Narrative Shopify Theme Review 2024 - All you need to know!

 As you may know, the Narrative Shopify theme is special because it's all about telling stories with pictures. It comes in different styles, each with cool designs and fancy writing. Plus, it works great on phones and tablets, showing Shopify cares about making websites easy to use on mobiles.

With the narrative theme, you can showcase your products by telling their stories. You also can add big pictures and descriptions to explain what each item is all about. Look at its features to see if they suit your online store.

Shopify Narrative Theme: A Quick Overview

While the Shopify Narrative theme is no longer available for new stores, it was once a popular option for those looking for a visually focused way to tell their brand story. You can choose from three different looks for the Narrative theme, each with its colors and layout styles. They're called light, warm, and cold. Although they share some things, each one has its unique features.

You'll see the brand name on every page at the top center. The menu button is on the left, and the shopping cart icon is on the right. Below the brand name, there's a wide slider for all three versions.

Light and Cold Styles

In the Light and Cold designs, you can use a video instead of pictures as the slider's main image. This is great for showcasing gadgets that need a demonstration. Ensure the video is long enough to avoid bothering visitors since it plays automatically.

The Light and Cold style theme, focusing on using videos in the slider, is ideal for stores specializing in sleek and modern gadgets or electronics. This theme's design aesthetic aligns well with products that benefit from dynamic demonstrations, such as cutting-edge technology, innovative gadgets, or sophisticated electronic devices. By utilizing videos instead of static images, the store can effectively showcase the functionality and features of its products, providing customers with an immersive and engaging shopping experience.

Warm Style

The Warm Style theme emphasizes using pictures in the slider and the carousel menu feature, which is well-suited for stores that evoke a cozy and inviting atmosphere. This style is ideal for businesses selling comfort, relaxation, and homeliness products. 

Stores specializing in home decor, cozy apparel like loungewear or knitwear, artisanal crafts, or comforting accessories like blankets and candles would benefit from the Warm Style theme. The use of picturesque imagery in the slider enhances the visual appeal and warmth of the store. 

At the same time, the carousel menu adds a convenient and interactive element for showcasing product categories or collections. This theme creates a welcoming and inviting ambiance, perfect for stores catering to customers seeking comfort and tranquility.

Features of the Narrative Shopify Theme

The Narrative theme is a top choice for small businesses. It's perfect if you run a dropshipping or online store. Unlike other themes, it's not designed to show many products simultaneously. You can add as many products as you like, but remember, you can only tell one story on your main page.

Now, let's check out some key points.

Customization

The Narrative theme offers many ways to make it your own. You can easily change different parts of the template. But remember, it's mainly for stores with a small inventory, so the focus is on showcasing products.

Features like variation labels and interactive suggestions are available on the Product Pages. You can also let customers filter and sort products on the Collection Pages. However, because the theme is big on visuals, there's no zoom option when you hover with the mouse.

Visual Storytelling

This theme is all about telling stories through pictures. It's made to highlight the best features of your products with lots of photos. Your main page is like a storybook that shows off your product from start to finish. 

For example, if you're selling speakers, you can add pictures of the speakers, buttons, and USB hub and describe them in the text box that pops up when you upload the picture.

Hero Pages

Hero pages, sliders or banners, let you use videos instead of pictures. Videos are better at getting your message across and can keep customers engaged longer because they're more likely to watch the whole thing.

Menu Navigation

In this theme, the menu is on the left side. You can't move it to the bottom, center, or top of the page because the designers made it that way, focusing on making it user-friendly.

Customizable block quotes can also be added to break up images. You can use them to share value statements, customer reviews, blogs, or inspiring quotes on your site.

Cart Features

Customers can easily adjust their shopping carts by clicking the cart icon at the top of the store. The cart pops up on the right side of the screen, eliminating the need for a separate page and streamlining the process. On the basket page, customers can provide specific instructions for their orders, such as requesting to exclude a receipt for gifts. The quick buy button allows customers to swiftly add items to their baskets and proceed directly to checkout, enhancing convenience and encouraging more purchases.

