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When you set up your Shopify store or refresh its design, you’ll choose a theme to power its front end. The best Shopify themes are easy to master and provide the features you need to create a customer experience that drives sales.

The great thing about Shopify is that you can build a successful ecommerce business with a free theme. Their limited layouts, fonts, marketing features, and checkout options only matter if you require more control over your store.

Should you have the budget for a paid theme, you can enjoy native countdown timers, cross-selling modules, stock counters, and other conversion-winning features you’d otherwise need to code into your site or add with additional apps.

I’ve put together a comprehensive guide to the best free and paid Shopify themes, plus the best themes by niche, to give your store the best start in life.

Your Shopify theme matters — more than you think

Your Shopify theme affects setup times, built-in features, customer navigation, and site performance — critical factors beyond appearance that directly impact your sales and growth potential. Here’s why your choice matters:

• Setup time: The best Shopify themes require minimal installation steps. Some themes include setup wizards and documentation, while others require significant learning curves despite showcasing polished demos.
• Features: Premium themes include built-in marketing tools like countdown timers, product comparison tables, and upsell modules. These features eliminate the need for additional apps or monthly subscription costs for equivalent functionality.
• Layouts: Shopify themes offer different product display options, collection page layouts, and homepage section varieties. These choices affect how you showcase merchandise to customers throughout their shopping journey.
• Navigation: Menu structures, filtering capabilities, and search implementations vary between themes. These elements impact how easily customers find products across your catalog, regardless of the number of items you sell.
• Speed: Theme code quality affects page loading times as much as any media and content you add. Well-built themes have lightweight code and follow best practices to pass Core Web Vitals in Google PageSpeed Insights.
• SEO: Your theme dictates loading times, navigation, mobile-friendliness, and many other usability features that Google considers crucial to a good page experience. Satisfying these criteria is essential to ranking high in the search results.

How I choose the best Shopify theme for ecommerce

My selection process covers what matters most to store owners rather than what theme developers promote. I read user reviews, noting common praise and complaints about setup difficulties, mobile performance, and support responsiveness.

I also check each theme’s documentation quality, update history, and developer standing in the Shopify community, prioritizing those with responsive developers and high-quality updates with few issues following new releases.

Exploring demo sites reveals each theme’s layout, navigation, and product display options to determine how they’ll work with products similar to what you sell. For instance, the Local theme has a Nutri-score module for food products, as seen in the screen grab below:

Demo sites also show how well each theme displays on all devices — here’s a comparison of the free Dawn theme and the paid Sleek theme:

My criteria across all theme types include:

• Listed on the Shopify Theme Store (to ensure they meet Shopify’s quality requirements)
• High-quality demo stores for testing all layouts
• Built-in marketing tools versus requiring apps
• Shopify 2.0 compatibility
• Design flexibility for multiple layouts and navigation options
• Support quality and typical response times
• Mobile experience on various devices
• Loading times (needs to pass PageSpeed Insights)
• Value comparison against similar themes (if paid)
• Unique product discovery, merchandising, and marketing features

My list of the best Shopify themes for ecommerce is the result. Of course, you should still test them out yourself, and the good news is that all paid themes via the Shopify Theme Store have an unlimited free trial — you only pay if you publish.

The best Shopify themes of 2025: Ranked & reviewed

All the themes I reviewed have high-quality demos, layouts, styles, features, and positive user reviews. Click the links below to jump to any categories that interest you, or keep scrolling to discover them all.

• Best free Shopify themes
• Best premium Shopify themes
• Best-converting Shopify themes
• Fastest-loading Shopify themes
• Best Shopify themes for dropshipping
• Best themes for clothing and apparel stores
• Best themes for health and beauty products
• Best themes for artists and digital products

Best free Shopify themes

Free Shopify themes provide a foundation for your store without any initial investment. You get the basics and can add additional features with free or paid apps rather than paying for features you might never use in a premium theme.

Here are the best free Shopify themes in 2025:

1. Dawn — Best free theme for general use

Price: Free

Dawn is the most widely reviewed free Shopify theme, with over 200 reviews. It offers quick setup and in-built advanced search, mega menu, sticky header, product filtering and sorting, and recommended products for media-first stores.

