Share a file or product without an order

How share links work

A share link is an address on your store's own domain, such as https://your-store.com/apps/alvadd/share?s=…, that opens a page with the file or the product's items. It can target one file, or one product with its files, the files of its packs and its links. There's no order and no Shopify customer needed, unless you choose a recipient.

Alva Digital Downloads doesn't email share links: you copy the link and send it however you like. Anyone who has a link without a recipient can use it, so treat it like a password. You can copy it again later from the Share links page with Copy link.

How download limits and expiry work

The download limit counts each item separately. With a limit of 5 on a product link, each file, the Download all files archive and each link can be used 5 times. A product link also stops after 50,000 downloads in total. A file link has one item, so its limit covers the whole link, and the Share links page shows it as Used up once it's reached.

Only pressing a button on the share page counts. Opening or reloading the page never uses a download, so email scanners and chat link previews can't use up a link. After the expiry, the page says Link expired.

Limit IP addresses (optional) takes 1 to 100. It's best effort, not a security control: one person who switches from Wi-Fi to mobile data counts twice, and people sharing one office network count once. An address that has already used the link can keep using it. Once the limit is reached, anyone on a new address sees Too many devices.

Links for one customer

A link with a recipient works only for that customer, logged in to your store with that account. Someone who isn't logged in sees Log in to download and is normally brought back to the link after logging in; if not, they open the link again. Someone logged in with a different account sees Shared with a different account and a Log out button, and nothing about who the link is for. If your store hides its login links, the form warns you that the recipient may not find a way to log in.

To share with someone who isn't a customer yet, click New customer under Recipient (optional) and enter their email address and, if you like, their name. The first time, Alva asks for permission to manage your customers: click Give permission, confirm in Shopify, and you're brought back. The customer isn't subscribed to marketing, and Alva doesn't email them: send them the link yourself.

What the person you share with sees

The share page uses your download page's logo and colours, set in Customise the download page. It shows Shared by your store name, the file or product title, the date the link is available until, and each item with how many uses it has left. The page appears in the visitor's browser language.

• Files have a Download button. When a product delivers a ZIP and the ZIP holds exactly the files the link shares, the page offers one Download all files row instead.
• Stream-only files play in the browser and are never offered as a download: video and audio have a Play button and PDFs a Read button. A file that any of your products sets to Stream only plays this way. Each press of Play or Read uses one of that file's downloads; replaying inside the open player doesn't.
• Links from the product have an Open button that opens your link's address.

What a product link leaves out

A product link reads the product again every time the page opens, so it follows later changes: new files and links appear, removed ones disappear. Some things are never shared:

• License keys. Keys are assigned to orders, so a share link never includes or shows one.
• PDFs a product protects. A PDF that one of your products protects with PDF protection is left out, because a share link can only send the original file. A PDF that a product only watermarks is sent as the original, without a watermark, and Alva warns you after you create the link.
• Installers and scripts in links without a recipient, such as .exe, .msi, .dmg, .pkg, .apk, .sh and .ps1 files. Choose a recipient to include them. ZIP files and other archives are allowed.
• Files of an unreleased pre-order. A file that belongs to a product whose pre-order hasn't released yet stays out until the release.
• Links that don't use https, or whose expiry date has passed. A sold link's own visit limit and expiry hours don't apply here; the share link's limit and expiry do.

The share page says how many items it left out, without naming them. A file link to one of these files is refused when you create it. Personalized products can't be shared, and neither can a product with more than 500 files and links.

When a product link pauses

A product link pauses while its product can't be delivered. The share page then says Not available yet, and nothing is counted.

• The product is switched off. While the product's Status is Inactive, the Share links page shows its links as Paused.
• The product is in an unreleased pre-order. Its links start working at the release.
• Your Alva subscription lapses. Alva switches every product off, so product links pause until your subscription is active again and you set each product's Status back to Active. File links keep working.

You can't create a link for a product that is switched off or in an unreleased pre-order.

Revoke, delete or replace

On the Share links page, Revoke ends a link at once and can't be undone. A link can't be edited: to change its expiry or limits, revoke it and create a new one. Check, on an active or paused link, says whether it works right now and how many items it serves.

Revoking stops every new download through the link. A download that has already started, or a player that is already open, keeps working until its download address expires, between 1 and 24 hours later depending on the file's size. A link item gives the person your link's own address, which Alva can't take back.

Deleting a file or a product revokes its share links, and the Share links page shows them as Deleted. Deleting a single file from its page, or a product, warns you how many active share links it revokes. Deleting several files at once, and deleting a product whose Shopify product no longer exists (see Fix or delete a mapping for a deleted product), revoke them without that warning.

Replacing a file keeps its share links: they serve the new version from then on. See Replace a file without breaking customer access.

Public links on a new store: the 72-hour wait

To protect every store's downloads, links without a recipient are available 72 hours after you install Alva Digital Downloads. Until then, the Share links page and the file and product cards show Public share links unlock on that date, in your store's time zone, and the create form asks for a recipient. Links for a specific customer work at once.

Need public links sooner? Click Email admin@alvaapps.com on the banner, or write to admin@alvaapps.com with your store's .myshopify.com address, and we'll review your store. Once your store is approved, links without a recipient work straight away.

Shopify Flow, the activity export and the API

• Shopify Flow. Every counted download, archive download, link opened or play fires Alva's Share link downloaded trigger, with Share link identifier, Link label, Item type (file, archive, link or play), Item name, Product title, Recipient customer identifier, Downloads used and Download limit. A field with no value carries the word none. Under very heavy use, Alva may skip a workflow run rather than use up your store's Shopify API budget; the download itself is never affected. Share links never fire Digital file downloaded or Media streamed.
• Download activity. Export download activity on the Orders page includes share-link downloads, labelled Share link download, Share link: link opened or Share link play, with no customer or order.
• Orders and Shopify Analytics. A share-link download never appears on an order and isn't sent to Shopify Analytics.
• External API. Create, list, read and revoke share links with the /share-links endpoints. See the API endpoint reference.