Ship one order to many recipients
Split one order into shipments for several recipients from a table you type, paste or upload, with their own address, email and gift message.
Available on the Operations plan and higher. Compare plans
Updated October 5, 2026
Some orders go to many people: corporate gifts, a team order, a wedding favor list. Ship to multiple recipients turns one order into a shipment set per recipient, each packed by your box rules and addressed to that person. Whatever no recipient gets ships to the order’s own address.
Before you start
- The products must have boxes set up. Items with no box, and items shipped by a dropship location or a 3PL, aren’t offered in the table. See Set up products.
- The order must not be cancelled.
- Have the recipients’ addresses ready: in a spreadsheet you can paste from, or in a CSV file.
Open the table
- Open the order from the Orders page.
- At the top of the page, click Ship to multiple recipients.
A table opens with one row per recipient and one column per product the order can still give out. Each product column shows its title, SKU and how many are available. Units already fulfilled or in a labeled shipment aren’t available.
Fill in the recipients
You can fill the table three ways, and mix them:
- Type in the cells. Tab moves right, Enter moves down and adds a row at the bottom.
- Paste rows copied from a spreadsheet into any cell. The block fills the table from that cell. If the first pasted row is a header, Parcello matches its columns by name.
- Upload a CSV with Upload CSV. Files with a header row work, in CSV, TSV or plain text.
To start from a file with the right columns, click Download template. It has every column for this order and one example row.
To give every recipient the same quantity of a product, click Fill under the product’s column and enter the quantity. It applies to every row with a name.
Under each product column, a totals line shows how many units are allocated and how many go to the buyer, for example “8 of 10 allocated” and “2 to the buyer”.
Columns
| Column | Required | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Name | Yes | The recipient’s full name. A file can use “First name” and “Last name” columns instead. |
| Company | No | |
| Address 1 | Yes | Street address |
| Address 2 | No | Apartment, suite |
| City | Yes | |
| State | US and Canada | Two-letter code, such as NE or ON |
| ZIP | Yes | Leading zeros dropped by Excel are put back for US ZIP codes |
| Country | No | Two-letter code, such as US or CA. Blank means the order’s country. Some names also work spelled out, such as United States, Canada, Mexico and United Kingdom. |
| Phone | No | |
| No | Must be a valid email if filled in. Used for the recipient’s carrier emails. | |
| One column per product | At least one per row | Whole numbers. The template names them “SKU (title)”, or the title for a product without a SKU. |
| Message | No | Up to 500 characters. Printed on the recipient’s packing slip. |
Files can name columns differently. Common names such as “Full name”, “Street”, “Zip code”, “Postal code”, “Province” and “Gift message” are recognized, and columns Parcello doesn’t recognize are ignored with a note.
A file can also list one item per row with “SKU” and “Quantity” columns. Rows for the same recipient (same name, street and ZIP) are combined into one row.
Up to 500 rows at a time.
Check and create
- Click Check rows. Problems are listed above the summary, each linked to its cell, for example “Row 3 · City: City is missing.” Fix them.
- Read the summary: the number of recipients, how many items ship to the order’s address, and one line per recipient with their city and items.
- Click Create shipments for N recipients. The button is available only when every row is valid.
You should see a message such as “12 shipments created for 12 recipients”, and the order page reloads with the new shipments.
What gets created
- Each recipient gets their own shipment, packed by your box rules and addressed to them. A recipient whose items come from two locations or two carriers gets one shipment per location and carrier, as any order would. Each shipment’s header shows “Recipient” and the recipient’s name.
- Items no recipient gets ship to the order’s own address, on a shipment marked “Buyer · Items no recipient gets”.
- The carrier and service are picked the same way as for a new order (product settings, what the customer paid for, your store default), and your automatic order presets apply.
- A recipient’s Email becomes the shipment’s customer email for carrier shipping emails. See Carrier shipping emails.
- A recipient’s packing slips leave off the buyer’s billing address and print the recipient’s Message. See Packing slips.
From here, each shipment works like any other: get rates, create labels, print, fulfill. A batch is a quick way to buy many labels at once.
What happens to existing shipments
- Labeled shipments stay as they are. Their units aren’t offered in the table.
- The order’s other shipments are replaced by the new ones. The table says which applies before you create.
- A voided shipment stays on the order with its history, but its boxes are removed and their units are given out again.
You can open Ship to multiple recipients again to redo the split. Shipments without labels are replaced again.
Notes and limits
- A recipient’s shipment keeps its own address. A change to the order’s address in Shopify doesn’t move it. See When an order changes in Shopify.
- Recipients in another country need the customs form on their shipment like any international shipment. See International shipments and the customs form.
Troubleshooting
“Nothing on this order is left to give out.” Every unit is already fulfilled, in a labeled shipment, or not packable (no box, dropship or 3PL).
“Only 2 of Gift Box left to give out (10 on the order).” The quantities in that column add up to more than the order has. Lower them.
“Give this recipient at least one item.” The row has an address but no quantities.
“Unknown country ”…”. Use a two-letter code such as US or CA.” Replace the country with its two-letter code.
“The header needs a “Name” column (or “First name” and “Last name”).” or “The header needs an “Address 1” column.” Your file’s first row must name its columns. Start from Download template.
“An item in the table isn’t on this order anymore. Check again.” The order changed while the table was open. Close it and open it again.
Some products aren’t in the table. The line under the table lists them: “Not offered (no box set up, or shipped by a dropship location): …”. Set up a box for them, or ship them separately.