Key features

• Fast with lightweight code
• Designed for visual storytelling
• Quick buy
• Cross-selling
• Promo banners
• Lookbooks, color swatches, and swatch filters

Pros

• Minimalist layout prioritizes product displays
• Cart includes the option for in-store pickups
• Responsive design provides a great user experience
• Minimal setup required to get your store ready for selling

Cons

• Only suitable for basic ecommerce requirements
• Some of the latest user reviews report glitches
• Its lack of features may leave you wanting for more

Ideal for

• Startups and small ecommerce stores
• As a foundation for custom theme development

2. Sense — Best free theme for complex products

Price: Free

Sense is the best free Shopify theme for selling products that have lots of necessary information, such as ingredients, usage instructions, and eco-features. It displays products beautifully and loads fast to ensure a pleasant user experience.

Key features

• Ingredient and nutritional information module
• Usage information module
• Lookbooks, size charts, and color swatches
• Image rollover and image zoom
• Sticky header and mega menu
• Product videos and slideshows

Pros

• Modern with fashionable gradient design
• Minimal setup steps
• Supports GIFs in image boxes
• Supports promo banners

Cons

• Limited layout and collection options
• User reviews reveal new issues with every update

Ideal for

• Beauty and cosmetic brands
• Showcasing products with complex information

3. Studio — Best free theme for long-form product displays

Price: Free

Studio is best for artists, galleries, and product makers wanting to create long-form storytelling sections with text. Its navigation uses collections and creator filters to assist users in finding products that relate to their tastes and habits.

Key features

• Optimized for long-form text
• Multiple image and text block layouts
• Product recommendations
• Promo banners and cross-selling
• Supports videos, galleries, and slideshows

Pros

• Perfect for visual storytelling
• Color accents frame images for a gallery-like feel
• In-store pickups for physical art stores
• Minimal setup steps to make it look professional

Cons

• Unsuitable for extensive product collections
• Some users report issues with saving their changes

Ideal for

• Art galleries and artists
• Makers, creators, and Etsy sellers

Best premium Shopify themes

Premium Shopify themes provide more marketing, conversion, cart, checkout, product discovery, and merchandising features. Additionally, they have a wider range of layouts and styles, and some have Shopify Plus support for combined and quantity listings.

Check out the best premium Shopify themes to upgrade your ecommerce game:

4. Sleek — Best premium theme for high-volume stores

Price: $350

Sleek offers a clean design focused on sales. Its sections blend images, text, and videos to create unique shoppable content for better engagement and conversion rates. It also supports Shopify Plus’s combined and quantity listings.

Key features

• Creative and flexible layouts
• Cart notes and gift wrapping
• Countdown timer
• Promo popups and banners
• Image hotspot and zoom

Pros

• Supports animations
• SEO optimization
• Focussed on user experience
• Suitable for high-volume stores
• EU translations (EN, FR, IT, DE, ES)

Cons

• Some users find it has a steeper learning curve
• Premium features may be excessive for small inventories

Ideal for

• High-volume stores
• Businesses needing EU language translations

5. Local — Best premium theme for physical stores

Price: $360

Local is a top Shopify theme for physical stores wanting to sell online. It connects your brick-and-mortar shop with your online presence through store finders, in-store pickup, and local inventory displays that help customers shop their way.

Key features

• Age verification system
• In-store pickup integration
• Interactive icons
• Nutritional facts display
• Quick buy functionality
• 25+ customizable sections

Pros

• Tailored for food industry businesses
• Supports age-restricted products
• EU translations (EN, FR, IT, DE, ES)
• Bridges the link between physical and digital sales

Cons

• Not particularly suitable for online-only businesses
• Some features are specific to food/beverage stores

Ideal for

• Businesses with physical storefronts
• Food and beverage retailers

6. Xtra — Best premium theme for product marketplaces

Price: $120

Xtra offers conversion-winning features like countdown timers, promo banners and popups, and product badges at a lower price than most premium themes. It’s also extremely well supported with live chat and coding help (with Premium support).

Key features

• Quick buy functionality
• Before/after image slider
• Promo banners and popups
• Collection page navigation
• Recently viewed products

Pros

• Excellent value for money
• Fully customizable layouts
• Fast loading speeds
• 99% positive user feedback

Cons

• Basic support is limited
• Not as specialized as industry-specific themes

Ideal for

• Budget-conscious merchants
• Multi-product marketplaces

Best-converting Shopify themes

The best-converting Shopify themes have features that encourage and enrich shopping sessions, such as cross-selling, in-menu promos, quick view, recommended products, and EU translations (essential if you have a European audience).

These are some high-conversion Shopify themes to consider:

7. Drop — Best theme for flash sales and limited-time offers

Price: $440

Drop is a conversion-focused theme with exceptional product promotion sections. It creates urgency with built-in countdown timers for product launches and limited-time deals, eliminating the need for additional apps.

