Top 10 Ways to Maximise Your Shopify Theme: Expert Tips for Merchants in 2025

New to the Theme Store, here are 10 quick things to consider when looking for a theme that will not only support your growth but make the early steps easier for you. 

1. Choose the Right Preset for Your Industry

Use Shopify’s new industry filters to select a preset tailored to your product range, whether it’s large catalogues (Erickson) or minimalist lines (Atom). This saves time and ensures design alignment.

2. Refine Typography and Accent Colours

Presets come with intentional font and colour choices that elevate aesthetics. Stick with these defaults before customising to maintain visual harmony.

3. Use Live Demo Previews

Take advantage of embedded demo stores to test layouts with your own content - check product galleries, navigation flow, and mobile experience in real-time.

4. Leverage Built-In Merchandising Features

Themes like Erickson include mega menus, cart recommendations, and product swatches. Brava adds product bundler tools, while Atom gives quick-add and sticky cart - all included and ready to use.

5. Avoid Over-Customising Early

Flip between presets like Voltage (Elysian) or Hawk (Erickson) to find your best fit. Custom coding later can be more focused and cost-effective than wholesale rewrites.

6. Update Smartly

Presets are versioned. Back up your store and review changelogs when updating - for example, Elysian v1.8.0 renamed presets District to Voltage and Concepta to Compass.

7. Use Filters Effectively

Shopify’s new catalogue size filters help you pick themes aligned with your inventory - small boutiques or large catalogues each get optimal UI patterns.

8. Work with a Credible Dev Team

Seek themes by experienced authors - Koding Themes' Shopify Experts portfolio includes themes across 15+ industry placements, ensuring credible, scalable design.

9. Modular Layouts for Easy Updates

All Koding presets include drag-and-drop sections: Erickson has 20+, Brava 30+, Elysian 25+, and Machina flexible content blocks, so you can easily transform style without coding.

10. Test Features That Boost AOV

Enable cart recommendations (Erickson), free shipping messages and product add-ons (Machina), or bundler (Brava) to test impact, without adding apps or extra costs.