How to Speed Up Your Shopify Store: 9 Fixes That Work

By the Shrine Theme team. Published 2026-10-08.

Shoppers leave slow pages, especially on phones, and speed also feeds into Google's page experience signals. These nine fixes are practical, and most of them are free.

1. Start with a lightweight theme

Your theme sets the speed baseline. Themes loaded with heavy scripts, sliders and animations start behind before you add a single product. Choose a theme built with lightweight code, like Shrine.

2. Resize and compress images

Large product photos are the most common cause of slow pages. Shopify's image CDN helps, but uploading a 5000 pixel original for a 600 pixel slot still wastes bandwidth. Resize before upload and compress with a free tool.

3. Lazy-load images below the fold

Images further down the page should load only when a shopper scrolls to them. Keep your main banner image loading immediately so the top of the page appears fast.

4. Remove apps you do not use

Many apps add scripts to every page. Uninstall unused apps, then check that no leftover code remains in your theme files.

5. Limit fonts

Use one or two font families with only the weights you need. Every extra font file adds to load time.

6. Skip autoplay video and big sliders

A single clear hero image usually loads faster and converts as well as a slideshow. Keep video for places where shoppers choose to play it.

7. Keep the homepage focused

Each section and product grid adds weight. Show your best collections and products, and link to the rest.

8. Be careful with pop-ups and widgets

Chat boxes, review widgets and pop-ups load third-party code. Keep the ones that earn their place and remove the rest.

9. Test, change one thing, test again

Run your homepage and a product page through Google PageSpeed Insights, with the mobile results first. Change one thing at a time so you know what helped.