One thing that every store owner knows is that slow stores lose sales. Shoppers get impatient fast, especially when they’re using their phones, and if your page takes too long to open and load, it means that most of your customers will just leave and try to go to another store page.
The thing is that “ making the store faster” might sound like a huge technical job. There are many tips you can find, and that makes it even harder to know where to begin.
The key thing here is that you don’t need to fix everything; there are a few main reasons for the slowdown, so if you try to fix those first in order, you’ll succeed faster.
So let’s go through this process step by step.
1.Check Where You Stand Before Changing Anything
Before adjusting any setting, it’s important to get the basics; otherwise, you won’t know if anything you did actually helped.
Shopify has a built-in speed report in your admin (you can find this on the Themes page). Another option is to run your store through Google’s PageSpeed Insights, which is actually a free feature. Feel free to check a few different pages, not just your homepage, because the homepage, collection page, and product page can all behave very differently, so it’s important to check them all.
Write down your scores, and also remember the load times if you can. Then, once you change a setting, test it again, and see if it worked. Also, test on mobile, since that’s where most of your visitors probably are and where slow pages hurt the most.
2. Clean Up Your Apps
If your score feels slow, apps are the first place to check. Many of them add extra code that loads on every page, even when you’re not really using what they do.
Go through your installed apps and ask yourself whether you use it and whether it’s making you money or saving you time. If your answer is no, then remove it.
A couple of things to know:
- Some apps leave code in your theme even after you remove them. If you feel okay doing it (or if you have a developer), it’s a good idea to look for that code. If you don’t feel comfortable, contact the app’s support. Ask how to get rid of the extra parts.
- Before you edit anything in your theme code, duplicate your theme first so you have a backup, in case something happens.
- If you have two apps that do almost the same job, keep only one.
This one change often makes a bigger difference than anything else on this list.
3. Fix Your Images
Big and heavy images are another major reason your store might load slowly. A photo straight from a camera or phone can be several megabytes, which is way more than a web page needs.
Here’s what you can do:
- Resize before uploading. An image that shows at 1000 pixels wide doesn’t need to be 4000 pixels wide.
- Compress them. Free tools can shrink an image a lot without you noticing any drop in quality.
- Skip the unnecessary extras. Do you really need 12 photos on a product page, or would 5 good ones do the job?
Also, make sure your photos below the first screen are set to load “lazily” meaning they only load when someone scrolls down to them. Many modern themes do this by default.
4. Simplify Your Homepage
Your homepage is often the heaviest page on your site because it’s where people try to put everything.
Some common culprits:
- Big auto-playing videos
- Image sliders with lots of slides
- Long strings of sections stacked on top of each other
- Pop-ups that load right away
Think about what a first-time visitor to your website needs to see Usually, such a visitor needs to see a clear headline, some of the best products or collections offered, and a good reason to trust this website. A straightforward homepage is much easier to load and is usually much more efficient.
5. Take a Look at Your Theme
The theme is the core foundation of your store. A well-built, lightweight theme makes everything feel easier. A theme with tons of built-in features you never use can slow you down, no matter what else you fix.
Shopify offers free themes that are designed to be efficient and work well for a lot of merchants. If you have an extensively customized theme, you can always check out a new one using a duplicate version of your shop in order to compare the performance.
6. Cut Back on Fonts and Tracking Scripts
These two are easy to overlook because you can’t really see them.
Fonts. Every extra font (and every extra weight, like bold or light) is another file your visitors’ browsers have to download. Try to stick to one or two font families, and only the weights you really use.
Tracking and marketing scripts. Chat widgets, heatmap tools, multiple analytics tags, and ad pixels all add weight. Some of them are worth it. But if you installed a tool a year ago and haven’t looked at its data since, it’s just slowing you down for nothing.
What to Fix First: A Simple Order
If you’re short on time, here’s the order I’d go in:
- Test your store and save your starting scores.
- Remove apps you don’t use.
- Compress and resize images, starting with your homepage and best-selling products.
- Simplify your homepage by cutting heavy videos, sliders, and extra sections.
- Trim fonts and tracking scripts.
- Review your theme and test a lighter one if yours is clearly bloated.
- Test again on mobile and compare with your starting numbers.
This order isn’t random. It’s roughly arranged from biggest impact and least effort to bigger projects that take more time.
Frequently Asked Questions
- What’s a good speed score for a Shopify store?
There’s no one specific stable number. Aim to improve from where you start. Focus on how the store feels to real people, mainly on mobile devices. Scores can shift from one test to the next, so don’t worry about changes. Just keep moving. - Do I need a developer to speed up my store?
Not for the basic fixes, like removing apps, compressing images, and simplifying your homepage; these are things most store owners can easily do. For deeper theme code changes, you can of course ask a developer to help you.
So, to sum up, it’s vital to comprehend that a Shopify store is not about doing everything in one go but rather doing it in the right order. To begin with, check your web page’s load time, uninstall unnecessary apps, reduce the number of images, and make your homepage simpler; then check how it works. All these little tweaks will create enormous benefits for your customers.
