You have chosen Shopify for the creation or redesign of your e-commerce site and you want to use one of Shopify's free themes? That's good, there are 8 on the official site Theme Store the Shopify . Each free Theme even exists in several versions, which makes about 20 different Themes to test without limit for your online store.
Theme Store is the site to go to get free themes because it's an official Shopify site. It has advantages that platforms like ThemeForest or MonsterTemplate cannot offer.
Indeed, the themes present on the theme store can be tested for free on a site Shopify ! Good for free themes, no need to pay, but this trick also works with paid themes.
Unlike many other E-commerce CMS, like Prestashop or Magento, at Shopify no need for complicated installation or ftp or file exchange. Just press a button to test or integrate the theme to your store.
Ranking Free Shopify Themes
It should be noted that this ranking is purely personal! All the themes on the Shopify site have indeed undergone numerous tests by the entire Shopify team before being published. Even if they don't always offer as many features as some paid themes, they have everything you need to make your store a success!
Simple
Simple is currently our favorite theme for its modularity. Available in three versions "Light", "Beauty" and "Toy", Simple lives up to its name. Accessible, flexible, fast and with a little extra: the sidebar menu, a bit like on Amazon.
Its low loading time is also one of the points most appreciated by users of the free Simple theme.
Simple Light is the black and white version of the theme. Something to offer a sober and distinguished setting for your products or, on the contrary, a playground for graphic designers to express themselves freely.
Simple Beauty he uses the "Futura" font which makes reading on the theme very pleasant in our opinion while bringing a little roundness. Very useful for a site of beauty or makeup products.
Simple Toy uses exactly the same structure as the other two but in a colorful and fun version more suited to a young target or to the world of toys.
Simple is a highly rated theme by its users with over 80% positive reviews at the time of writing this article.
Brooklyn
Brooklyn is a hot theme right now as it is chosen by many fashion brands as their main theme. Available in two versions, classic and playful, it specializes in fashion sites (clothing, shoes, accessories) for men and women.
Obviously, nothing prevents you from using it for something else, but if you are launching a fashion e-commerce store, it may be for you. If you like it a bit unstructured with blocks of varying sizes, Brooklyn ets may be the right theme for you too.
Brooklyn classic is oriented rather to use large photos of the shooting or scenario type. the rest is a little more discreet.
Brooklyn Playful to him a more pop and colorful side. It will depend on the graphic charter of your brand but if you are looking for a fun side and a little more 50s, this version is made for you.
Minimal
Minimal is a 100% free Shopify theme available in three versions: Vintage, Fashion and Modern. The theme lives up to its name both in terms of design and functionality. very refined, it is not there to offer you thousands of things but on the contrary for only one: to highlight your products.
Ideal therefore for those looking to put their range in the spotlight, even if it means having to install a lot of Shopify apps for the functional side.
Minimal Vintage is the slightly postcard version of the theme. With its somewhat empty attic atmosphere, this theme is perfect for second-hand products or products with a history.
Minimal Fashion : More fashion oriented, Minimal Fashion is a theme that is easy to work with using an e-commerce agency to create a custom theme for your store.
Minimal Modern : More modern, with more spacing and a stricter font, Minimal Modern is aimed more at decoration or tableware brands. Of course, it is possible to add any products of your choice, but the atmosphere is resolutely contemporary.
Note that many merchants emphasize the high quality of this theme in its responsive version. Ideal for having a mobile-first site.
Narrative
Narrative is a hot topic right now and that doesn't surprise us. Very focused on story telling and the highlighting of history, the theme will appeal to many brands. If visuals are as important to you as stories, then Narrative might be your theme of choice.
Proposed in three versions, Warm, Cold and Light, narrative can thus suit different atmospheres and themes.
Narrative Warm, pastel colors, a Monotype Baskerville font that provides significant reading comfort, this theme is surely one of our favorites.
Narrative Light is more "bright", hence the name. Ideal for highlighting a limited product catalog but can be a little more technical. Ideal to present a know-how for example.
Narrative Cold, the atmosphere of Cold seems to us more appropriate for technical products but still with this high-end atmosphere
Narrative is a theme appreciated by the Shopify community with more than 68% positive opinions, which still seems a bit light compared to the quality of the theme. The bad marks seem mainly to come from the compatibility of the slideshow between the desktop version and the mobile version.
Boundless
The goal of Boundless is to highlight the photos rather than the rest. If you are looking for a light and refined theme to highlight great visuals such as shootings or atmospheres, this could well be your theme of choice!
Boundless exists in 2 versions, a "Black and White" version and a "Vibrant" version.
Boundless Black and White is, as its name suggests, in black and white. This is the type of theme highly sought after by many luxury brands who need a cocoon for their product, and therefore discreet themes.
