The Impulse theme on Shopify is one of those themes that can make your Shopify store feel like a visual art. From large and stunning image blocks, well-organized sections, snappy response, and overall great performance, it’s truly worth considering.
Can the Impulse Shopify theme live up to its name? Can it truly unleash your customers’ impulsive desires to shop to their hearts’ content?
Well, there’s only one way to find that out. In this Impulse theme review, we’ll take our microscopes and look at all the tiny features that contribute to this theme’s elegant appeal.
Let’s get started.
💡 We meticulously evaluate Shopify themes and apps based on our hands-on experience. Read more about our comprehensive review process and methodology.
Shopify Impulse Theme Review
In this Shopify Impulse theme review, the first one we look into is its developers. By simply identifying the developer, we’ll have an idea if that theme will be properly executed or not.
And here’s the thing, the Impulse theme on Shopify was developed by a season theme developer named Archetype.
Archetype is responsible for five other premium themes in the Shopify theme store:
- Fetch
- Expanse
- Motion
- Gem
- Streamline
All their themes are well-received by their users. The Impulse theme shares the same positive perception from its users.
As such, the Shopify Impulse theme is off to a good start, here.
Impulse Theme – Who’s It For?
Upon closer inspection of the Impulse theme on Shopify, we figured that it is a very flexible template for many types of businesses. Based on its look and features, here’s our list of suggested users for this theme:
- Physical store owners - the Shopify Impulse theme allows for in-store pickup for online store owners who also operate physical stores.
- Fashion brands - the Impulse Shopify theme features size charts, color swatches, and lookbooks. As such, it is well-suited for fashion brands.
- Luxury brands - the Impulse theme features large image blocks, luxury brands have the real estate to display their product images in such a way that captures attention.
- Sports and athletic brands - the Impulse theme Shopify has a dedicated theme style for sports and athletic brands.
- Enterprise-scale merchants - merchants with complex needs will find the Impulse theme features really useful for their operations.
- Basically any type of online store - the good thing about Shopify themes is that they are very flexible in terms of niche. Thus, their demo stores are merely suggestive and it is up to the users to do the customizations to tailor their theme to their brand.
Impulse Theme Shopify - Pricing
The Impulse theme Shopify is classified as a premium theme in terms of pricing.
Priced at $380, Impulse is in the same price range as other popular themes such as Flow, Prestige, and Symmetry.
Impulse Theme Styles
Shopify Impulse theme comes in 3 styles:
- Modern
- Clean
- Bold
Each style brings you different kinds of feelings and fits well with different stores and industries. Let’s take a closer look at each of them.
1 - Modern
The Modern style of the Impulse theme has the vibe of a high-end brand. A classic brand logo in the center of the header, multi-level menus, big banners with high-quality images of cool parallax effects, large promotion tiles with tempting discounts, and gift cards CTA buttons.
Everything is put together on the homepage, which creates a great experience of browsing with visually-focused tactics. The Modern style seems to work best with large inventory stores, stores with many collections, and catalogs, especially, clothing and fashion shops.
2 - Clean
The of the Shopify Impulse theme is simpler and more straightforward. However, it still captures visitors with big hero banners, but this time the overlay header does make the store look more “clean" and direct from the top.
The style focuses more on the product visuals and collections. It features in-menu images that gives visual cues for easier store navigation. This simple, clean, and straightforward is refreshing to explore as it does not strain the eye with too much visual information.
Be that as it may, it still makes for a great theme option for brands with large catalogs.
3 - Bold
From the name itself, the Bold style of the Impulse Shopify theme has a more bold approach in its design. This is evidence in its all-black background that makes all website elements pop out – especially the images.
The video hero is an outstanding point of this style. The homepage has less text content than the other two. Instead, there're many animated videos and banner sections with parallax effects that enhance the visual browsing experience.
Impulse Theme Shopify - Key Features
The Shopify Impulse theme isn’t just all about looks. In fact, it packs some serious features that make it a truly capable theme choice for Shopify stores.
Let’s take a look at some of the important features of the Impulse theme Shopify.
1 - Mega Menu List
The dropdown menu of the Shopify Impulse theme is another level. Merchants can add layered menu items in the header but it still looks organized and stylish. A cool thing about the feature is you can choose to show the mega menu images, which is outstanding.
