Let me preface this by stating that I am new to Shopify and need some guidance about how to get started in terms of building out my Shopify online store. I have chosen Horizon as my theme. Should I use Sidekick Ai to build out my Shopify store? Can anyone suggest any tutorials on how to use Sidekick Ai in the Shopify store building process. If using Sidekick Ai is not a good idea can anyone suggest a viable alternative to Sidekick Ai? Any input and suggestions are needed and appreciated. Thanks in advance.
Honestly, Sidekick is genuinely useful for small stuff like tweaking sections, debugging issues, or asking what a setting does. But if you’re planning to fully depend on it to build your entire store from scratch, that’s not the right call. AI is good at executing specific instructions, not at making the strategic decisions that actually make a store convert. You end up with something that technically works but feels generic.
Better approach: spend a few hours exploring the Horizon customizer manually before touching any AI. Horizon already has most layouts you’d need built in. Shopify’s YouTube channel has free Horizon walkthroughs that show how to build each section properly. Once you’ve got the foundation, that’s where Sidekick earns its keep, small fixes, color tweaks, debugging little issues.
If all of that still feels like too much or you want it done properly without the learning curve, hiring a Shopify developer is also a solid option. A good dev can set up your homepage, product page, and collection structure in a few days or a week, and you take it from there. Just make sure they’re actually a developer and not an “AI prompter” charging dev rates.
Hope that helps! If it did, a Like and Marking it as Solution goes a long way and helps others find the fix faster too.
Best,
Moeed
Sidekick is a good tool, but you really should take it with a grain of salt. And you need to keep in mind that it has limited memory for your previous conversations and your store in general. It does keep some preferences but you need to tell it specifically. Like what theme you are using.
The ai code generator will fail in what you want 90% of the time. Last time I checked, it will only make a section and puts it on the homepage. And you get very limited options to adjust before making it. You have to be very specific.
Sidekick itself has a coding knowledge base, the ai code generator is a completely separate tool. With this in mind, you can tell it that you don’t want it to go to the ai generator, but rather just give you the code and instructions. This is what I did and never went back to that generator. Caveat - you do have to do the work and know a little about navigating the theme and code editors.
As for Sidekick in general, you have to treat it like a child. The failure of Shopify providing for it to retain information in memory makes it very limiting and frustrating, and you will often end up repeating yourself, especially if doing complex tasks that involve lengthy or multiple conversations. Speaking of conversations. If you have extremely long conversations that have multiple iterations of code, it will load slowly and eventually crash the browser. If you get frustrated because it gives inaccurate or wrong information or code - just keep in mind the Shopify made it have severe limitations. It’s not like ChatGpt where it can look up information online.
Welcome to the Shopify Community!
Great choice with the Horizon theme — it’s one of the most modern and flexible themes available on Shopify.
Here’s what Sidekick can help you with:
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Theme customization — update colors, fonts, layouts, sections, and content in your Horizon theme
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Products — create and manage products, variants, collections, and pricing
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Store settings — set up shipping, taxes, payments, and store policies
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Discounts & marketing — create discount codes, automations, and customer segments
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Analytics — view reports and get insights about your store’s performance
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Navigation — quickly takes you to pages inside your Shopify admin
What Sidekick can’t do:
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Make purchases or interact with your storefront like a customer
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Build completely new custom features or code that doesn’t already exist in the theme
For advanced customizations, you may still need a developer or a Shopify app, depending on the feature you want to add.
For video tutorials, Shopify’s official YouTube channel and the Shopify Help Center are great places to start.
Thanks!