Key features

• Built-in countdown timers
• Product grid videos
• Back-in-stock alerts
• Product badges
• Cross-selling capabilities

Pros

• Auto-playing product videos in collection grids
• Lifetime free updates and support
• Multiple ways to create fear of missing out (FOMO)
• Extensive product promotion options

Cons

• Higher price point than many other themes
• It may be overwhelming for simple product catalogs

Ideal for

• Visual storytelling brands
• Merchants seeking to create urgency

8. Grid — Best theme for visual product showcases

Price: $260

Grid engages customers with visual-focused layouts and conversion-ready features. Its unique masonry grid design showcases products and videos, and its multi-column menu and quick shop functionality speed up the path to purchase.

Key features

• Masonry grid layout
• Multi-column mega menu
• Quick shop functionality
• Image zoom and rollover
• Product videos

Pros

• Works well for stores of all sizes
• Multiple page layout options
• Great for visual storytelling
• Fast navigation system
• Age verification support

Cons

• Less extensive feature set than higher-priced themes
• Limited marketing tools compared to competitors

Ideal for

• Visually-driven product catalogs
• Brands focused on editorial content

9. Ignite — Best theme for advanced customization

Price: $340

Ignite is one of the best high-conversion Shopify themes because it has 40+ customizable sections, gated discount codes, meta field integration, and page alerts to drive conversions. It also has clean code optimized for speed and search rankings.

Key features

• 40+ customizable sections
• Gated discount codes
• Tabbed sections
• Cross-selling tools
• Quick order list

Pros

• 100% positive user reviews
• Fast loading times
• Clean, extensible code
• SEO optimization
• Suitable for thousands of product listings

Cons

• Customizable sections have a learning curve
• Higher learning curve due to flexibility

Ideal for

• High-volume sellers
• Stores needing extensive customization

Fastest-loading Shopify themes

Fast-loading Shopify themes have demos that pass testing tools like PageSpeed Insights, Pingdom, and GTmetrix. However, remember that your site’s layout, navigation choices, and the media and content you add determine its final speed.

Some of the fastest Shopify templates include:

10. Agile — Best fast theme for conversions

Price: $320

Agile passes the Core Web Vitals Assessment in Google PageSpeed Insights and has a 94% performance rating in GTmetrix. It combines this technical performance with premium design and quick setup options to help you launch rapidly.

Key features

• Quick buy functionality
• Back-in-stock alerts
• Countdown timer
• Infinite scroll
• Age verifier
• Quick view option

Pros

• 100% positive user reviews on Shopify
• Performance-optimized code
• Accessibility focus
• Minimal setup requirements

Cons

• Limited customization compared to more complex themes
• Fewer promotional features than specialized themes

Ideal for

• Stores needing a quick launch
• Conversion-focused businesses

11. Charge — Best fast theme for multi-product sites

Price: $170

Charge is a multi-vendor and multi-product theme that improves site performance by reducing CSS/JS scripts for faster loading times. It passes Google PageSpeed scores and achieves a 90% GTmetrix performance rating.

Key features

• Cross-selling capabilities
• Product tabs and labels
• Countdown timer
• In-menu promotions
• Slide-out cart

Pros

• Excellent speed metrics in testing tools
• Loads of upsell features
• 98% positive user reviews on Shopify
• Right-to-left language support

Cons

• Fewer customization options
• Limited animation capabilities

Ideal for

• Dropshippers
• High-volume stores

12. Spotlight — Best fast free theme

Price: Free

Spotlight is the fastest free Shopify theme, boasting a 98% GTmetrix performance score. It fails Google’s Core Web Vitals Assessment only because the demo images aren’t optimized. Look no further if you want a fast, minimal theme with a grid layout.

Key features

• Quick buy functionality
• Image galleries and zoom
• Slide-out cart
• Cross-selling capabilities
• Mega menu

Pros

• Fast across categories and products
• Clean, minimal design
• Quick setup process
• In-built stock counter
• Sticky header and search bar

Cons

• Only 41% of reviews on Shopify are positive
• Limited marketing features
• Its basic layout may feel restrictive

Ideal for

• New store owners
• Budget-conscious stores

Best Shopify themes for dropshipping

Shopify themes listed in the Shopify Theme Store with the label “Designed specifically for dropshippers” are easy picks. These themes have visual tools like slide-out and sticky carts, stock counters, color swatches, and slideshows for content-first designs.

