hydrogen-versioning

name

hydrogen-versioning

description

Versioning reference for Hydrogen and Shopify's GraphQL APIs. Covers CalVer formats, quarterly release schedules, version support policies, and release cadence expectations. Use when discussing hydrogen calver, calver, SFAPI version, API version support, hydrogen release cadence, version support window, unstable API version, storefront API version, or customer account API version. Also activates when planning a Hydrogen major release, answering merchant questions about API version compatibility, or determining which versions are currently supported.

Hydrogen & Shopify API Versioning

Reference for all versioning schemes in the Hydrogen ecosystem. For release process (how to actually ship a release), see hydrogen-release-process. For domain architecture context, see headless-storefronts-context.

Shopify GraphQL API Versioning

Shopify's GraphQL APIs (Storefront API, Customer Account API, Admin API) all use the same calendar versioning scheme.

Format: YYYY-MM

• Uses hyphens, not dots
• No trailing .0 — the version is just YYYY-MM
• Examples: 2025-01, 2025-04, 2025-07, 2025-10

Quarterly Release Schedule

Four versions are released per year, always on the 1st of the release month:

Quarter	Version	Release Date
Q1	YYYY-01	January 1
Q2	YYYY-04	April 1
Q3	YYYY-07	July 1
Q4	YYYY-10	October 1

The unstable Version

An unstable version always exists alongside the CalVer versions. It is the bleeding edge:

• New features land in unstable first, then in a specific CalVer version once verified
• Breaking changes can happen at any time in unstable
• Not for production use — only for previewing upcoming features

Release Candidates

The upcoming CalVer version's release candidate becomes available ~3 months before its official release (it ships on the same day as the current quarter's stable release).

Example timeline for 2026-04:

• January 1, 2026: 2026-01 is officially released. Simultaneously, the 2026-04 release candidate becomes available.
• ~March 18, 2026: Breaking changes to the 2026-04 RC are generally frozen.
• April 1, 2026: 2026-04 is officially released.

Note on the RC freeze: The ~2-week freeze before release is internal policy, not publicly documented. In rare cases, breaking changes to the RC may still be permitted with SLT approval. Do not cite this freeze window as an official guarantee to merchants or external parties.

Developer Changelog

API changes in each new version are posted in the Shopify developer changelog. Check this when planning Hydrogen upgrades to understand what changed.

Hydrogen CalVer Versioning

Hydrogen uses a different CalVer format than Shopify's GraphQL APIs.

Format: YYYY.MAJOR.MINOR

• Uses dots, not hyphens (unlike Storefront API (SF API) versions)
• YYYY = calendar year
• MAJOR = the Storefront API release month (1, 4, 7, 10) — NOT a sequential counter
• MINOR = minor/patch number within that major release

Examples:

• 2025.7.0 = year 2025, aligned with SF API 2025-07, first release of that major
• 2025.7.3 = third patch of the 2025.7.x line
• 2026.1.0 = year 2026, aligned with SF API 2026-01

Historical anomaly: 2025.5.x: Hydrogen versions 2025.5.0 and 2025.5.1 are the first and (so far) only releases outside the standard quarterly pattern. These were released to ship breaking/major changes between SF API version updates. There are no current plans to do this again — in general, breaking/major changes are timed to coincide with SF API version updates. However, an off-cycle major release could be warranted in the future if significant breaking changes need to ship between quarterly API updates.

Tied to Storefront API / Customer Account API (CA API)

• Hydrogen releases a new major version with every SF API/CA API version update, regardless of whether there are breaking changes in the APIs
• Breaking changes in Hydrogen are possible every 3 months with these API updates

Deriving Hydrogen Versions (Formula)

SF API releases quarterly as YYYY-MM. Each SF API release triggers a corresponding Hydrogen major:

SF API YYYY-MM  →  Hydrogen YYYY.M.0

Where M is the month number without zero-padding: 01 → 1, 04 → 4, 07 → 7, 10 → 10.

Version Support Policy

Both Hydrogen packages and Shopify GraphQL APIs follow the same support policy:

• 365-day minimum support window from release date (Shopify-wide standard)
• After 365 days, a version may be sunset — but Shopify must provide at least 365 days of notice before any breaking change or sunset takes effect

Fall-Forward for Expired SF API Versions

When a requested SF API version is >365 days old, requests are not rejected. Instead, they are automatically served by the oldest currently-supported version (which is a newer version than what was requested). This is called "fall-forward."

Example: In May 2026, the valid SF API versions are:

Version	Released	Still Valid?
2025-07	Jul 1, 2025	Yes (oldest valid)
2025-10	Oct 1, 2025	Yes
2026-01	Jan 1, 2026	Yes
2026-04	Apr 1, 2026	Yes (newest)

A request for 2024-10 (expired) would be served by 2025-07 (the oldest valid version). The merchant would silently get newer API behavior, which could include breaking changes.

Currently 4 valid versions exist at any time (not counting unstable). This is a natural consequence of quarterly releases + 365-day support window.

Practical Implications

• If no breaking changes or sunsets affect a merchant's specific API operations, they may not need to take action even after their version expires — but upgrading is still recommended
• When a merchant reports "my storefront broke and I didn't change anything," check whether their requested API version recently fell forward to a newer one that may have breaking changes for their use case

Release Cadence Expectations

Hydrogen aims to support new SF API versions promptly after release.

create-hydrogen Versioning

The package is @shopify/create-hydrogen (scoped) — not the legacy unscoped create-hydrogen which stopped at 4.3.14 in mid-2024. It uses SemVer, not Hydrogen CalVer, so npm create @shopify/hydrogen@2025.7.0 will not work as-is. There is no direct version correspondence — a lookup step is required.

How npm create resolves the package: npm create @shopify/hydrogen@VERSION invokes @shopify/create-hydrogen@VERSION under the hood — npm prepends create- to scoped packages.

Lookup technique — find which @shopify/create-hydrogen SemVer maps to a target Hydrogen CalVer:

gh api repos/Shopify/hydrogen/releases --paginate \
  --jq '.[] | select(.tag_name | test("create-hydrogen|@shopify/hydrogen@TARGET")) | {tag: .tag_name, date: .published_at}'

Replace TARGET with the Hydrogen CalVer (e.g., 2025.7.0). The create-hydrogen release published within seconds of the Hydrogen release is the correct match.

Known version mappings (confirmed from GitHub release timestamps):

Hydrogen CalVer	@shopify/create-hydrogen	Released
2025.7.0	5.0.25	2025-09-30

Scaffold command for a specific version:

npm create @shopify/hydrogen@5.0.25  # scaffolds Hydrogen 2025.7.0 skeleton

Related Skills

• hydrogen-release-process — Release process, back-fixes, changelog.json, release failure recovery
• hydrogen-dev-workflow — Day-to-day development workflow, testing, recipes, CLI tooling