 Slideshows

Unlike most slideshows, this one is vertical. Towards the bottom of the website, there's a section where customers can scroll through products within that category. On the left side, there's a big photo, and on the right side, there's a vertical slideshow showing many products.

Wide Layout

Usually, stories are placed in the middle of the screen, but not with this theme. You can use up all the space on your page. Big photos don't make your page look bad; it adds to its quality. 

Successful Narrative Theme Stores

1. Drizzle Honey

Narrative tells a story to help sell Drizzle Honey’s bee-friendly, unprocessed honey. They use old-fashioned pictures a lot. Plus, they stick customer reviews in oversized boxes to make them stand out. Drizzle Honey changes the colors and words on its website to make its honey seem more trustworthy.

2. Crazy Horse Craft 

Crazy Horse Craft sells leather stuff by showing pictures with words on top. Their bold logo font stands out next to Narrative's calmer fonts. So, their design mixes a Western vibe with a smooth online store look. Their website is easy to use with grid displays, a menu that stays put, and a place to sign up for newsletters.

3. Sweet Tooth Hotel

At Sweet Tooth Hotel, they don't stick to neutral colors like most places in their field do. Instead, they go for bright pictures and lots of flashy pink to get attention. Along with their blogs and picture galleries, they ask people to sign up for their newsletters to keep them interested.

Why should you use a Narrative Theme for your Shopify Store

Putting all these features together can bring you lots of benefits. The theme developers added more stuff to help you grow your business even more.

Mobile Responsiveness

The theme is if you're using a phone or not. It's designed to work well on mobiles, so people visiting your Shopify store will find it easy to use, no matter their device.

Customizable Content

You don't have to stick to the theme's setup. You can remove or add things however you like. For example, you can eliminate a vertical product carousel if you don't want it. This lets you change the length of your landing page to fit your company's needs.

Marketing Features

On the Narrative Theme, visitors can easily click on social media links shown as icons. This leads them to your brand's social media pages. It's a way for your visitors to share your content with others. Also, use the Shopify email signup form in the footer.

There's also a blog page included, which is essential for any website. You can share helpful and engaging content to improve your customers' shopping experience, build their loyalty, and make your brand more trustworthy in your industry. With a blog, you can attract free traffic from search engines if you use SEO correctly.

Pros and Cons of Narrative Theme

Pros

• Regular updates come at no additional cost, ensuring your store stays current and secure.
• It is specifically designed for businesses selling either a single product or a small range of items, making it an ideal choice for those focusing on niche markets.
• Particularly suited for selling medium- to high-value products, catering to customers looking for quality over quantity.
• It has various useful functionalities to enhance sales, including integrated marketing tools and adaptable checkout choices. 
• With four pre-designed styles to choose from, simplifying the setup process and conserving your precious time and energy.

Cons

• Users have expressed dissatisfaction through low ratings, indicating potential issues with the service's performance or user experience.
• While it provides basic customization options, the platform may have limitations regarding advanced functionality and design flexibility, which could restrict your ability to fully tailor your store to your specific needs.

Narrative Shopify Theme user reviews, Support, and Resources

User reviews

Teresa Villegas:  “This theme was used for a service-based client. Her "services as products" were writing workshops. This is the perfect theme for a new service-based business because it was easy for the client/owner to manage and take over themselves after only a few tutorials from me (the designer.) The theme developers were very supportive and helpful to her on the few occasions I wasn't available to help her myself. This is exactly what I search for when selecting themes for my clients: accessible, straightforward in use, and a supportive theme dev team."

Aknazar Arysbek: “This is one of the best free themes available. It is beneficial and has lots of good features. It is more appealing than simple, minimalist, and elegant. The mobile version is designed to be modern and responsive. It is easy to navigate if there are not so many pages. My shop uses only a minimum number of sections, so it was perfect. The drop-down menu is efficient, and it's animation is pleasing. Overall, it is a solid theme for shops centered on one product or a category without too many pages. It looks best with big visuals and less text.”