I recommend these Shopify dropshipping themes in 2025:

13. Startup — Best dropshipping theme for single-product and low-volume sellers

Price: $100

Startup offers a sleek, minimalist design built for dropshippers and single-product stores. It showcases customer testimonials and detailed product information while keeping the purchase path simple for direct-to-consumer selling models.

Key features

• Customizable testimonials section
• Quick buy functionality
• Promo banners
• Mega menu navigation
• Product tabs and videos

Pros

• Ideal for small product catalogs
• Optimized for dropshipping
• Quick setup process
• Affordable price point
• Significant focus on customer reviews

Cons

• Limited marketing features
• Unsuitable for extensive product collections

Ideal for

• Dropshippers with small, curated catalogs
• Brand and product storytelling

14. District — Best dropshipping theme for high-volume sales

Price: $220

District is the ideal theme for dropshippers managing extensive product catalogs. It offers featured products and collections with visual-focused layouts highlighting your items while maintaining a professional storefront appearance.

Key features

• Quick buy functionality
• Product badges and trust badges
• Promo banners and popups
• Collection page navigation
• Sticky header and cart

Pros

• Suitable for thousands of listings
• 99% positive user reviews on Shopify
• Visual storytelling capabilities
• Multiple promotional display options

Cons

• Requires extensive setup time
• More expensive than basic dropshipping themes

Ideal for

• High-volume dropshippers
• Visual-focused product catalogs

15. Parallax — Best dropshipping theme for visual effects

Price: $240

Parallax brings movement to your store with its signature scrolling effects that create depth between page elements. Its parallax feature turns product displays into interactive experiences where images, text, and backgrounds move at different speeds as customers scroll your site.

Key features

• Parallax scrolling effects
• Slide-out cart
• Quick buy functionality
• Promotional banners and popups
• Video background support

Pros

• 96% positive user reviews on Shopify
• Creative visual control
• Conversion-focused checkout
• Back-in-stock alerts

Cons

• Visual effects may slow page loading on older devices
• Parallax presentation doesn’t work well for text-heavy displays

Ideal for

• Visually-driven brands
• Dropshippers with high-value products

Best Shopify themes for ecommerce by niche

Some Shopify themes have unique features and designs that improve sales for specific niches, such as shoppable videos for beauty brands and special typography and layouts for art stores.

If you have a niche and want a Shopify theme built to give you the best start, you can’t go wrong with any of the options below.

Best themes for clothing and apparel stores

The best Shopify themes for clothing and apparel stores support live search, visual storytelling, animations, and detailed product pages. Check out these themes for starters:

16. Motion — Best fashion theme for animations and video

Price: $400

Motion brings your clothing and apparel brand to life with smooth animations and video features. As customers scroll, elements animate into view, highlighting your fashion collections and creating a premium-feeling interactive shopping experience.

Key features

• 20+ sections available on all pages
• Smooth scrolling animations
• Collection collage options
• Product sales points
• Multiple template layouts

Pros

• 97% positive reviews from 522 users on Shopify
• Premium animated effects
• Flexible collection displays
• Quick setup process

Cons

• Higher price point
• Animations may distract from simple catalogs

Ideal for

• Clothing and apparel brands
• Visual storytelling businesses

17. Avante — Best fashion theme for long-form content

Price: $290

Avante integrates product displays with long-form content sections for fashion retailers. Its dual-sidebar layout and editorial page templates let you publish lookbooks, trend reports, and brand stories alongside your clothing collections.

Key features

• 40+ customizable sections
• Two optional sidebars
• Pre-order functionality
• Size chart integration
• Product videos and slideshows

Pros

• 100% positive user reviews on Shopify
• Mobile-first design approach
• Speed-optimized code
• Right-to-left language support

Cons

• Not as easy to set up as some other themes
• Premium support services cost extra

Ideal for

• Apparel and fashion retailers
• Luxury and boutique stores

Best themes for health and beauty products

Check out these health and beauty themes for your Shopify store:

18. Wonder — Best beauty theme for shoppable videos

Price: $390

Wonder is a fast and modern theme that shows off your health and beauty products with engaging, shoppable videos. Customers can click directly on skincare and beauty items in videos to add them to their cart without leaving the page.

