Custom Shopify Website Themes: When to Build From Scratch

Custom Shopify Themes: When to Build From Scratch vs. Customize a Premium Theme

When you're planning a new Shopify website, one of the first — and most important — decisions you'll make is what type of theme to use. Should you build on top of a premium Shopify theme, or should you go fully custom from the ground up?

At Conspire, we’ve done both — and the right approach depends on your goals, your brand, and how far your design vision deviates from Shopify’s defaults.

Two Starting Points: Premium vs. Custom

There are really two viable starting paths when developing a Shopify site:

1. Customize a Premium Theme: This means building on top of a robust, prebuilt theme like Prestige, Impulse, or Motion.

2. Build a Custom Theme: This means starting with a barebones framework like Dawn — or even going headless — and coding everything from scratch.

It’s worth noting that starting with Dawn or Debut is effectively the same as going custom. These themes offer little more than navigation and a few basic sections. If you’re choosing Dawn, you’re choosing to design and build everything.

When to Use a Premium Theme

Premium themes are great when your design vision doesn’t push too far outside the standard Shopify structure. They come with:

• A wide variety of prebuilt sections

• Solid responsive behavior

• Built-in SEO and accessibility considerations

• A faster path to launch

This is often the right move when time and budget are tight — or when the project doesn’t call for a bespoke design system.

Typical Budget Range: $10,000–$25,000 depending on complexity, level of customization, and content needs.

Examples from our work:

• Body Bio

• TCS Jerky

• OMRE

• Kinto

• Cousins Maine Lobster

Each of these sites was built on a premium theme with custom styling, section modifications, and Shopify Functions layered in — but without reinventing the wheel.

Caution: If your design requires rewriting most of a theme’s components to match mocks, you’re better off going fully custom. Otherwise, you end up with a Frankenstein build that’s harder to maintain and scale.

When to Go Fully Custom

If your site requires a unique UI, more flexible CMS, or exacting performance needs — you’ll want a custom theme. This gives you:

• Total design freedom

• Lean, optimized code

• A CMS mapped exactly to your content needs (metafields, blocks, etc.)

• Full control over SEO structure and accessibility

Typical Budget Range: Starting at $25,000 and potentially reaching into six figures for complex builds or headless architectures.

Examples from our work:

• Sims Fishing: A fully custom theme, developed to support a highly branded UX and complex product organization

• Zia Tile: A headless Shopify build for a fast, visually rich catalog browsing experience

The tradeoff? It costs more, takes longer, and requires careful planning — but the end result is a site built to scale.

Note: Tools like Instant can help close the gap between design and development. Instant outputs native Shopify Liquid code, meaning it’s still performant and compatible with Shopify’s platform standards. You can design and deploy entire sections or pages visually — which is especially powerful for custom theme builds. Still, when starting from scratch, you’re responsible for all the foundational work: accessibility, SEO, performance, CMS linkages, and every layer of code.

What to Consider

How to Choose

Ask yourself:

• Does my design fit into a theme structure?

• Am I heavily customizing every section?

• Will I need advanced SEO or CRO work later?

• Do I have the budget to do it right?

If your design works within a theme’s bounds, and you don’t need major custom functionality, a premium theme is the right move. If you’re pushing boundaries — go custom.

If you're unsure which path to take, check out our Shopify Website Development and Shopify CRO Services to see how we approach strategy, design, and development.

Final Thoughts

There’s no one-size-fits-all answer. Some of our most successful builds have used premium themes — others required full custom builds to support performance, flexibility, or long-term growth.

The key is picking the right starting point based on your goals. And if you’re not sure? That’s where we come in.

Want help figuring out the best path forward for your Shopify site? Let’s talk. Or explore our Shopify services and case studies for inspiration.