Thirty-eight percent of people leave a website if its layout is unattractive. And for ecommerce sites, those exits aren’t just lost traffic — they’re lost sales.
Your store’s design is a visual representation of your ecommerce business, so it not only needs to communicate what your brand is about but must also convey trustworthiness. After all, if a site doesn’t look professional, customers aren’t going to want to shop on it.
Luckily, the free Shopify themes available to sellers are all high-quality designs, but not every theme is a good fit for your brand. Let’s take a look at the best free Shopify themes, according to their ratings, and delve into their features to help you determine which one is right for your business.
How to select the best free Shopify theme
Brick-and-mortar retail stores are designed to draw customers in, showcase products, and give people a preview of the shopping experience they can expect from the brand. Online stores should do the same thing, which is why the theme you select for your Shopify store is so important.
So don’t install a free Shopify theme at random. First, consider the following questions:
- What kind of experience do you want to create for customers?
- What features do you want in your store?
- How many products do you need to showcase?
- How do you want to display those products?
- What are your competitors doing that you like or dislike?
Once you have a clear idea of what your Shopify theme needs to accomplish, you’re ready for an in-depth look at the best free Shopify themes available.
As you browse the top six themes below, keep in mind that you’re not tied to the fonts of colors featured in the examples. These features are customizable, so you can easily make them fit your brand.
1. Minimal
Shopify’s Minimal theme eliminates visual distractions so you can focus on what matters most: your products. With its lack of clutter, Minimal is an excellent pick for the company that doesn’t want design to detract from its offerings.
Rating
Minimal has an 84% positive reaction out of 91 reviews.
Styles
The theme comes in three styles: Vintage, Fashion, and Modern, all of which feature plenty of white space to keep products front and center.
Features
- Home-page slideshow: Showcase various products at the top of the home page.
- Product-image zoom: A closer view of an image appears when users hover their mouse over it.
- Product recommendations: This feature displays products from the same collection on product pages, so customers can keep shopping.
- Home-page video: Feature a YouTube or Vimeo video front and center on your home page.
- Product filtering: This allows customers to filter products by price, rating, and more.
Pro
Users praise Minimal for being very user-friendly and easy to customize, and its high rating makes it one of the best free Shopify themes.
Con
The downside of this theme’s minimalist aesthetic is that brands are unable to include additional content and navigation tools, like a sidebar or a blog.
Store Using Minimal
Photography store Leica Store Miami selected the Minimal theme to showcase its camera gear and photography accessories.
2. Simple
Another one of the best free Shopify themes also has a very clean look. The Simple theme is similar to Minimal in that it also has a lot of white space, but it differs most notably with the presence of a sidebar menu
Rating
Simple has an 83% positive reaction out of 24 reviews.
Styles
The theme comes in three styles: Light, Beauty, and Toy. All feature the minimal design but offer slightly different looks.
Features
- Sidebar menu: Organize and display products and collections so shoppers can navigate with ease.
- Product-image zoom: A closer view of an image appears when users hover their mouse over it.
- Product recommendations: This feature displays products from the same collection on product pages, so customers can keep shopping.
- Image animations: Photos and images animate into the page, creating a smooth transition effect.
Pro
Users love that Simple has a fast load time.
Con
Some users are dissatisfied with how the theme displays on mobile.
Stores using Simple
Adventure Cats opted for the Simple theme and customized it with a rotating image header to highlight certain products.
3. Brooklyn
The Brooklyn theme is the best free Shopify theme if you sell clothing and accessories. It shines the spotlight on brand imagery, offering many opportunities for displaying product photos. While this theme could be used for any clothing or accessory store, its minimalist aesthetic especially suits contemporary shops.
Brooklyn Styles
Brooklyn is offered in two styles: Classic and Playful, one of which is more neutral, while the other features a brighter color scheme. But both offer a clean aesthetic and a modern feel.
Rating
Brooklyn has an 73% positive reaction out of 71 reviews.
