Where to Build Tools as Address APIs Move from Lists to One Selection

The era of retrieving a full address list is ending

An API is the connection channel through which services exchange information. Kakao (카카오) has changed the API that lets external services retrieve delivery addresses from a Kakao Account.

The new approach became available on October 1, 2026. A service can retrieve only the default delivery address or one address selected by the user. When a user needs to choose among several saved addresses, the service must use Kakao’s delivery-address selection window.

Under the previous approach, a service could receive the full list of delivery addresses saved in a Kakao Account. Kakao said it is ending that approach to strengthen personal-data protection and provide only the information a service needs.

Support for the previous approach ends on April 6, 2027. From that day, address requests through the old API will fail. The migration period, from the availability of the new approach to the end date, is 187 days.

This is not just a change from receiving many addresses to receiving one. Teams also need to check address-selection screens built around lists, conditions that verify consent, guidance for users with no saved address, and fallbacks to manual entry when errors occur.

What changes in a flower-gift order flow

Consider a subscription flower-delivery business with six employees. It accepts Kakao Login (카카오 로그인) on its own store, and lets customers choose whether flowers should go to their home, workplace, or parents’ home.

With the old approach, when a customer selects “Load Kakao delivery addresses,” the business can retrieve the address list and display it in its own screen. Once the customer chooses one, the recipient name, phone number, and address enter the order form, then pass to the admin screen and courier-registration screen.

An operator may watch only whether orders are arriving normally and miss the fact that this connection method is about to end. Without a migration, address retrieval will fail from April 6, 2027. Customers may stop midway through an order or need to enter the address again from scratch.

The new approach changes the flow. The business uses the default delivery address directly, or the customer chooses one address in Kakao’s delivery-address selection window, after which the business receives only that one address and fills the order form.

Detailed information may not be returned if the user has not consented to provide delivery-address information or has no saved address. When consent is missing, the service can request additional consent or offer its own entry screen. It also needs to decide in advance whether a failed retrieval should show “Try again,” “Enter manually,” or “Cancel order.”

One thing does not change: Kakao delivery addresses provide saved delivery-address information.

That creates a short, clear window of demand from October 1, 2026 to April 6, 2027. The first needs are to identify use of the old approach, add the new selection window, and monitor failed orders. Demand for migration audits may decline after the end date, so it is better to also prepare capabilities that remain useful afterward: checking address errors and minimizing the storage of personal information.

Elsewhere, address selection and validation are sold separately

Fluid Checkout sells address autocomplete for WooCommerce, an e-commerce site-building tool. After Google moved the previous Places API to legacy status on March 1, 2025, it released a version for the new approach and told new installers to use the new connection method from the start.

It is a small product starting at about KRW 44,000 per site per year. No public figures show improved conversion or fewer delivery failures, but it is a relevant example of selling a migration path that helps existing stores avoid a feature outage when platform rules change.

US fragrance retailer FragranceNet added Shop Pay to its own ordering system. Customers authenticate in a separate window and select a saved delivery address and payment method; the merchant then receives the information needed for the completed order.

According to Shopify’s own case study, the integration took eight weeks. One month after launch, checkout completion rose by 3.4% and new-customer acquisition increased by 7.5%. Shop Pay charges through Shopify’s payment-processing system rather than as a separate flat-fee product, and these performance figures are supplier-reported and need independent verification.

Australian frozen home-meal seller The Dinner Ladies added Addressfinder address autocomplete to its order screen. The service lets customers correct apartment and unit numbers that could easily be omitted in the previous address-entry process before placing an order.

Addressfinder starts at about KRW 18,000 per month, including 200 validated addresses. In its own case study, the supplier said calls to correct addresses fell from about 25 per week by more than 90%. This shows that address retrieval and validation for actual delivery can be sold as separate functions.

Four things to build from this

1. Kakao delivery-address migration report

• What it does: Runs through an order-address retrieval flow once, checks for use of the old approach, an in-house delivery-address list screen, consent refusal, and error handling, then creates a document to send to the development team.
• Who uses it: Operators of stores with fewer than ten employees that sell flowers, cakes, or return gifts through Kakao Login.
• Why now: If they do not find the old connection before April 6, 2027, address retrieval will fail immediately.
• First screen: A screen for entering the store URL and the order screen to test, with fields for “Load delivery address,” “Choose among several addresses,” and “Manual entry available.”

2. A one-address selection delivery screen

• What it does: Combines Kakao’s delivery-address selection window, retrieval of one default delivery address, and manual entry into one order flow.
• Who uses it: Local businesses with many meal-subscription customers who alternate between their own home and their parents’ home.
• Why now: They can no longer maintain a process that retrieves and displays the full address list in their own screen.
• First screen: A mobile-like screen with three choices: “Use default delivery address,” “Choose another Kakao delivery address,” and “Enter manually.”

3. Delivery-address connection status monitor

• What it does: Separates and alerts operators about successful address retrieval, additional consent required, no saved address, switch to manual entry, and connection failure.
• Who uses it: Operators of Korean beef and fruit-gift stores, where orders spike around holiday periods and recipients’ addresses often change.
• Why now: While the new and old approaches operate together, problems can remain hidden and then surface all at once on the end date.
• First screen: A screen that divides today’s delivery-address outcomes into five statuses and includes a button to retest the screen for a failed order.

4. Delivery-address minimum-retention cleanup tool

• What it does: Finds which screens and files retain recipient names, phone numbers, and addresses, then creates a list of stored items to delete because they are not needed for order processing.
• Who uses it: Production agencies that manage order and admin screens for several small online stores.
• Why now: If a business continues storing historical full delivery-address lists after moving to a one-address structure, its operations remain out of step with the purpose of the new policy.
• First screen: A side-by-side view for each store: “Information received from Kakao,” “Information stored internally,” and “Information with no defined deletion date.”

Why this matters where you are

Check whether address, identity, or payment connections used by the products you operate are moving from broad data access toward a user-selected record. The providers, rules, and migration dates may differ in your market, but the examples here show separate room for migration guidance, selection flows, and delivery-address validation. A useful first action is to map where saved addresses enter an order and where they remain afterward.

One question to ask your developer today

Within 30 minutes, call the developer who manages the current store and ask: “Do we use the old method that retrieves the full Kakao delivery-address list, or the new method that retrieves one default or selected address?” If the store uses the old method, or the person responsible cannot answer immediately and has no migration-test date, that is a signal worth testing a migration-audit or monitoring tool first.