How to Use the Koala Inspector?

Koala Inspector is a free Chrome extension that shows competitor data for any Shopify store while you browse it. To use it:

1. Install Koala Inspector from the Chrome Web Store and click Add to Chrome.
2. Pin it to your toolbar: click the puzzle-piece icon in Chrome, then the pin next to Koala Inspector.
3. Open any Shopify store you want to research and click the Koala Inspector icon.
4. Read the panel that loads. It shows the store overview, estimated traffic, running ads, installed apps, the Shopify theme, the full product list, and tracked store changes.

The rest of this guide explains every feature in detail and gives practical ways to use the data.

Researching a Shopify competitor used to mean checking their source code for theme clues, guessing at their ad budget, and manually scrolling through hundreds of product listings. Koala Inspector replaces that guesswork with a Chrome extension that pulls traffic data, installed apps, running ad campaigns, product lists, and store changes onto a single panel while you browse.

How to Install Koala Inspector

Koala Inspector runs as a Chrome browser extension. There is no separate app to download.

Step 1: Add it from the Chrome Web Store

Open the Chrome Web Store and find the Koala Inspector page, then click Add to Chrome.

Step 2: Pin it to your toolbar

Click the puzzle-piece icon next to your Chrome profile avatar to open the extensions menu. Find Koala Inspector in the list, then click the pin icon so it turns blue. The Koala icon will now sit permanently in your toolbar for one-click access.

Step 3: Open a competitor store and click the icon

Go to any Shopify store you want to research, then click the Koala Inspector icon. The extension loads a panel with everything it has found about that store.

What Koala Inspector Shows You

Once installed, the extension surfaces data across several tabs. Here is what each one does.

1. Store Overview

Store Overview gives you the store's Shopify theme, target country and language, launch date, and product count in one summary.

The first thing you see after clicking the icon is a summary of the store: the Shopify theme it uses, the country and language it targets, when the store launched (based on the date of the first published product), and a rough product count.

That launch date detail is more useful than it sounds. If a store in your niche launched 18 months ago and is now pulling significant traffic, you can see what they added and when, rather than wondering how long it took them to get traction.

2. Website Traffic: See How Much Traffic a Competitor Gets

The Website Traffic tab estimates a Shopify store's monthly visitors, traffic sources, top keywords, and visitor countries.

Traffic data is one of the hardest things to find about a competitor, since Shopify stores do not publish it. Koala Inspector pulls estimated traffic figures and presents them in a chart so you can see monthly trends rather than just a snapshot.

The traffic panel shows:

• Monthly visitor estimates over time, so you can spot seasonal patterns
• Average monthly traffic for the last three months
• The month-over-month change (whether traffic is growing or declining)
• Bounce rate, average visit duration, and pages per visit

The traffic sources breakdown tells you whether visitors are arriving from search, direct, referrals, social, paid ads, or email. If a competitor gets 60% of their traffic from organic search and yours comes mostly from paid, that tells you where to invest.

You can also see the top keywords driving traffic to the store. These tend to be branded terms, but occasionally you will spot a generic product keyword that a competitor ranks for that you are missing.

The geo breakdown shows which countries the store's visitors come from. If a competitor you thought was local turns out to get 40% of their traffic from the US, they are in a different game than you thought.

3. Ad Campaigns: See Which Ads a Competitor Is Running

The Ad Campaigns tab shows a store's active Google, Facebook, and Instagram ads, including the creative, the promoted products, and the attached keywords.

The Ad Campaigns tab shows active ads across Google, Facebook, and Instagram in one view. You can see the ad copy and creative, which products they are promoting, and the keywords attached to each campaign.

Finding ads manually is slow. You would have to check the Facebook Ad Library, search Google manually, and scroll Instagram, all for a single competitor. Koala Inspector aggregates that into one screen.

The keyword data alongside each ad is particularly useful if you are planning your own campaigns and want to know which terms are already working in your niche rather than guessing.

4. Shopify Apps and Theme: See What a Store Is Built On

This tab names the Shopify theme a store runs and lists every app it has installed.

This tab shows the Shopify theme a store is using and all the apps they have installed. For many stores, the app stack alone reveals a lot: which review app they use, whether they have a loyalty program, their email tool, their upsell setup.

If you are building a new store and want to match a competitor's functionality without testing every app yourself, checking their installed apps is a shortcut. If multiple stores in your niche all use the same review app or page builder, that is a data point worth acting on.

There are other ways to find what Shopify theme a competitor uses, but doing it from the extension while you browse is faster than switching to a separate tool.