If you have a large store with many products and want to sort them out into collections on the navigation bar, Impulse can be a good choice. Specifically, many clothing and fashion stores using Impulse theme often utilize its mega menu capability, even the famous brand like Kappa:
Credit: Kappa USA
2 - Edge-to-edge Hero Banners
Let's be honest here. Most of you would love big banners with high-quality resolution because they're very engaging and bring a great sense of credibility to a website. With the Shopify Impulse theme, merchants can freely display huge and full-width slideshows on the home page, add large image with text sections, and set up parallax effects or image focal points of a banner.
Credit: Penny Skateboards
Worry about mobile responsiveness? Impulse allows merchants to choose desktop and mobile slideshow images separately to make sure the mobile version of your site is high converting. You can follow the best image heights, recommended by the theme developer, for both devices with many options.
3 - Promotion Customization
This feature is what makes Impulse different from others, and a true sales booster. Impulse can help you create alluring promotion banners with CTA buttons to support your marketing campaigns.
Archetype truly did a great job when designing this theme because they provide promotion features that merchants can make use of in literally every corner of their stores. You can see promotion grids on the homepage, banner promotions on collection pages, large images with text boxes on product pages, and even footer promotions.
If you can place these promotion tiles in the right place on your site and with smart tactics, people might not even hesitate to make their impulsive buying.
Credit: NanaMacs
4 - Color Swatches
Color swatches is a familiar feature that you can see in many Shopify themes. It helps improve the user experience. Adding color options on the product pages with variant images changing through color selection can help visitors visualize the product better.
With Impulse, you can choose to enable “color swatches” on product pages or collections pages.
Credit: Kappa USA
5 - Product Page Content Sections
This is a powerful feature of Impulse theme. If you want to “spice up" your product page, make it a more compelling place to visitors, the theme supports you with an array of cool content sections.
From image with text, image hero, video hero, text column with images to testimonials, and many more, merchants can flexibly add and place the sections on the product page and give a more exciting browsing experience to visitors.
6 - Collections within Collections
If you choose to show this option, when people click on the main menu of a collection, it will display the sub-collections that you have set up in the navigation section. This can help visitors navigate to other collections easily and increase their engagement with your web store.
7 - Advanced Collection Filtering
With a large inventory store, having a robust collection filter is necessary for a responsive collection page. Impulse offers both sidebar and pop-out filter options. If you focus on showcasing products on the collection page, you can use a pop-out filter to increase the space for your product to shine. Meanwhile, for those who want customers to find the products in the quickest way, having a sidebar menu is a good decision.
Credit: Kappa USA
8 - Video features
Using Impulse Shopify theme means that you have multiple options to have a visually stunning web look. Why? They give you many video options from video heros on top of the homepage to video sections both on the homepage and product pages, even the video in product media.
Having animated content sections on your site can make it even more attractive to people and increase the interaction between your potentials and your store.
Shopify Impulse Theme – User Reviews
With more than 1,000 reviews in the Shopify theme store as of October 2024, the Impulse Shopify theme has managed to get a very high 95% positive review.
This is not a small feat considering that users nowadays are very meticulous with the money that they spend. 
As a premium Shopify theme that costs $380, you’d expect users to be very critical of their reviews. At this price, expectations are high. And looking at this rating, we can say that the Impulse Shopify theme has successfully satisfied its users.
Let’s take a closer look at the actual reviews of the Shopify Impulse theme:
In-built features are well appreciated
Clean, modern, and user-friendly layout
Amazing support team
Shopify Impulse Theme Pros & Cons
We've seen many cool sides of the Impulse theme so far, but to give you a more objective view towards this premium theme, let examine its pros and cons:
Pros:
- It's very modern and cutting-edge
- The theme brings a professional look
- You can have flexible header and footer options
- It offers multiple product page and collection page optimization features
- It's mobile-friendly because there are several mobile custom options
- The support documents of Impulse is excellent
- You can find many agencies with external customization services related to Impulse theme like Hulk App, Exibea, or even popular name like Storetasker or Carson
Cons:
- No Support Chat: The theme doesn't have customer support chat.
- Premium Cost: Higher price point compared to some other Shopify themes.
Performance Issues: Potential slow performance when managing large image files or extensive product catalogs.