Key features

• Shoppable video functionality
• Mobile-first design
• Quick buy and view options
• Ingredient information display
• Before/after image slider

Pros

• 100% positive user reviews on Shopify
• Strong focus on user experience
• Multiple promotional display options
• Extensive merchandising tools

Cons

• Higher price point than many competitors
• Video features require content creation

Ideal for

• Skincare and beauty brands
• Visual storytelling

19. Be Yours — Best beauty theme for dropshipping

Price: $320

Be Yours has multi-product and one-product templates for dropshipping and dedicated sections for product ingredients, usage instructions, and before-and-after comparisons that show the effects of your skincare and makeup products.

Key features

• Templates for one-product stores
• 30+ sections available on all pages
• Before/after image slider
• Ingredients information display
• Usage information sections

Pros

• 98% positive reviews from 590 users on Shopify
• Eight-hour support response time
• Works well for both single and multi-product stores
• Multiple product display styles

Cons

• Some users report bugs
• Navigation isn’t as streamlined as some other themes

Ideal for

• High-value dropshipping
• Brands with a sleek, minimalist style

Best themes for artists and digital products

These are among the best Shopify themes for artists and digital products in 2025:

20. Baseline — Best artistic theme for bold brands

Price: $360

Baseline has a brutalist-inspired design for curated storefronts. It combines blocks, grids, graphic lines, and modular dividers that appeal to artists and designers looking for a modern, gallery-like presentation for their products.

Key features

• Text-centric layouts
• Modular grid system
• Slide-out cart
• Promo banners and popups
• Collection page navigation

Pros

• 99% positive user reviews on Shopify
• Mid-century modern aesthetic
• Typography-focused design
• Quick setup process
• Flexible product placement

Cons

• Brutalist style may not appeal to all audiences
• Marketing features are limited to popups and promo tiles

Ideal for

• Artists and designers
• Creative brands
• Editorial-heavy content

21. Label — Best artistic theme for digital products

Price: $320

Label excels at selling digital products like music, videos, and downloadable content. It integrates audio players, video galleries, and product showcases for musicians, labels, and digital content creators.

Key features

• Audio track integration
• Video galleries and playlists
• Lookbook layouts
• Product specification displays
• Cross-selling capabilities
• “Complete the look” upsell banners

Pros

• 100% positive reviews from 67 users on Shopify
• Lightning-fast audio and video players
• Flexible product specification options
• Works for both digital and physical products

Cons

• Music-focused style may need customization for other digital goods
• Media-heavy features can impact load times

Ideal for

• Music labels and artists
• Physical stores with digital products

Testing your shortlist: Don’t skip the demo

Shopify theme demos let you assess their suitability for your store before installation. Most demos showcase all layouts, typography, colors, product displays, and features like lookbooks, slideshows, and countdown timers.

You can view demos for free and premium Shopify themes by navigating to their pages in the Shopify Theme Store and clicking View demo store as shown below:

After loading a theme demo, you might see a top bar with a dropdown for different Theme styles — these are demo variations to showcase the theme’s design potential. For instance, the Glossy theme has five variations. Here’s the Wildpeak variation:

And now the Inove demo:

It’s best to review all demos to assess the quality of finished developer stores. Check these criteria during your review of Shopify themes:

• Category and product page layouts
• Product showcases
• Quick view functionality
• Checkout page
• Navigation and search features
• Image handling, including slideshows
• Stock counters and back-in-stock features
• Loading times with Google PageSpeed Insights and GTmetrix

Upgrade your theme with email and SMS marketing

Email and SMS marketing are crucial to covering your customer journey with timely communications that grow sales, nurture customers, and recover abandoned revenue.

However, neither Shopify nor its themes have built-in email and SMS marketing features. The closest you get is Shopify automatically sending transactional messages for orders, shipping, and customer account notifications.

These basic communications aren’t enough for your ecommerce store. You need an additional Shopify app to create an email and SMS marketing strategy that covers your customer lifecycle from initial signup to post-purchase and milestones.

Omnisend is one such app that works perfectly with any theme. It automatically syncs your Shopify customer information, purchase history, product data, and cart activity. With it, you can:

• Create automations for email and SMS marketing
• Recover abandoned carts
• Send welcome series emails
• Capture emails with popups and forms
• Monitor the performance of forms
• A/B test emails and forms
• Build campaigns with pre-made templates
• Segment customers for targeted messaging
• Track cross-channel sales performance
• See each customer in a lifecycle stage map
• Access 24/7 support, even with the free plan

The most important feature is automation — abandoned carts, welcome messages, and browse abandonment emails were responsible for 87% of all automated orders in 2024. Omnisend has pre-built workflows for these and an intuitive drag-and-drop automation editor.

Frequently asked questions about Shopify themes