Pre-Submission Checklist

TL;DR: The final gate before you submit to the Shopify Theme Store.

Run this checklist once, all the way through, right before you submit. It highlights the highest-risk items from all 22 official requirements. See Theme Store Requirements for the full detail behind each line.

Structural

Scaffolded from Skeleton Theme, or fully original code, with nothing derived from Dawn or Horizon
All 14 required templates present and rendering (see Required Templates & Features)
Main product section and featured product section accept @app blocks
A Custom Liquid section and block exist, each with a liquid-type setting
Header and footer are rendered via section groups, not hardcoded into theme.liquid

Performance & accessibility

Lighthouse Performance ≥ 60 and Accessibility ≥ 90, averaged across product/collection/home, on both desktop and mobile, tested against real content
Keyboard-only pass completed on the full purchase flow (home to product to cart to checkout)
Color contrast checked: 4.5:1 for body text, 3:1 for large text and icons, in every color scheme the theme offers
Focus states are visible throughout, not just where a default browser style you haven’t touched happens to show one

Content & design

Demo store uses real photography and real copy, with no Lorem Ipsum placeholder text
Theme name is 1–2 words, under 30 characters, and doesn’t collide with a Shopify, industry, or SEO term
Theme is structurally unique, not a reskin (see Store & Design Requirements)
Every section tested against a 200-character heading and an empty-content state

Settings & schema

Every setting has a label, uses t: locale keys, and follows Shopify’s terminology list
metaobject/metaobject_list settings use only standard definitions
No settings_data.json default points at a resource that only exists in your demo store
At least 4 color settings, each with a paired foreground color
theme_info block present in config/settings_schema.json

Assets & code quality

No Sass/SCSS files anywhere in the theme
No pre-minified CSS/JS (except approved third-party libraries)
shopify theme check passes with zero offenses
No leftover debug code, console.log statements, or commented-out blocks of dead code

Browser & device coverage

Tested on the required desktop browsers (Safari, Chrome, Firefox, Edge, see Required Templates & Features)
Tested on the required mobile browsers (Mobile Safari, Chrome Mobile, Samsung Internet)
Tested in at least one required webview (Instagram, Facebook, or Pinterest)

Business readiness

Theme documentation and a public contact form exist and are linked from your listing
Support workflow in place to answer merchant requests within 2 business days
Version number and release notes prepared for this submission (see After Approval, though release-notes.md is excluded from your first submission specifically)

How to actually run this checklist without missing anything

A checklist this long is easy to skim past under deadline pressure. Here’s a more reliable way to run it:

Have someone else run it, not just you. Ask someone who didn’t build the feature to go through this list. A second pair of eyes catches things the builder has stopped noticing.
Work top to bottom, in one sitting, instead of checking off items over several days. When you check things partially, an item can quietly get marked “done” without actually being re-tested after a later change.
Re-run it after any change you make following your first full pass, even something that feels unrelated. A late CSS tweak or copy change is a common way a previously-passing item breaks again.

Do / Don’t

✅ Do	❌ Don’t
Run this checklist on a fresh theme install on a brand-new dev store, not just your main working store. This is the closest you can get to what an actual merchant will see when they install your theme.	Checking items off from memory, telling yourself “we handled accessibility earlier,” instead of actually re-testing them against the current, final code.
Keep a copy of your results (screenshots, Lighthouse scores) for your own records. If Shopify’s review flags something you thought you’d already checked, you’ll want proof of what you tested and when.	Running this checklist only once, early on, and assuming later changes don’t affect what you already checked.
Set aside real time for this pass. If you treat it as a quick final glance, items get checked off without actually being re-tested.	Having the same person who built a feature be the only one who checks it off here. Self-review misses the same blind spots that let the issue into the code in the first place.

Key takeaways

This is the last gate, not the first pass. Everything here should already be true well before submission day. You’re just confirming it one more time.
A single missing item can cause full rejection. Treat every checkbox as required, not optional.
Have someone other than the feature’s builder run the final pass.