Can I Use of Themes Other Than Shopify Themes Store?

[AyushJ]

Hello Everyone,

Can you please help me, I made a website using another external theme (other than shopify themes). And, today I heard that there is some kind of penalty for this from Shopify guidelines. Is it true?

Is there any restriction on using external themes (Other than shopify themes)?

[Rainy-EComposer]

Hi @AyushJ,

It's Rainy from EComposer.

As what I know, Shopify still allows us to use external themes outside its Theme store without any restrictions. There are lots of high-quality Shopify themes in prestigious markets like ThemeForest, HeyCarson, etc.

While themes on Shopify theme store may not as diversified as other markets and its paid themes are more expensive as well, you can feel comfortable when using them 'cause Theme on Shopify theme store all need to pass the strict inspection of Shopify before publishing. 

With the external themes, it's probably not clean and versatile for your store. When installing on, your store may meet unexpected bugs that may affect the whole store performance.

If you want to use the 3rd party Shopify themes, please select themes developed by the Elite theme providers, like The4 Shopify theme, Hallothemes, Wokiee, etc. 

There are some 3rd party themes I recommend you use: Kalles, Ocolus, Gecko, Unsen, etc.

Hope this helps you! 😊