Every 10,000 km between your server and your user adds ~100ms of baseline latency. A Shopify app in US-East serving Singapore adds 300-400ms before your code runs. Here are the five architectural decisions that determine whether your Shopify system serves the world or just one AWS region. Pick the Right Topology First Don't start with active-active. Most teams underestimate the operational complexity. Topology RTO RPO When to Use Active-Passive 2–10 min < 30s Default: resilience without write conflicts Active-Active (2) < 1 min Near-zero US + EU merchant split, compliance-driven Active-Active (3+) Seconds Near-zero Shopify Plus global stores Edge-Only (Oxygen) Built-in N/A Hydrogen storefronts Start active-passive. Upgrade when traffic or compliance forces your hand. GeoDNS with Health Check Failover Route 53 latency-based routing is the cleanest solution for AWS-hosted Shopify apps. evaluate_target_health = true is the critical setting — without it, DNS failover doesn't trigger on regional failure.…