Cart permalinks let you redirect shoppers straight into Zest checkout with a pre-specified cart. This guide covers what cart permalinks do, how to add a cart redirect button to your ecommerce site, and a few limitations to keep in mind.
Before you start, make sure:
You have at least one published storefront in Zest.
The products you want shoppers to be able to send through Zest are listed on that storefront.
Your development team is available to add the cart button to your ecommerce site (Zest provides the URL format and guidance — your team handles the implementation).
What Are Cart Permalinks?
A cart permalink is a specially formatted URL that sends your customer to Zest storefront checkout with multiple products already loaded in the cart. When a shopper clicks one:
A new Zest cart is built with the products specified in the URL.
The shopper lands directly on the Zest checkout page with that cart, ready to enter recipients and complete their order.
Cart permalinks are the multi-product cousin of product permalinks. Use a product permalink when you want to highlight a single item and allow the customer to continue shopping (for example, from a product detail page); use a cart permalink when you want to hand off an entire cart full of items and send the customer to checkout.
Setting up a Cart Permalink
URL format
A few things to know:
List each variant ID in the
cart=parameter, separated by commas.The
storefront=parameter is optional. If you leave it off, the link opens yourmainstorefront by default.
Zest accepts:
Shopify numeric variant IDs (e.g.,
47382937492).Shopify GIDs (e.g.,
gid://shopify/ProductVariant/47382937492).Variant IDs from other ecommerce platforms (BigCommerce, Magento, and others).
Zest internal variant IDs.
Adding a Cart Redirect Button to Your Ecommerce Site
The most common way to use a cart permalink is to add a button to your ecommerce cart — something like "Send to multiple recipients" or "Send as a gift" — that takes the shopper to Zest with their existing cart contents already loaded.
Because the shopper's cart contents change with every visit, this button should be built dynamically by your development team using the variant IDs from your ecommerce platform's cart. Your developer doesn't need to know anything about Zest's internal IDs — they can pass the same variant IDs they already use on your own site.
Shopify example using Liquid
If you're on Shopify, your developer can generate the full cart permalink dynamically with one line of Liquid:
https://{YOUR_ZEST_PORTAL}/permalink?cart={{ cart.items | map: 'variant_id' | join: ',' }}&storefront={YOUR_STOREFRONT_SLUG}
This pulls every variant ID currently in the shopper's Shopify cart, joins them with commas, and drops them into the cart permalink. Your developer can wire this into a button on your cart page or cart drawer.
Your development team handles this update. Share your Zest portal URL and storefront slug with them and they can add the button to your cart page or cart drawer.
Building a permalink manually for a one-off campaign
If you want to create a single cart permalink to share in an email, an SMS, or behind a QR code, you can build one by hand:
For each product you want to include, find the variant ID in your ecommerce platform's admin (in Shopify, this is the numeric ID at the end of the variant's admin URL).
Combine the variant IDs with commas in the
cart=parameter, following the URL format above.Test the link to confirm the cart loads as expected before sharing it.
Where to Use Cart Permalinks
Beyond the primary cart redirect use case, cart permalinks work anywhere a regular link does:
Curated gift bundles in email or SMS. Promote a "Mother's Day Bundle" or "Client Appreciation Kit" and link straight to a pre-built cart.
QR codes on packaging or print. Print a QR code on a card or flyer that opens a pre-loaded gift cart on a shopper's phone.
"Shop the set" promotions. Link from a blog post, lookbook, or social campaign to a complete bundle.
Sales follow-ups. After a conversation with a corporate client, send them a link with everything they discussed already in their cart.
Limitations and Known Constraints
You need a variant ID for each product.
Cart permalinks require variant IDs — they can't be built from product IDs alone. For a redirect button on your cart, this isn't a problem because your ecommerce cart already knows the specific variant in each line item. For manually built permalinks, you'll need to pick a specific variant (size, flavor, color) for each product.
Products that require customer input can't be pre-loaded.
If a product on your Zest storefront has a required custom field — like a gift message, engraving, or other personalization — it can't be added to the cart through a cart permalink. The shopper will land on checkout, but that product won't be in the cart.
Important: If you want a cart permalink to include a product that has a required custom field, either make that field optional on the storefront listing, or use a product permalink for that item instead so the shopper is prompted to fill in their details.
Out-of-stock or unavailable products are skipped.
If a variant is sold out, unavailable, or not listed on the storefront you're linking to, it will be silently skipped — the shopper won't see an error. The rest of the cart will load normally.
If no products can be added, the shopper lands on the storefront home.
If every variant in your permalink is invalid or unavailable, the shopper is redirected to the storefront's landing page instead of an empty cart. This means a broken link won't show an error — but it also won't tell the shopper what went wrong. Always test your cart permalinks before sharing them, and make sure the products on your ecommerce site that customers can route through Zest are also listed on your Zest storefront.
Troubleshooting
A product isn't showing up in the cart.
Confirm the product is published and listed on the storefront you linked to.
Confirm the variant is in stock.
Check that the product doesn't have any required custom fields. If it does, it can't be pre-loaded — use a product permalink for that item instead.
Double-check that the variant ID in your URL matches the variant ID in your ecommerce platform.
The link sends shoppers to the storefront home page instead of checkout.
This usually means none of the variants in your URL could be added. Check each variant ID for typos, confirm each product is listed on the storefront you're linking to, and confirm they're all in stock.
The cart button on my site is sending the wrong items.
Ask your developer to verify the cart button is pulling variant IDs from the current cart context rather than a hardcoded or cached list.
If you've recently changed Shopify themes, the button may not have been carried over correctly. Your development team can pull the snippet from your old theme and add it to the new one.