Brooklyn Features
Brooklyn highlights brand and product imagery with these key design features:
- Header slideshow: Showcase various products at the op of the home page.
- Dynamic product grid: This layout of product images changes automatically based on how many images are displayed.
- Slide-out cart: Customers can add items to their cart without leaving the page they’re viewing.
- Home-page video: Feature a YouTube or Vimeo video front and center on your home page.
Pro
Sellers rave about this free Shopify theme’s versatility.
Con
Users have reported issues with product-image placements on Brooklyn. The template automatically stacks images on top of one another if more than three are added for a product, which creates an annoyingly long scrolling path.
Stores using Brooklyn
String Theory highlights its designer scarves, masks, and other items with Brooklyn’s image-centric design.
4. Narrative
Shopify’s Narrative theme is the best free Shopify theme if you want to walk your customer through your product’s story. With its wide views and large image blocks, Narrative is ideal for showcasing small inventories or a single service.
Rating
Narrative has 62% positive rating out of 45 reviews.
Narrative Styles
Narrative is offered in four styles: Earthy, Warm, Light, and Cold.
Narrative Features
Narrative makes product storytelling easy with these standout features:
- Hero video: Feature an autoplay, full-screen video at the top of your home page.
- Wide layout: The theme has a full-width layout for showcasing large, high-resolution images.
- Vertical slideshow: Display products, images, blog posts, and more on your home page.
- Fixed navigation: Fix your menu, logo, and cart at the top of the page so it’s visible no matter how far down customers scroll.
Pro
Narrative’s design is captivating and immersive and ideal for showcasing product details with imagery because it’s equipped to handle large, high-resolution photos.
Cons
Users have complained that the template’s product page design is limited. For example, it places a cap on product description length, and the layout is difficult to reformat.
Store Using Narrative
The Narrative theme allows Drizzle Honey to feature eye-catching photography on its home page that draws shoppers in.
5. Supply
If you have a lot of products to showcase, the Supply theme has you covered because it was designed for stores with large catalogs.
Rating
Supply has a 61% positive rating out of 54 reviews.
Supply styles
Supply offers just two styles: Blue and Light.
Supply features
Supply is perfect for showcasing large catalogs because of its exceptional layout features:
- Collection filtering in the sidebar: Users can filter collections by brand, price, and other customizable categories.
- Home-page slideshow: Showcase various products at the op of the home page.
- Featured collections: The theme allows for multiple featured collections on the home page.
Pro
Users say that Supply is easy to customize.
Con
There have recently been several complaints that the theme is slow to load.
Store using Supply
Cenegenics Life installed the Supply theme to showcase its extensive collection of supplements and health products.
6. Venture
The Venture theme is an alternative to Supply that features a user-friendly filtering tool, so shoppers can find exactly what they’re looking for.
Rating
Venture has a 46% positive rating out of 65 reviews.
Venture styles
This theme is available in three distinct styles: Snowboards, Outdoors, and Boxing.
Venture features
This free Shopify theme is perfect for showcasing large catalogs because of its exceptional layout features:
- Multicolumn menu: Display product information and photos in an easily navigable menu.
- Slideshow: Select products or images to highlight on the home page.
- Single featured product: You can also opt to show off just one product by putting it front and center.
- Product filtering: This allows customers to filter products by price, rating, and more.
- Promotional banner: Bring attention to a sale, discount, or specific product by promoting it at the top of the home page.
Pro
No other best free Shopify theme is equipped to manage and organize extensive product catalogs as well as Venture.
Con
Users report that this theme can be more challenging to customize than other Shopify themes.
Store using Venture
Disc Golf Shopping’s large number of products can all be featured on its home page, thanks to the Venture theme.
Draw customers in with design
Effective web design is an essential component to generating online sales. With the right aesthetic and layout, ecommerce stores can create an engaging and intuitive shopping experience that entices shoppers to add more items to their carts.
Shopify sellers can easily design a beautiful, branded store by opting for one of these six best free Shopify themes.