Boundless vibrant is very similar to Black and White but offers a more colorful environment while keeping the high-end spirit that drives this theme.
Little more of the theme that we really like, the "Sticky navigation" or in other words the sticky menu at the top of the page. Very practical and modern to facilitate navigation, especially on mobile. The theme is however not very well rated, the fault of some recent comments complaining about too large product images ... which is the main function of the theme. Odd. Like what, spending some time analyzing the perfect theme for your store is important!
Venture
Venture is also available for free to all Shopify users. It is offered in 3 distinct versions to maximize the possibilities: snowboards, outdoors, boxing. Rather intended for large catalogs (not including single product sites) Venture is rather made in our opinion for sites with many categories.
Its small specialty is to offer drop-down menus by default, which few Shopify themes offer.
If you don't need drop-down menus, go your way. Venture does not bring much more, unless you like the different atmospheres.
Venture Snowboards is perfect for products with strong visuals such as winter sports. With beautiful presentations and a classy and upscale atmosphere, a sports brand can find what it is looking for.
Venture Outdoors : Do you prefer wide open spaces and nature? Then go for Venture Outdoors. Enough to allow your customers to get some fresh air while staying in front of your site. This theme alone is a call to adventure.
Venture Boxing . Need a wilder, hormone-filled theme? Then Venture Boxing is for you. Ideal for selling products around combat sports, bodybuilding or simply products needing a strong visual impact.
Venture is at the bottom of our ranking, but so are the opinions of other merchants. He is especially criticized for his simplicity which is not only apparent. We quickly go around the theme but after all it is free!
Supply
Suppy is another free theme for Shopify, it comes in two flavors. A "blue" version and a "light" version. Supply is defined as "Easily present and filter large inventories".
Supply is therefore more intended for large product catalogs. To test therefore if your site will offer many categories and many different products.
The version "Supply Blue" is more oriented for catalogs of electronic products with a fairly square and strict atmosphere.
The version "Supply Light“Is she more fashion and fashion oriented. The font is rounder, the colors lighter, and the mood of the theme makes more DVNB (digital vertical native brand) brand of clothes.
The functions delivered with this theme are quite limited and the management of filters, one of the "advantages" of this theme did not convince us more than that. The other merchants also remain moderately convinced by this theme with only 65% of positive opinions.
Beginning
Debut is Shopify's default theme. So you must have come across him more than once. Available in two versions "default" and "light", Start with all the elements necessary to start e-commerce:
- A slideshow (carousel) on the homepage
- Banner management for promotions
- predictive research
- Product recommendations
- Videos on the homepage
- Customer reviews
- Product filters on category pages
Debut describes itself as "The theme designed to showcase your brand and products".
As the name suggests, it's a good theme to start with, but it's a bit limited for our taste. The homepage widgets are limited, the filters are very basic and don't support metafileds and are much less efficient than an app like "
Smart Product Filter & Search" .
In short, if we look in detail, it is really a starting theme that will often require a lot of work to match your needs.
On the other hand, to launch a site with few products and relatively simple and to highlight large photos, the theme is suitable!
It's up to you to test Start on your store to get an idea, but the comments under the theme are not the most complimentary.
A few tips for choosing the right free theme for you
How to choose the right theme for you? This may be the question you asked yourself when you saw this list of themes above.
First, you don't need to choose based on price! Indeed, as all the themes mentioned here are free, no need to deprive yourself. You can even use several themes (not at the same time) if you feel like it.
Le design
This is of course the No. 1 criterion for choosing your theme. Even if there are technical specificities to each design and that you can customize almost everything via CSS, choosing a theme with a design that speaks to you is essential.
Analyze product pages
The product pages are, in my opinion, almost more important than the homepage or the category pages. A product page will indeed have to convince the user to checkout. it is a heavy and strategic mission for a commercial site.
So check that the product page of the theme you like can contain the necessary information you need to make a sale. It is always possible to add metafileds but if you start with an already adapted theme, it's always time to save.
Fonctionnalities
Some Shopify agencies love feature-shielded themes. And some merchants too. They thus have the impression of "getting a bargain" with lots of functions for a reduced price. It is, in my opinion, a choice that can be discussed.
The purpose of a theme, free or not, is not to add functions. That's the purpose of apps. Choosing a theme filled with javascript code and conditional logic to fit all cases can slow down your site.
At Pikka, we are more in favor of clean and efficient source code. Separating function and design allows for greater agility and performance.
So we always try to choose the lightest themes first.
Conclusion
We can see that even if the number of free themes on Shopify seems quite limited at first there are still many variations and differences. There is certainly something to find your happiness and customize css files of the free theme to get a version that will suit your ebusiness.
You can also tell us in the comments your favorite themes and the reasons why you choose one over another!
