What are Automatic actions?
Automatic actions let you automatically change what’s in a customer’s subscription over time by swapping, adding, or removing products/variants at specific points in the subscription lifecycle.
How the “After # orders” trigger works
Automatic actions are evaluated based on successful billing attempts.
Triggered only after the defined order number is reached: If an action is set to run after 2 orders, the first 2 successful paid orders are created normally, and the action runs after the 2nd order - meaning it impacts order #3.
No early execution: The action will not apply to order #1 or #2 in the example above - only to the next order after the threshold is met.
Retroactivity and existing subscriptions
Automatic actions are not retroactive, but they can still affect existing subscriptions going forward.
Does not backpropagate: Automatic actions do not fire for past orders and do not rewrite what has already happened on an existing subscription (no retroactive changes to previous orders).
Can impact subscriptions that already existed before the setting was adjusted: If a subscription was created from the same selling plan and later meets the required conditions, the automatic action can apply to that subscription’s future orders, even if the subscription itself was created before you changed the setting.
This can happen when:
The subscription reaches the required order number (e.g., the next order is #3 in an “after 2 orders” setup), and
The product/variant IDs match the configured targets/conditions for the action.
In other words: no retroactive changes, but future orders of previously-created subscriptions can still be affected if they were created from the selling plan and match the rules.
Pricing impact
Automatic actions can change the subscription price.
For swaps, the subscription will update to the replacement product’s price at the time of the swap (not necessarily the price when the subscription was first created).
Summary
“After # orders” means it affects the next order: after 2 orders → changes apply starting with order #3.
No backpropagation: no retroactive changes to already-created orders/subscriptions history.
Existing subscriptions may still be impacted going forward if created from the selling plan and they later meet the order number + product/variant match conditions.
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