Why is my site suddenly so slow theme editor

[DoobysNails]

Since opening my shop in January shopify has been great. I have been on woocommerce before and shopify was a dream. All was well until 3 weeks ago my shopify store editor became unbearably slow. 

The site works fine for a customer point of ciew but trying to edit text and promotions is beyond painful.

I have contacted my theme editor and even downloaded a new theme to try but editing is so slow.

Can anyone please help or advise why this is. The theme is slow on my laptop, new iphone 14 shopify app and parents and friends laptop so not a case of the technology.

I honestly dont know what to do

www.doobysnails.com

[DoobysNails]

I have also tried with other peoples WIFI, with my ee internet. Have cleared all cache from laptop

[Stacy_Longeneck]

Hi all, I really want to keep this conversation going as Shopify is trying to say we are responsible for "fixing our themes" and not accepting that our themes are now broken because of them. Sorry, but it's absolutely ridiculous that I should now have to pay a developer to try to fix this problem that Shopify clearly caused, as my theme was working fine before and nothing changed on my end. Shopify, FIX THIS! This is not our problem, it's yours!

[Cedcommerce]

Hello @DoobysNails, 

This looks like an issue with your Shopify store or theme. We advise you to try contacting theme support or Shopify support. But if the issue is not related to the theme and has popped up at your end, you can first optimize your store and see if it works. We have some easy and basic optimization tips that can help you.

Also, optimizing your Shopify store is crucial to gain conversions. There are a few things you can perform to improve your store’s performance and gain better results.

1. Optimize images: Large images can slow down your website on mobile devices. Use image optimization tools like TinyPNG or Kraken.io to compress your images without losing quality.
2. Minimize JavaScript and CSS files: Minimizing JavaScript and CSS files can help reduce the amount of code that loads on your website. You can use tools like Minify JS and Minify CSS to compress these files.
3. Optimize your website's code: Optimizing your website's code can help reduce the amount of data that loads on all devices. You can use tools like GTmetrix or Google PageSpeed Insights to identify the critical areas where the website's code needs optimizing.
4. Use a responsive design: Responsive design ensures your website looks good on any device, including mobile devices. Your website's layout and design will automatically adjust to fit the screen size of the device used.
5. Use a mobile-friendly theme: Shopify offers various mobile-friendly themes optimized for fast loading on mobile devices. Choose a responsive and well-optimized theme for more speed.
6. Reduce the number of apps: Review your installed apps and remove any that are no longer necessary or are causing performance issues.
7. Enable lazy loading: Shopify has a built-in lazy loading feature that loads images only as needed, which can help reduce the amount of data that loads on customers’ devices.
8. Use a responsive and mobile-friendly checkout: Shopify's checkout is fast and easy for desktop and mobile devices. Ensure your checkout process is optimized and loads quickly.

By implementing these tips, you can help improve the performance of your store without needing much technical knowledge.

The above solution will surely help. Let us know if you need any further help with speed and optimization.

All the best, 

CedCommerce 

[flareAI]

Hello @DoobysNails,

Greetings! I am Gina from the flareAI app helping Shopify merchants get $6Million+ in sales from Google Search, on autopilot.

There could be several reasons why your Shopify site's theme editor has become slow. Below are a few potential causes and solutions you can try.

1. If your theme contains high-resolution or large image files, it can slow down the editing process. Consider optimizing your images by compressing them without losing too much quality. You can use online tools or Shopify apps specifically designed for image optimization.

2. If you've recently installed or updated any apps on your Shopify store, there might be a conflict between them and your theme. Try disabling any recently added apps temporarily to see if it improves the editing speed. If the problem resolves, you can reach out to the app developers for assistance or look for alternative apps that are compatible with your theme.

3. It's possible that there are inefficiencies or conflicts within your theme's code that are causing the slowdown. If you're comfortable with coding, you can review your theme's code for any potential issues or get help from the theme developers.

4. Clearing your browser cache or using a different browser can sometimes resolve performance issues. Additionally, disabling any browser extensions or plugins that might interfere with the theme editor can help.

5. Occasionally, Shopify servers can experience temporary slowdowns or issues. You can check Shopify's status page or contact their support to inquire about any ongoing technical problems that might be affecting your editing experience.

6. Consider switching to a more lightweight theme that is optimized for speed. Shopify offers a wide range of themes, and some are designed to be faster and more efficient. Look for themes with good reviews regarding performance and consider testing them to see if they provide a smoother editing experience.

Remember to always make backups of your theme files and database before making any significant changes.

Hope this helps

Gina

[fencetalk]

I don't have a solution for you, but I wanted to let you know you aren't alone. I've noticed a drastic slowdown when using the editor too (the normal page view speed is normal and unaffected), in scrolling the sections, but also end when selecting options or even adding text to a block. This started about 2 weeks ago.

I've done a lot of testing and spent hours with Shopify support. I have duplicated the editor's lag on different computers, on different networks (e.g., home wifi and cellular), and different stores.

Shopify support wanted to blame apps too, but I had the same experience on a new app-less store, using Dawn, only Dawn sections, and no images, video, etc. In other words, a completely vanilla experience.

Shopify support eventually acknowledged they could see the lag in this empty test store once more than 12 sections were added. The sluggishness got worse as more sections were added, and nearly unusable at 25 sections.

The claim was that everyone will see lag as more sections are added, because of the editor's overhead growing, but that each person will experience it differently based on their computer and internet. I get this, but what I'm experiencing now is much different than what I experienced weeks earlier.

It got kicked up to the developers.

[Madawcisrich]

Hi, just want to let you know that I have the same problem. I am pretty sure that it is due to the last update of Shopify.