Margaret Bachl: “I love how user-friendly it is. I wish page editing were a little easier and there were more page options, but that's just that. I don't think there's much of that in any particular theme. Native is a well-rounded and dynamic page that leaves clean lines of sight and brings attention where needed—to your product! Without repeatedly shoving it into your face, it gives space for context and background information.”

Support & Resources:

Assistance and Support:

Narrative Theme provides various avenues of support to aid users encountering challenges or seeking guidance. The inclusion of live chat support ensures prompt solutions, with responses often delivered within minutes. This real-time assistance aims to streamline issue resolution and elevate user contentment.

Available Resources:

Narrative offers various resources to assist users in understanding and utilizing the theme's features effectively. These include in-depth guides, tutorials, and an active community forum where users exchange experiences, seek advice, and glean insights to optimize their theme usage.

Alternatives to Narrative Theme 

1. Kalles Theme

Kalles is at the top of the list, following the narrative theme. It provides a variety of styles to meet different merchants' needs, ensuring customers have a smooth shopping experience. With its modern design, simple look, and various examples, Kalles gives your online store a fresh vibe.

Kalles is all about simplicity, creativity, and budget-friendliness. It also includes essential SEO features for your pictures—the most crucial feature when choosing a theme—like structured data for Google's rich snippet, speed optimization, and options to customize metadata and headings. Also, Kalles is mobile-friendly, allowing you to customize product categories and easily connect with social media.

Key features

• Smart Product Filter: Kalles integrates an intelligent product filter, enhancing the shopping experience by enabling efficient sorting and searching of products.
• Swift Page Load Speed: Enjoy fast loading times, contributing to a seamless and responsive user interface that elevates the online shopping experience.
• Adaptive Design: Kalles ensures an adaptive design that seamlessly adjusts to various devices and screen sizes, providing accessibility for a wider audience.
• Robust Theme Options Panel: Benefit from a comprehensive built-in theme options panel, providing users with a centralized hub for convenient and effective theme customization.
• Diverse Product Layouts: Choose from over fifteen product layouts, allowing for diverse and visually appealing product presentations tailored to different business requirements.
• Flexible Customization Choices: Use flexible customization options that empower users to personalize the theme according to their brand identity and specific preferences.
• Mega Menu Integration: Kalles incorporates a mega menu feature, enabling organized and efficient navigation through the website's extensive range of products and categories.
• Quick View Functionality: The quick view feature improves user convenience by enabling customers to preview product details without leaving the current page.
• SEO Optimization: Kalles is designed with search engine optimization (SEO) in mind, ensuring that your online store is well-optimized for visibility and discoverability on search engines.

Read more: Kalles Shopify Theme Review

2. Brooklyn Theme

Brooklyn is a top pick for temporary fashion shops that pop up quickly. It's a great free Shopify theme. You can choose between classic or playful styles and tweak it to fit your brand. Plus, the product grid layout adjusts based on the number of items you show.

Key features

• Mobile-Optimized Design: Brooklyn's responsive and refined design guarantees a smooth browsing experience across various devices.
• Style Variations: Choose between two distinctive styles – Classic and Playful. The Playful style is especially suitable for stores specializing in customized products.
• Key Features: Brooklyn has essential features like a header slideshow, automatic product grid, slide-out cart, drop-down navigation, and a homepage video.
• SEO Integration: The theme incorporates search engine optimization to improve your store's visibility in online searches and ensure better discoverability.
• Free Theme Updates: Users receive complimentary theme updates, keeping their store current with the latest features and improvements.
• Detailed Documentation: Brooklyn offers comprehensive documentation to assist users in navigating and maximizing the theme's functionalities, ensuring a smooth setup and customization process.

3. Minimal Theme

With Shopify's Minimal theme, you receive a straightforward design highlighting your products. It's great for businesses that want their items to stand out without flashy designs. Your products are neatly arranged in a grid layout. The theme also includes category pages you can search through and precise, high-quality pictures of your products. Minimal is the way to go if you want a clean, simple store design with just a few products.

