Theme Testing - Getting Started
Learn how Theme Testing can optimize your store's design and user experience.
Theme testing lets you compare different Shopify themes by showing them to real visitors and measuring which one performs better. Instead of publishing a new theme and hoping for the best, you can test it against your current design with live traffic and make the switch only when the data says it's the right move.
What Is a Theme Experiment?
A theme experiment splits your store traffic between your current published theme and one or more unpublished themes. Each visitor is randomly assigned to see one theme, and Elevate tracks how each version performs across conversion rate, revenue, session duration, and other metrics.
This is different from other experiment types in Elevate. Page tests and content tests change elements within a theme. Theme tests swap out the entire theme — every page, every layout, every design element.
When to Use Theme Testing
Theme testing is the right choice when:
You're considering a new theme — Purchased a new theme from the Shopify Theme Store or had one custom-built? Test it before publishing to make sure it actually converts better.
You've done a full redesign — Major changes to layout, navigation, typography, or visual style across the entire store. Too large to test as individual page experiments.
You're testing seasonal layouts — Want to see if a holiday-themed version of your store outperforms the standard design during peak season.
You're comparing design approaches — Minimal vs. feature-rich, single-column vs. multi-column, or any other store-wide design philosophy.
How It Works
You set up a theme experiment with your published theme as the control and an unpublished theme as the variation
When a visitor arrives at your store, Elevate's script checks their variation assignment
If assigned to the variation, the visitor is redirected to view the store through the unpublished theme using Shopify's theme preview system (
preview_theme_id)The visitor experiences the entire store through their assigned theme — every page they navigate to stays on the same theme
Elevate tracks all behavior and attributes conversions to the correct variation
From the visitor's perspective, the experience is seamless. They see a fully functional store — they don't know they're viewing an unpublished theme, and all checkout and cart functionality works normally.
What You'll Need
Before creating a theme experiment:
An unpublished theme ready to test — The variation theme must be fully set up, customized, and ready for visitors. It should be an unpublished theme in your Shopify theme library (Online Store → Themes).
Third-party apps configured on the variation theme — Any apps that inject code into your theme (review widgets, upsell popups, chat widgets, etc.) may need to be configured for the unpublished theme as well. Check that they display correctly when previewing the theme.
The Elevate Liquid snippet — Must be installed on both your published theme and the variation theme. Elevate will handle this automatically, but verify during QA.
Theme testing works on all Shopify plans.
Important Considerations
Full Store Experience
Unlike page tests where only one page changes, a theme test affects the entire visitor experience. Every page the visitor navigates to — homepage, product pages, collections, cart, checkout — all render through the assigned theme. Make sure the variation theme is complete and polished across all page types.
Theme Preview Limitations
Theme experiments use Shopify's theme preview system under the hood. A few things to be aware of:
The variation theme must stay unpublished — Don't publish it while the experiment is running. The experiment depends on the control being the published theme.
Some analytics tools may not track preview themes — Third-party analytics scripts that rely on the published theme may not fire on the preview theme. Elevate's own tracking works on both, but verify your other tools.
QA Is Critical
Because you're testing an entire theme, QA is more involved than other experiment types. Go through every major page type — homepage, product pages, collections, cart, and checkout — on the variation theme to make sure everything works correctly before launching.
Next Steps
How to Create a Theme Experiment — Step-by-step setup guide
Theme Preview & Development — How to preview themes without Elevate's redirects interfering
Audience Targeting — Control which visitors see your experiment
Last updated