Why ecommerce is harder than it looks

Ecommerce is the category where AI-generated web apps die fastest. Payments, inventory, receipts, refunds, App Store rules — none of them forgive shortcuts.

If you are shipping a native ecommerce app, the boring parts matter more than the landing page. I learned this writing off a full week on my first attempt because I skipped Apple in-app purchase rules.

What you actually need to build

• Product list and detail: FlatList with images, product screen with size or color variants, basic filtering.
• Cart and checkout: Local cart state, Stripe checkout for physical goods, Apple IAP for digital unlocks.
• Order confirmation: Push, email, and an order history screen. Skip any of these and your refund volume goes up.
• Account screen: Orders, addresses, sign out. No loyalty points in v1.
• Push for shipping updates: This is the retention loop.

Apple specifically requires IAP for digital goods. Physical goods go through Stripe or the card network of your choice. Mix them up and your app gets rejected.

The stack I use

• React Native + Expo.
• Stripe for physical goods checkout. The official React Native SDK, not a WebView fallback.
• Supabase for orders, addresses, and product catalog.
• NestJS for the transaction layer so stock updates stay consistent.
• Push via Expo Notifications.
• Claude Code + 11 AI agents — scaffolds product list, product detail, cart, and checkout screens.

Real build time

My first ecommerce attempt was ~8 weekends because I kept failing Apple review. With the boilerplate in Shippen you should be able to do 3 weekends for the first app in this category.

• Product list + detail: ~10 hours.
• Cart + checkout + Stripe: ~12 hours.
• Orders, addresses, account: ~8 hours.
• Push + order confirmation loop: ~5 hours.
• App Store submission + IAP compliance fix if needed: ~6 hours.

About 41 hours.

Where people get stuck

• Physical vs digital: Digital goods must go through Apple IAP. Physical goods can use Stripe. Confusing the two is the most common rejection in this category.
• Stock races: Two users buy the last item at once. Do the stock decrement inside a Postgres function, not from the client.
• Tax: Enable automatic_tax on Stripe. Do not compute tax yourself unless you are in a category Stripe does not cover.

Skip the setup

Shippen ships with a Stripe checkout template, a Supabase order schema with stock locking, and scaffolds for the screens you need. The AI agents handle the rest from a prompt.

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