Lift Checkout Conversion by Up to 25% with the Carriyo Checkout Options API
On Wednesday we made the industry case: the delivery section of checkout is one of the highest-leverage revenue surfaces in eCommerce — where 40% of reasoned cart abandonment traces to extra costs and 20% to slow delivery [1], where free-shipping thresholds move average order value by 15–20% [2], and where a credible delivery promise alone has lifted conversion by up to 25% [3]. And we named the reason most merchants never pull that lever: the tooling is rigid. One flat table of shipping options, configured once, identical for every customer, basket, and market.
Today, the tooling stops being the excuse. Meet the Carriyo Checkout Options API.
What It Does
The Checkout Options API lets merchants customize and test different delivery options on checkout. Merchants set rules that dynamically price delivery and provide a customized promise for every customer and checkout basket — so the options a shopper sees are computed for their order, not copied from a settings page.
In practice, that means the delivery section of your checkout becomes a decision made in real time. Your storefront sends Carriyo the context of the checkout — the merchant, the basket's line items, the order value and currency, the customer's location, and the fulfillment locations that could serve the order — and the API returns the delivery options that apply: each with its price and its delivery promise, ready to render [4].
Rules That Price Every Basket on Its Merits
At the heart of the API is a rules engine. Merchants define delivery options and the conditions under which each one appears, and every checkout is evaluated against those rules. Conditions can consider the destination's country, state, city, or area; the order's value; the basket's weight; the payment type, such as cash-on-delivery versus prepaid; product categories to include or exclude; and working days and blackout dates, evaluated timezone-aware [4].
Pricing is equally dynamic. A delivery option can carry a merchant-set fee — which the rules can vary by those same conditions — or pass through a live carrier-quoted rate, so the shopper sees a price grounded in what the shipment actually costs [4].
The compound effect is delivery pricing that behaves like the rest of your commercial strategy. Free express shipping above a threshold in your home market. A modest fee on heavy baskets headed to remote areas. Cash-on-delivery offered only where your operation supports it well. Each rule is one decision — the API applies them all, on every checkout, consistently.
A Promise Computed, Not Guessed
Every option returned carries a delivery promise — an estimated arrival window computed for that specific order, taking into account the fulfillment location that would serve it, working days, and cut-offs [4]. That matters because the promise, not raw speed, is what the data rewards: 92% of consumers consider delivery windows when deciding whether to buy [5], and Shopify's Shop Promise program demonstrated up to 25% conversion lift from showing reliable predicted dates [3].
And because delivery isn't only home delivery, the API speaks pickup natively: alongside courier delivery, it can return collection options with the eligible pickup locations for that customer, including distances — the option that carried 17.5% of US eCommerce during the 2024 holiday season [6]. Options can even be filtered against real-time stock, so a promise is only shown when the inventory to keep it exists, and per-product delivery options can be surfaced as early as the product page [4].
Built to Be Tested
Wednesday's argument was that delivery options deserve the same experimental discipline as every other revenue surface. The Checkout Options API is designed for exactly that: because options, rules, prices, and promises are configuration rather than code, merchants can trial different configurations — a different free-shipping threshold, a new express tier, a repriced same-day option in one city — and measure what each does to conversion and basket size. The API evaluates whatever rules you give it; changing the experiment doesn't mean re-platforming the checkout.
Three Ways to Operate It
Like every Carriyo capability, checkout options work in three modes:
- Traditionally — teams configure delivery options, rules, prices, and promises hands-on in the Carriyo dashboard.
- Automated — the rules engine is the automation: once rules are set, every checkout is priced and promised dynamically, with no human in the loop.
- By AI agents — through Carriyo's native MCP layer [7], agents can operate checkout options the way a growth team would: reviewing configurations, proposing and applying rule changes, and tuning thresholds and tiers against performance.
The same capability, three operating models — use the one that fits each decision, and change your mind later.
From Checkout to Doorstep, Literally
Carriyo's tagline is "from checkout to doorstep." With the Checkout Options API, the platform now spans that promise word for word: the delivery options and promise at checkout, distributed order management and fulfillment behind them, shipping automation across 100+ carrier integrations, returns, and the post-purchase experience — one platform that has processed 20M+ shipments and over $5B in GMV for 100+ brands shipping to 200 countries.
That end-to-end span is what makes checkout options more than a widget. The promise shown at checkout is computed from the same system that will allocate the order, book the carrier, and track the parcel — which is the only way a promise stays honest. The revenue lever most merchants leave static is now dynamic, testable, and connected to the operation that has to keep its word.
The Checkout Options API is available now. Documentation is at carriyo.com/docs — or talk to us about what your delivery section could be doing for your revenue.
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Sources
1. Baymard Institute. "50 Cart Abandonment Rate Statistics" (among US online shoppers who abandoned checkout for a reason other than "just browsing": 40% cited extra costs too high — shipping, tax, fees; 20% cited delivery was too slow). https://baymard.com/lists/cart-abandonment-rate 2. Capital One Shopping Research. "Free Shipping Statistics" (free shipping increases average order value by 15–20%). https://capitaloneshopping.com/research/free-shipping-statistics/ 3. Shopify. "Shop Promise" (merchants using Shop Promise, which displays reliable Shopify-predicted delivery dates on product pages and checkout, have seen up to a 25% increase in conversion). https://www.shopify.com/shop-promise 4. Carriyo. Storefront API documentation — delivery options at checkout: condition-based rules (geography, order value, weight, payment type, product categories, working days and blackout dates), fixed or carrier-quoted pass-through pricing, estimated arrival windows, collection options with eligible pickup locations, inventory-aware filtering, and per-product delivery options. https://carriyo.com/docs/api/shipping/checkout/ 5. Capital One Shopping Research. "eCommerce Delivery Statistics" (92% of consumers consider delivery windows when choosing to buy). https://capitaloneshopping.com/research/ecommerce-delivery-statistics/ 6. Capital One Shopping Research. "Buy Online Pick Up In Store Statistics" (click-and-collect was 17.5% of US eCommerce during the 2024 holiday season, versus 9.93% across the full year). https://capitaloneshopping.com/research/buy-online-pick-up-in-store-statistics/ 7. Carriyo. "How Carriyo's MCP Server Turns AI Agents Into Shipping Operators" (May 2026). https://carriyo.com/blog/carriyos-mcp-server-turns-ai-2026-05-23/