I have also tried on several clean new theme without any pictures, the theme editor is quite slow as well. 

I have contacted my theme developper. They are working on a fix, but it takes a lot of time. Hope that shopify will fix this very soon.

[DoobysNails]

Awful to say but glad I am not alone. 

Mine is the same to the customer the speed is fine (which I guess is a positive) but I am constantly changing banners and promotions and I create them on word and copy and paste but it is so time consuming.

I have spent ages onmy site deleting anything I don't use and removing apps.Cleared all my cahes used about 7 different laptops and internet providers. Hopefully it will be resolved soon and this isnt just it. Any updates with mine I will keep you updated.

Thank you for the message

[MaxDesign]

I can confirm my experience in the theme editor has become quite bad as well. Slow and laggy. I tried multiple browsers and cleaned cache and cookies but the problem remain. Please @fencetalk keep us posted if you have news from their tech team, that'd be great to be on page.

[secantscope]

Same here. We have Dawn 7.0.0 and our site scores great on Google Pagespeed and GTMetrix, but editing is super slow since a few days/weeks. Even templates with <10 sections (most native dawn, only 1 klaviyo section) are a PitA.

Shopify please fix this!!!!!

[Pav1]

Hi guys,

I have the same issue. The editor is super slow. Also, I noticed that it puts a heavy load on my CPU (mac m1). Something is definitely wrong here. 

I am using Gecko theme 6.01 but I doubt this is something to do with the theme itself, 'cause it was installed 2-3 months ago. 

I reported this to Shopify and they asked me to contact the developers of my theme. I pointed them to this topic. Hopefully, they can sort this out. 

[The4Studio]

You are not alone, Shopify changed the loading mechanism in Customization and it caused a lot of my customers to complain. I hope Shopify will pay attention to this topic and fix them because everything was fine before, suddenly now it's too hard to use.

[Stacy_Longeneck]

Adding another case here that I am experiencing the same thing, and it's very new (within the past 5-7 days), and our theme is not new. Leave it to Shopify to blame the theme. They absolutely changed something in the theme editor to cause this issue.

I am SO, so tired of the awful Shopify updates. The past year with them has been absolutely horrific in terms of completely unnecessary/useless updates that only make things worse than they were before. Random things that worked perfectly fine keep changing and almost always for the worse. Do the developers have that much spare time??? It honestly seems like the people making these changes don't even check their work after or literally ever use Shopify themselves. I can't think of any other explanation, as the changes are usually so obviously bad no one in their right mind would think they're a good idea. I am really growing to hate Shopify more and more. Been on it for 10+ years but it's getting unbearable.

[hellonella]

Adding another case. Same issue maybe 2 weeks ago. Too slow to edit anything. 

[oscprofessional]

Hello @DoobysNails 

Hope you are doing well. 

I have checked your site in the Google page insight tool. your website score is very low.

Many shopify apps make your site speed low so "reducing the impact of third-party code" needs to be solved.

Below are some factors that might impact the speed of your online store, and how you can address them. 

• Reduce JS Payload.
• Use Critical CSS.
• Replace GIFs With Static Images
• Reduce Large Image Sizes
• Migrate Tracking Codes To Google Tag Manager
• Compress Images
• Limit Third-Party JavaScript & Shopify Apps
• Preload Web Fonts. 
• I suggest limiting it to one and using a standard web font.

By fixing these issues, your website speed score can definitely improve.

If anything needs to be included or clarified then feel free to ask.  We will surely help you. 

Thank you

Have a nice day!

[MaxDesign]

@oscprofessional Even though this is great feedback you are missing the point of this topic. We are discussing performance issue regarding the theme editor only, this is an issue on Shopify's side. 

[Stacy_Longeneck]

Hi all, I really want to keep this conversation going as Shopify is trying to say we are responsible for "fixing our themes" and not accepting that our themes are now broken because of them. Sorry, but it's absolutely ridiculous that I should now have to pay a developer to try to fix this problem that Shopify clearly caused, as my theme was working fine before and nothing changed on my end. Shopify, FIX THIS! This is not our problem, it's yours!

[lightingbulbsnc]

We're experiencing the same and yes, we're getting the runaround too when it comes to help.

If it worked on Day 1, I added 500 pages, then Day 2 it slowed down, I would be able to do some reasoning on my own as to why it doesn't work. We haven't touched the theme, or made any changes of that much volume at all to suddenly have the editor slow.

Thankfully, the consumer end works fine, but it is extremely frustrating preparing for a new theme launch with sales/promotional details since we haven't been able to make any changes in the past two weeks without spending hours.

Changing a banner image: 15 minutes. Used to take 15 seconds?

[Pav1]

I checked my theme editor a few minutes ago and it's back to normal. I also noticed that someone from Shopify (from the Philippines) spent around 15 minutes on my website earlier today. 

[MaxDesign]

I reported the issue 4 hours ago with a video highlighting the issue on a random store, and right now on the same store the issue seems to be gone. I was told that they could not replicate the issue on a fresh theme, so even though it seems something has been done, who knows if it's intentional and if it's going to stay that way 🤞

[The4Studio]

I can confirm that everything is back to normal, the past week has been terrible and we have lost a large amount of money for refunds due to performance issues at Theme Customize

[secantscope]

I tried the theme editor this morning and it seems fixed (for now). Let's hope this is for real!

[Pav1]

This was Shopify's reply:

"We have worked with the devs here and they said everything should be perfectly working fine now as they should be".

As I said earlier they were on my website a few times during the past few days. Definitely fixed the issue.