5. Products: See What a Competitor Sells

The Products tab lists everything a store sells and lets you sort by best selling or newest, view price ranges, and export the list to CSV.

The Products tab lists everything for sale on the store. You can sort by Best Selling or New Products, see price ranges, and compare how many items they carry against other stores you have checked.

Sorting by Best Selling shows which products a store is leading with. Sorting by New Products shows what they have added recently, which is useful if you track a competitor regularly and want to know when they expand into a new category.

If you want to dig further into the data outside the extension, you can export the full product list to CSV. That makes it straightforward to compare pricing across several competitors in a spreadsheet, or to load products into your own store as a starting point.

6. Find Retailers

If you see a product on a competitor's store and want to know where to source something similar, the Find Retailers button searches across AliExpress, Amazon, Walmart, eBay, Etsy, Target, and other marketplaces. The same button is also available inside the Live Trends tab.

7. Export CSV

You can export product lists to CSV from the All Products, Best Selling, New Products, and Favorite Products tabs. Select the view you want, click Export CSV, and get a file you can open in Excel or import directly into your own Shopify store.

8. My Favorites: Save Products Across Stores

The Favorites tab collects products you have saved from any store. Hit the heart icon on any product to add it. When you have gathered candidates from several stores, you can export them all together as a CSV.

9. Live Trends: Track Sales as They Happen

Live Trends shows real-time sales activity across Shopify stores, including which products were added recently and how current bestsellers compare to last month.

If you are looking for product ideas before a season or trying to catch a trend early, checking Live Trends across a few stores in your niche takes less time than running a separate product research session.

10. Tracked Shops: Monitor Competitor Changes Over Time

Tracked Shops logs the changes a store makes over time: apps, products, prices, variants, and product names, with email alerts when something changes.

The Tracked Shops tab (available on the Premium plan, up to 50 stores) records changes to stores you follow. It logs:

• Apps added or removed
• Products added or removed
• Price increases or reductions
• Variant additions or removals
• Product name changes

To start tracking a store, go to the Structure tab while on that store, then click the green Track Shop button in the top right corner.

After you click Track Shop, Koala Inspector redirects you to Shop Changes. Click the bell icon to set up email notifications so you hear about changes automatically rather than checking manually.

Every logged change is clickable. You can go straight to the product page or app that changed without hunting for it in the store. To stop tracking a store, disable Track Changes and the email option, then confirm.

11. App Discounts

The App Discounts tab lists current deals on Shopify apps, including tools for ads, push notifications, and other store functions. This is useful if you have identified an app from a competitor's stack and want to try it without paying full price.

12. Subscription Plan

Click the letter icon in the upper right corner of the extension (or the three vertical lines) to open your subscription details.

This screen shows your current plan, the email address you are logged in with, and your remaining credits for Export CSV, Find Retailers, Ad Campaigns, Website Traffic, and Live Trends. You can also upgrade from here if you want to expand your tracked stores or increase your monthly data credits.

13. Affiliate Program

If you write about e-commerce or have an audience of Shopify sellers, Koala Inspector has an affiliate program that pays a 35% lifetime recurring commission. That means you earn on every renewal for the life of a customer you refer, not just the first payment.

Koala Inspector FAQ

What does a Koala Inspector do?

Koala Inspector is a Chrome extension that shows competitor research data for any Shopify store while you browse it. From one panel it reveals the store's Shopify theme, installed apps, estimated traffic, running Google and Facebook ads, full product list, and the changes the store makes over time.

Is Koala Inspector free?

Yes. It is free to install and use for core features like the store overview, theme, apps, and product list. A Premium plan adds higher data credits and tracking for up to 50 stores.

How do I install Koala Inspector?

Open the Koala Inspector page on the Chrome Web Store, click Add to Chrome, then pin it to your toolbar from the puzzle-piece extensions menu. There is no separate app to download.

Does Koala Inspector show competitor traffic?

Yes. The Website Traffic tab shows estimated monthly visitors over time, the three-month average, the month-over-month change, traffic sources, top keywords, and the countries visitors come from.

Does Koala Inspector work on any website?

Koala Inspector is built for Shopify stores. It loads its full breakdown when you open a store running on Shopify and click the extension icon.

Getting Started

The extension is free to install. Once you have it pinned to Chrome, the fastest way to get value from it is to open three or four stores in your niche and compare their traffic breakdowns and product lists side by side. The differences between what is working for them and what you are currently doing will point you toward the most useful changes to make to your own store.

For a deeper look at how to research what your competitors are doing on Shopify, see our full guide.