Shopify store speed: what you can and cannot fix

Key takeaways

On Shopify, the platform handles hosting, caching and delivery, so the things that slow most stores down are the things the merchant adds: apps, theme features and images. You cannot change the servers or the checkout. You can remove unused apps and the code they leave behind, choose a lighter theme, resize images and limit what loads on the first screen. That is where the speed is.

• Shopify runs the servers and content delivery network. You cannot tune them.
• Apps are the main cause of slow stores, because each adds scripts to the storefront.
• Uninstalled apps can leave code in the theme that still loads.
• The theme and image sizes are the other two levers in your control.

What does Shopify handle for you?

Shopify provides the hosting, serves files through a content delivery network, handles capacity at busy times and runs the checkout. That removes several causes of slowness that owners of self-hosted shops have to manage, including server response and traffic spikes.

It also means those things are fixed. If a store is slow, a different hosting plan is not an option. The cause is almost always in the theme, the apps or the content.

• How website speed affects customer experience and conversions
• Website slow at busy times? Staying fast under peak traffic

What slows a Shopify store down?

Three things account for most slow stores.

• Apps: reviews, pop-ups, upsells, chat, loyalty and tracking each add scripts to every page.
• Leftover code: snippets from apps removed long ago.
• Theme features: sliders, video sections, animation and mega-menus switched on by default.
• Images: product photographs and banners uploaded far larger than displayed.
• Too many sections and products loaded on the homepage and collection pages.

• Third-party scripts: the hidden reason your site is slow
• Product page speed: fast pages without losing the detail

How do you audit your apps?

Go through the installed apps with last quarter's figures beside you. For each, ask what it earned.

• 1. List every installed app and its monthly fee.
• 2. Note which ones add something visible or tracked on the storefront.
• 3. Check what each contributed: orders, reviews collected, emails captured.
• 4. Remove apps that earned nothing or duplicate another.
• 5. Ask a developer to remove leftover code from the theme.
• 6. Re-test the homepage, a collection and a product page.

• How to test website speed the way customers feel it

What else is in your control?

After apps, the theme and the content are yours to change. Choose a current, well-supported theme and switch off sections you do not need. Replace homepage sliders with one image. Upload images at sensible dimensions and let the platform serve the right size. Limit how many products load on collection pages before the shopper scrolls.

Shopify's admin includes a web performance report showing Core Web Vitals from real shoppers. Use it to see whether changes helped, alongside PageSpeed Insights for the detail.

• Optimise website images for speed and search
• Core Web Vitals for business websites

What can you not fix?

You cannot change server response, the content delivery network or most of the checkout. Scripts required by the platform will load whatever you do, and some apps offer no control over how theirs load.

That is a fair trade for most small shops. The platform's parts are generally quick, and the limits stop a store being misconfigured. If the constraints are costing sales, that is a platform decision, not a speed fix.

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• What a UK e-commerce website needs

What does this look like in practice?

A pattern we see in stores a couple of years old: more than twenty apps have been installed over time, a dozen are still active and several removed ones have left code behind. The theme's homepage has a slider, a video and six product carousels. On a phone, the first product is visible long before it can be tapped.

Cutting to the apps that earn their fee, cleaning the theme and simplifying the homepage usually changes the store more than any setting. Global Bridge Labs (GBL) starts every Shopify speed review with the app list.

• See client work
• Website Design & Development for UK businesses

Shopify speed checklist

• Open the web performance report in the admin.
• List apps and remove those that earn nothing.
• Have leftover app code removed from the theme.
• Switch off unused theme sections and sliders.
• Resize large banners and product images.
• Test homepage, collection and product pages on a phone.

• The website speed scorecard: score your site in an hour
• E-commerce website speed: where online shops lose orders

Next step

On Shopify, a faster store is mostly a matter of what you take away. We will go through your apps and theme and show you what each costs.