Change your invoice numbering

Invoice numbers are built from a format you set under Customize > Content > Numbering, with separate formats and counters for invoices and credit notes. The default is INV-%%%% for invoices and CR-%%%% for credit notes, which gives INV-0001, INV-0002 and so on. A number is assigned once, when the document is generated, and never changes afterwards.

Change the format

1. Open Customize and switch to the Content tab.
2. Under Numbering, pick the Invoices or Credit notes tab.
3. Choose a preset, shown as a sample number, or Custom and type a format. The Preview line below shows the next number the format will produce.
4. Click Save. You will see “Preferences saved”.

The format applies to documents generated from now on. Existing documents keep their numbers.

Tokens

A format needs at least one of %, # or {{order_number}}, and may contain letters, digits, spaces and the characters - _ / \ . , : ; ( ). The question-mark icon next to Numbering opens the same list in the app.

Token	What it does
%	Continuous counter that never resets. Repeat it for zero padding: %%% gives 001, 002, 003.
#	Counter that restarts at 1 whenever the date tokens change: YYYY-MM-### gives 2026-09-001, 2026-09-002, then 2026-10-001.
DD, MM, YYYY	Day, month and four-digit year of the day the document is generated, in your store’s timezone.
{{order_number}}	The Shopify order number without the #, for example 1001. INV-{{order_number}} gives INV-1001.

Use one run of % or # per format. Once the counter outgrows the padding, the number simply gets longer.

Reset the counter

The counter behind % is stored, so it keeps counting after you change the format. To start a new sequence, for example at the start of a financial year:

1. Under Numbering, click Reset counter.
2. Enter the New counter value. This is the number the next document will get; the dialog shows the current next number for reference.
3. Click Reset. The change applies immediately, without saving the page.

The # counter cannot be reset by hand. It reads the previous document’s number, so it restarts on its own when the date part changes.

Good to know

• Invoices and credit notes never share a counter, and a supplementary invoice takes the next invoice number.
• A deleted document leaves a gap; its number is not reused. See Delete a document.
• A format built only on {{order_number}} gives one number per order. A second invoice for the same order gets a -2 suffix.
• Editing a document, including its date, does not change its number.

Caution

Invoice numbers are a legal sequence in most EU countries. Change the format or reset the counter at a clean break such as a new year, and pick a new format that cannot collide with numbers already issued. The app does not warn you when a reset would repeat an existing number.

See also

• Change the document date
• Delete a document
• Set up Invoice Inn