When you’re starting a new Shopify store – picking a theme can seem overwhelming. It doesn’t have to be! The theme is what determines the backbone of your website. In Shopify, there are many different free and paid themes available in the theme store. However, how do you know which theme to pick? In this guide, we’ve put together some helpful questions you might have when you’re theme shopping.

Should you pay for a Shopify theme – or use a free Shopify theme?

This is one of the biggest things small businesses struggle with. They say “I’m just starting out”, “I have a budget”, and “I don’t have money to spend on a theme”, so they pick out a free theme.  This is great and works well for certain business owners and certain Shopify stores.

The problem we see most, is the free themes do not offer the customization, and personalization most brands want when building a business on Shopify. If you want to make a lot of adjustments easily, be more in control, have more choices for dropdowns, edits and things then you are going to want to go with a paid Shopify theme. The paid themes are easier to edit a few items and they have less global settings compared to the free Shopify themes.

What can you change with a Shopify theme once you purchase it?

The answer? It depends! This varies based on the theme, theme developer, etc. Generally speaking – the theme is the skeleton of your store. Each of the photos, products, logo, colors will all be swapped out for your brand. This means when you’re looking at themes you should keep in mind where the logo block is, how wide the hero banner is, what shows up on the homepage, etc.

Make Decisions on Shopify

With this in mind – you will be able to take your theme to your Shopify Setup expert (like us) and we’ll be able to help get you off the ground and running 100% on Shopify both quickly, and easily.

Take a look at the Shopify theme store and be inspired.