Troubleshooting Shopify problems

Something not working in your Shopify store? This guide covers the most common problems and what to do about them. Start with the Quick summary, then jump to the section that matches your issue.

Before you start troubleshooting

A few quick checks that solve many problems:

1. Hard refresh your browser. Hold Shift and click the refresh button (or Shift + F5 on Windows). This clears your browser's cached version of the page.
2. Try a private/incognito window. This rules out browser extensions and cached logins as the cause.
3. Check Shopify's status page. Go to shopifystatus.com to see if there is a known outage affecting your store or payments.
4. Check your Shopify admin for alerts. Sometimes Shopify shows a banner about a problem — for example, if your Shopify Payments account needs attention.

Checkout and payment problems

Customers can't complete checkout

Possible causes and fixes:

• No payment provider is set up. Go to Settings → Payments and make sure a payment method is active and connected.
• Store is still in private mode, or isn't on a paid plan. In private mode (formerly called password protection), your online store is hidden and visitors need the password to get in. Change this from the access menu on the Online Store page, or in Online Store → Preferences under Store access. On a free trial, checkout can stay inactive until you choose a paid plan, and the Pause and Build plan switches checkout off.
• Shopify Payments isn't fully set up. When you set up Shopify Payments, you submit your details for verification. If you switched from another provider, you also need to click Activate once verification is complete. Shopify may also ask for more documents later; payouts might be held until they're verified. Check Settings → Payments and your admin alerts.

A payment was declined

A payment can fail for many reasons. Most relate to the customer's card or bank, such as wrong card details, an expired card, or the card being declined. A payment can also be blocked if it looks high-risk. Advise the customer to:

• Try a different card
• Contact their bank to authorize the payment
• Use an alternative payment method (PayPal, Shop Pay, etc.)

If multiple customers are being declined, check shopifystatus.com and your Settings → Payments for any alerts.

I'm not receiving payouts from Shopify Payments

Go to Finance, then click View payouts in the Payouts section. Common reasons for delayed or missing payouts:

• Your bank account details are missing, incomplete, or incorrect
• Shopify is still verifying your business details
• A payout was placed on hold during an account review, for example over a chargeback
• You recently changed your payout schedule or your bank account (changing or adding a payout bank account after setup pauses payouts for a few business days)

Theme and display problems

My store looks broken or unstyled

This usually means a theme file has an error, or a recent change broke something. Try:

1. Go to Online Store.
2. If you have a backup or duplicate theme, preview it, and publish it if it works.
3. If the problem appeared after a code edit, the code editor's Timeline view can restore individual files to an earlier version. Shopify has no version history for a whole theme.

If you recently added an app, try turning off its app embeds in the theme editor.

A section is missing or not showing

• Make sure you are looking at the right page in the theme editor (use the template menu at the top).
• Check whether the section was hidden by accident: look for the hide button next to its name in the sidebar.
• Some sections depend on content you choose. For example, a section that features products may not show what you expect until you pick the products or collection it should display.

My changes aren't showing up on the live site

1. Make sure you clicked Save in the theme editor (on your live theme, the button may say Publish).
2. Do a hard refresh on your live store.
3. Clear your browser cache or test in a private window.

Product and inventory problems

A product is not showing up in my store

Check the following in the product editor:

• The product's status must be Active (not Draft, Archived, or Unlisted).
• The product must be published to the correct sales channel (Online Store). Look for the Publishing section on the product page and make sure the Online Store is selected.
• If the product should be in a collection, check that the collection's conditions (or your manual selection) include it.

Inventory shows as out of stock but I have stock

Open the product, click the variant, and check the quantity in the Inventory section. If you manage inventory across multiple locations, quantities are shown for each location, so make sure stock is assigned to the right one. Units already in unfulfilled orders count as Committed, not Available. You can also check all your stock in Products → Inventory.

Email notification problems

Customers aren't receiving order confirmation emails

Most customer notifications, including Order confirmation, are sent automatically and can't be switched off, so the setting itself is rarely the problem. Check these instead:

1. Verify the customer's email address in the order — it may have a typo.
2. Ask the customer to check their spam or junk folder. If the emails still don't arrive, Shopify suggests using an address with a different email provider.
3. If your notifications are sent from your own domain (the Sender email in Settings → Notifications), make sure that domain is authenticated: add Shopify's CNAME records for SPF and DKIM, plus a DMARC record, to your domain's DNS. (Domains bought through Shopify are set up automatically.) Without these records, Shopify sends your emails from a shopifyemail.com address instead.

I'm not receiving staff notifications

Go to Settings → Notifications and click Staff notifications. Check that the right people are listed under Recipients, and click Add recipient to add someone. The account owner gets new-order notifications by default. Changing these settings needs the Orders and Manage settings permissions. Also check your spam or junk folder.

App-related problems

Apps can sometimes conflict with your theme or with each other. If a problem started after installing or updating an app:

1. If the app adds features to your storefront, try turning off its app embeds in the theme editor.
2. If the problem disappears, the app is the cause.
3. Contact the app developer's support, or uninstall the app (Settings → Apps) if it is not essential. Some apps add code to your theme that isn't removed when you uninstall them, so ask us if the problem continues.

Common questions

My store is showing a blank white page — what do I do?

A blank page usually means there is an error in your theme code or a conflict with an app script. Go to your Shopify admin (which should still work even if the storefront is broken). If you or your developer recently edited theme code, open the code editor (on the Online Store page, open the theme's actions menu and click Edit code) and review those changes; each file's Timeline view shows earlier versions. You can also publish a backup copy of your theme if one exists.

A customer says their order disappeared — what happened?

Orders don't delete themselves, but they can move out of view. By default, Shopify automatically archives orders that are paid and fulfilled (or fully refunded), and archived orders appear in a separate view for archived orders (Shopify's help pages call it Closed or Archived) rather than with your open orders. Only a few kinds of order, such as test orders and orders paid with a manual payment method, can be deleted, and only after they've been archived or canceled. The customer may also be looking at the wrong account or email. Search your orders list using the customer's details. If the order exists, they may have checked out as a guest and the order is not linked to an account.

My Shopify admin is slow or not loading properly

This can be a temporary Shopify platform issue. Check shopifystatus.com. Try a different browser. If the problem persists for more than 30 minutes and no outage is listed, contact Shopify Support.

I accidentally deleted a product — can I get it back?

Unfortunately, deleted products in Shopify cannot be restored. If you have a recent backup of your product data (e.g., a CSV export), you can re-import it. Going forward, consider exporting your products regularly via Products → Export, and archive products you no longer sell instead of deleting them. Or contact us — if we were managing your store recently, we may have a record.

When to contact support

Contact Shopify Support directly for:

• Billing disputes or unexpected charges
• Shopify Payments account holds or verification issues
• Platform-level outages affecting your store
• Anything related to your Shopify account login or security

Contact us at Chykalophia for:

• Theme customization issues
• App recommendations and configuration
• Store setup and design problems
• Anything we built or configured for you

Related guides

• How to log in to Shopify
• Understanding orders in Shopify
• Payment providers (Shopify Payments, PayPal, etc.)
• Using the Shopify theme editor
• Shopify apps explained
• Shopify plans & billing

Learn more

• Shopify Help Center
• Shopify Status page