made-to-order has a first-class production workflow: collect the brief at checkout, track through admin, upload the final file, Alva delivers automatically.
- License keys
- Auto-generate · bulk import · revoke on refund
- POS
- Digital + in-store bundles
- Flow
- 14 actions and triggers
- Made-to-order
- Brief → production → upload → auto-deliver
Email deliverability and branded sender domain
Every Shopify digital-download app has to solve the same inbox problem: transactional email with a download link needs to land in the primary folder, reliably, at scale. Both Alva and Digital Assets take deliverability seriously. The difference is how the sender identity is handled on the paid tiers.
Alva sends delivery emails via Postmark — a transactional-email provider purpose-built for inbox placement. On paid plans (from $8.99/month), merchants can send from their own domain via Alva's managed Postmark Domain API integration: domain creation, DKIM pending state, verification — the whole lifecycle is automated, so merchants go from "install" to "sending from their own domain" with just the CNAME records Alva prints. Digital Assets lists email customization from its Growth tier ($29/month) and reserves a custom sender email for the Premium tier ($39/month).
- Alva sender
- Postmark-backed · your domain on every paid plan
- DKIM lifecycle
- Automated via Postmark Domain API
- Domain cost
- Included in Basic, Pro and Enterprise plans
- Digital Assets approach
- Email customization from Growth tier
Free tier, flat monthly.
Alva has a free plan (5 products, 1.5 GB) plus three flat-monthly paid tiers at $8.99, $18.99 and $28.99. Every plan includes unlimited orders and unlimited bandwidth. Digital Assets' paid tiers are $19/mo Basic (50 GB), $29/mo Growth (100 GB) and $39/mo Premium (1 TB), with a free 1 GB tier. Alva's equivalent paid plans are meaningfully cheaper and bundle fraud protection and custom email domain on every paid tier — on Digital Assets, fraud detection starts at $29/mo and a custom sender email starts at $39/mo.
| plan | Free $0/mo For trying it out | Basic $8.99/mo | Recommended Pro $18.99/mo | Enterprise $28.99/mo |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Storage | 1.5 GB | 35 GB | 350 GB | 1.5 TB |
| Products | 5 | Unlimited | Unlimited | Unlimited |
| Bandwidth | Unlimited | Unlimited | Unlimited | Unlimited |
| Fraud protection | — | |||
| Made to order · custom email domain | — |
See Digital Assets' full pricing tiers on the Digital Assets listing. Full details on Alva's pricing are at the Alva pricing page. Even the Basic plan typically pays back within the first avoided chargeback.
Moving from Digital Assets to Alva.
- Install Alva Digital Downloads from the Shopify App Store. No credit card for the trial; the 14-day clock only starts after your first live order.
- Export your files from Digital Assets (or re-upload from source). Alva's bulk importer accepts drag-and-drop and CSV. Individual files up to 20 GB on paid plans.
- Map files to Shopify products. Attach files, packs or license-key pools to the same Shopify products or variants they serve today.
- Run a test order, then switch over. Verify delivery lands via email, thank-you page, order status and customer account. Both apps can run side-by-side during the transition.
- Re-send links to older customers (optional). Any customer who bought before the switch can be re-issued a fresh signed Alva download link — no lost customers.
Alva Digital Downloads works across every digital-product niche on Shopify — see how it fits photographers and digital artists. For a deeper look at digital product packaging, read the guide on Shopify digital product bundles and file packs.
Answers before you switch.
Outgrow storage-tiered delivery this afternoon.
Install Alva from the Shopify App Store. Upload a file, attach it to a product, place a test order — watch the first branded delivery fire through all four channels, with fraud protection and license keys included from the Basic tier. Alva can run alongside Digital Assets during the transition. 14-day trial starts only after your first live order.
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