Key features

• Vintage Design: This style embraces a timeless aesthetic, predominantly characterized by a white theme that exudes elegance and simplicity. The slider, occupying 60% of the area, is the focal point, inviting visitors into a world of classic charm and sophistication.
• Fashion Design: With ample space below collections, the layout effectively spotlights products, allowing them to take center stage amidst sleek and captivating visuals.
• Modern Design: The website is optimized to accommodate up to eight collections and features a concise slider that seamlessly integrates with the overall design. Its clean lines and streamlined interface provide a modern and polished look, appealing to customers seeking style and functionality in their online shopping experience.

Add custom sections to theme using EComposer

EComposer offers a comprehensive overview:

Choose EComposer's Landing Page Builder to create a customized landing page that reflects your brand's identity and goals.

EComposer enhances landing pages for SEO, speed, and performance, increasing the likelihood of turning visitors into loyal customers. Incorporating interactive elements and captivating designs, it also includes clear calls to action, encouraging visitors to take the intended actions.

Key features for your online store include:

• Effortless Page Creation: Seamlessly generate various pages and sections, including landing pages, homepages, collection pages, and product displays, catering to diverse needs.
• Intuitive Drag-and-Drop Builder: Utilize a live drag-and-drop page builder that adheres to Shopify standards, boasting a user-friendly interface that requires no coding skills for effortless customization.
• Rich Design Library: Explore a comprehensive design library featuring various page layouts, section templates, and multiple elements to enhance your pages' visual appeal and functionality.
• Integrated Add-Ons: Use add-ons like Ajax Cart, Color Swatch, Image Optimizer, Cross-selling, and more to enrich the user experience and boost sales.
• Advanced Functionalities: Access advanced functionalities, including Page Analytics for insightful data, Global Blocks for consistent branding, AI Content Generation for dynamic content creation, Lazy Loading for optimized performance, and other robust features to elevate your website's capabilities.

Instructions on adding custom sections to the Narrative Shopify theme using EComposer.

Follow these steps to seamlessly integrate custom sections into your Narrative Theme using the EComposer Page Builder for your Shopify storefront:

Step 1: Access Your Shopify Account: Sign in to your Shopify account using your credentials.

Step 2: Install EComposer Page Builder: Install the EComposer Page Builder app or open it if already installed to ensure it's integrated into your Shopify store.

Step 3: Access Theme Customization: Navigate to the 'Online Store' category and select 'Theme' to access theme customization.

Step 4: Customize Responsive Theme: Choose the Narrative Theme and click 'Customize' to enter the customization interface.

Step 5: Add Custom Sections: Within the store interface, click 'Add section.' Choose the specific type of section desired for customization within the Narrative Theme.

Following these steps, users can effortlessly incorporate unique and tailored custom sections into their Narrative Theme using the EComposer Page Builder for their Shopify storefronts.

FAQs

Is the Narrative theme a good fit for my store?

The Narrative theme is ideal for stores with a limited catalog that want to prioritize brand storytelling and a visual focus. Better choices might be made for stores with many products or complex product variations.

Is the Narrative theme easy to use for beginners?

Yes, the theme is designed to be user-friendly. It utilizes Shopify's drag-and-drop interface, making adding and editing content accessible without coding experience.

How many products can I realistically showcase with the Narrative theme?

The Narrative theme is best suited for stores with a smaller product range. While it can handle a moderate number of products, potential layout limitations might make it unsuitable for stores with hundreds of products.

Does the Narrative theme have any built-in features to boost sales?

The theme includes product sorting by price or popularity and an age verification pop-up for age-restricted products.

Conclusion

The Narrative Shopify theme is a great choice if you have a small store with just a few things to sell. It's perfect for businesses that have few products. This theme is about telling your brand's story, which helps sell your stuff. Narrative makes shopping fun with excellent videos, pictures, simple designs, and useful features. Plus, it doesn't cost anything; you can change it however you like and get support from Shopify.

In addition to the Narrative Shopify theme, alternatives like Kalles, Brooklyn, and Minimal themes offer compelling solutions for businesses looking to elevate their online stores. Meanwhile, EComposer simplifies the customization process of these themes with its intuitive drag-and-drop editor, empowering users to create dynamic pages and sections effortlessly.

Try EComposer for FREE!