- With content sections on any page, there are no customized options for adjusting padding and margin for the elements. So if merchants want a flexible design, they must edit the code or use a 3rd-party page builder app like PageFly, for example, to easily drag, drop and customize the elements the way they want.
For more in-depth Shopify Theme Reviews, check out:
- Shopify District Theme: Is It The Perfect Theme For Fashion Niche?
- Shopify Minimal Theme: Pros, Cons & Everything In Between
- Parallax Theme Shopify: Deep-dive Review and Tutorial
- Shopify Venture Theme: The Perfect Starting Free Theme?
- Shopify Dawn Theme Review: Next-Generation Theme Design
Shopify Impulse Theme - Speed Test?
Shopify themes are built for speed and snappy response. However, their speeds vary when tested. There are Shopify themes that are inherently fast, while there are some that have average performance.
To see how the Impulse theme Shopify performs, let’s measure its speed using PageSpeed Insights.
PageSpeed Insights uses several parameters to measure a website’s speed. To know more about these parameters, read more about core web vitals.
Desktop speed test
After testing, the Impuls Shopify theme returned desirable results in its desktop version. On all five core web vitals, Impulse passed them without breaking a sweat and with a lot more to spare. This means that if you use the Impulse Shpoify theme, your customers will find your website delightful to browse.
Mobile speed test
On the other hand, the mobile speed test of this theme passed all parameters except the LCP or largest content paintful. This metric is used to measure the time it takes your website to render element such as images and videos. At 3.1 seconds, it is 0.6 seconds slower than the desirable speed. Be that as it may, 0.6 seconds won’t be enough to make a poor user experience.
Thus, the Impulse theme Shopify also nailed the mobile speed test.
Impulse Shopify Theme Examples - Actual Stores
After having read this Shopify Impulse theme review, you may already be convinced that this theme is a great choice. The only thing remaining is to see how other stores look like with this theme.
Thus, if you’re looking for inspiration, take a look at these Impulse Shopify theme examples:
1 - Kappa USA
2 - Anita Herbert
3 - The General Co
4 - Anaya Home
5 - Lotus Leggings
Our Verdict
The theme truly shined in this Shopify Impulse theme review. It stands out as an exceptional theme, boasting a wide array of features tailored for product showcasing and visual storytelling.
This makes it particularly beneficial for merchants in the clothing, luxury goods, and decor sectors, as well as for those who conduct sales in person, where extensive product visibility and robust offline selling capabilities are crucial.
The Impulse theme is a great starting point in designing a stunning website because right off the bat, Impulse is well-designed in terms of architecture and visual styling. The positive customer reviews also add a certain degree of peace of mind when using it – knowing that when problems arise, their customer support team is ready to lend a hand.
Moreover, we are amazed at how well the Impulse theme performed in the speed test. This ensures that you won’t lose any customers because of slow website speed.
All in all, for $380, Impulse offers merchants a great number of awesome features to promote their brands with cutting-edge and modern storefronts. We would say it’s worth the price.
Blum Theme: A Compelling Alternative to The Impulse Theme
The Blum theme presents itself as the perfect solution a friendly alternative to the renowned Impulse theme. Designed to cater to a wide range of industries, the Blum theme offers a unique blend of modern design, user-friendly features, and powerful customization options that make it a strong contender for your online store.
Blum Theme, which is only available through the Shopify Theme Store, has received numerous positive reviews for its exceptional product quality and user-friendly features
Like Impulse, Blum is visually stunning and has three distinct styles, each designed to suit various business types and preferences. Whether you have a large inventory store or a luxury brand, this theme can support your needs with its intuitive mega menu, customizable promotion banners, and mobile-first design approach.
Blum theme puts a strong focus on product visuals and user experience, making it an excellent choice for stores looking to showcase their products in the best possible light. With its edge-to-edge hero banners, color swatches, and product page content sections, Blum ensures your products stand out, helping you drive sales and engage customers.
One notable aspect of the Blum theme is its impressive page speed. This ensures a smooth and efficient user experience for your e-commerce customers, providing your store with a competitive advantage in the industry.
While the Blum theme might not have some of the extensive promotion customization features found in the Impulse theme, it still offers plenty of flexibility to create eye-catching promotions that resonate with your target audience. With its clean and simple design, Blum is a fantastic option for businesses seeking a professional look and feel for their online store.
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