- To sell more on Shopify, find the funnel step with the largest drop first, then work through speed, product pages, cart and checkout, prices and free shipping. The list has 10 steps.
- Check your baseline in Shopify Analytics and GA4 before you change anything. Every step in this guide is a hypothesis until your own data confirms it.
- The checkout is limited on Shopify, and the limits depend on your plan. Everything before the checkout, including the cart, can be tested on every plan.
- Test theme changes, prices and product page modules before you roll them out. Revenue, purchases and average order value can be imported as goals.
To get more sales from a Shopify store, look at the funnel in Shopify Analytics and GA4, find the step where most visitors leave and fix that step first. Typical levers are speed, the product page, the cost shown in the cart, the free shipping threshold and, within your plan's limits, the checkout. Test each change before you roll it out.
This guide lists 10 steps that are specific to Shopify: the theme and apps, product page sections, cart and checkout limits by plan, prices, bundles and free shipping, and how to test changes. A checklist at the end turns the steps into points you can work through.
Check your numbers in Shopify Analytics and GA4 first
Optimization starts with one question: where do visitors leave? Look at the funnel before you change anything.
- Read the funnel in Shopify Analytics and GA4. Compare the steps from session to product view, add to cart, checkout start and purchase. The step with the largest drop is your first target. Check the device split as well, because many stores lose most buyers on phones.
Keep the numbers you find as a baseline, with the date range. Every change in the next sections is a hypothesis, and the baseline is how you see whether it worked. For orientation on reasons: the Baymard Institute reports an average cart abandonment rate of 70.22% and names extra costs that were too high (40%) as the top reason (US shoppers, retrieved October 20, 2026). Your own funnel shows which of those reasons is likely in your store.
If you see traffic but no sales, the cause is usually in one step, not in all of them. Find the step first.
Theme and speed: app ballast and image sizes
A slow store loses visitors before they see a product. Two causes are common on Shopify:
- Remove apps you do not use. Many apps add scripts and styles to every page of the storefront, and some leave code behind after you uninstall them. Make a list of your apps, note what each one does for sales and remove those that do nothing. Check the theme code for leftover snippets.
- Resize and compress images. Large product and banner images are the most frequent cause of slow pages. Upload images in the size they are shown, use a modern format and load images below the first screen lazily.
Measure on a phone with a mobile connection, before and after each change, and note the numbers. Which apps slow your store down is a question for measurement: disable one app at a time on a test theme and compare the loading time. Hypothesis: a store with many apps for pop-ups, chat, reviews and sliders loads more scripts than it needs.
If you consider a new theme, test it before the switch. See Shopify themes and A/B testing.
Product pages on Shopify
The product page carries the decision. Shopify themes build it from a template with sections, and you can change the order and the content of those sections in the theme editor.
- Put the decision information high on the page. Title, price, availability, delivery time and a short return note belong near the buy button. Move long descriptions and technical data below, or into tabs.
- Place reviews and trust signals next to the buy button. A rating with a visible number of reviews, a guarantee line and the accepted payment logos answer the doubts buyers have. Only promise a guarantee you honor, and have its wording checked legally. Our article on trust badges shows which signals work where.
Use product templates for groups of similar products, so that one improvement reaches many pages. Then test the template change on a few products before you roll it out to the rest of the store. For a platform-independent review of the page elements, see our guide to product page optimization.
Cart and checkout on Shopify
The cart and the checkout decide whether an interested visitor becomes a buyer. Two practices cover most of the ground:
- Show the total cost in the cart. Extra costs were too high for 40% of the shoppers who abandoned a cart in the Baymard list, and 12% could not see the total up front. State shipping and taxes as early as you can.
- Know what your plan allows in the checkout. Shopify limits what you can change in the checkout, and the limits depend on the plan. The table below sums them up. Source: Shopify Help Center, “Customizing and editing your checkout and accounts pages”.
| Shopify plan | What you can change in the checkout |
|---|---|
| Basic plan or higher | Standard checkout customizations in the checkout and accounts editor, and eligible apps on the thank you and order status pages. |
| Shopify Plus | Everything above, plus advanced customization: eligible apps on the information, shipping and payment pages, and access to the Checkout Branding API. |
Our page on Shopify checkout A/B testing explains which parts of the checkout can be tested. The general principles are in our guide to checkout optimization.
Prices, bundles and free shipping
Price decisions move revenue faster than most design changes, and they are the easiest to get wrong. Two practices help:
- Set a free shipping threshold with a calculation. Start from your average order value, margin and parcel cost, and show the threshold in a bar and in the cart. Our guide on how to set a free shipping threshold has the five steps.
- Offer bundles and add-ons where they fit. Combine products that buyers use together, and suggest the add-on in the cart or on the product page. Check the margin of the bundle against the single items. More tactics for larger baskets are in our guide on how to increase average order value.
Test price changes before you commit to them. A price test shows which price brings the best margin, and you can run it without a visible change for the visitor. See the documentation on how to test prices in Shopify.
How to test changes on Shopify
The last step is the one that tells you whether the other nine worked.
- Test each change before you roll it out. An A/B test compares the original with the changed version on real visitors, and your baseline from step 1 tells you what to measure.
With Varify. Varify runs through a snippet on every Shopify plan and reads results from your analytics tool. With Prompt-Based Experimentation (PBX), you describe a change in plain language and the AI builds the variation without a developer. See the PBX examples. To find out which of the ten steps matters most for your store, the AI CRO Audit analyzes a page URL and returns recommendations and 10 test ideas. Shopify goals for revenue, purchases and average order value are imported directly, so you can judge a change by the revenue it brings. The documentation shows how to connect Shopify conversion data and how to set up a Shopify custom pixel for GA4.
- Theme tests. Compare a new theme with the current one before the switch. See Shopify theme test.
- Price tests. Find the price with the best margin. See Shopify price test.
- Product page modules. Try ready-made modules before you add them for good. See modules for your Shopify store.
- Checkout. On Shopify Plus, the Varify Checkout A/B Test app adds components such as USP blocks and free shipping bars to the checkout without code.
For help choosing a tool, see A/B testing tools for Shopify, and read how to run an A/B test on Shopify for the process.
Checklist: Shopify store optimization
Work through the list in order. Write down the date and the number for every point. Preparing for Black Friday? The timeline and Shopify checklist in our guide to Black Friday shop preparation add the sale-specific points.
- Funnel baseline saved. Session to product view, add to cart, checkout start and purchase, by device.
- App list reviewed. Every app has a job. Unused apps and leftover code are removed.
- Images sized and compressed. Measured on a phone before and after.
- Product page shows the decision information high. Price, delivery, return note, rating.
- Trust signals sit next to the buy button.
- Total cost is visible in the cart. Shipping and taxes stated early.
- Checkout limits for your plan are known. Table filled with the Shopify Help Center source.
- Free shipping threshold calculated and displayed. Average order value, margin and parcel cost used.
- Bundles and add-ons are checked. Margin of the bundle against the single items.
- Every change is tested. Goals: revenue, purchases and average order value.
Find out which Shopify change earns more.
Varify.io: Shopify goals for revenue and average order value, theme tests, price tests and PBX.