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Updating Your Theme After Installing Hyperspeed

Shopify supports automatic updates only for themes that were installed directly from the Shopify Theme Store. These updates are delivered through Shopify’s Theme Store update system and appear as an update prompt in the Themes page.

When Hyperspeed optimizes a theme, Shopify creates a separate copyof that theme using the Shopify Admin API. Because this optimized theme is an uploaded theme, it is not connected to the Theme Store update system and can not be automatically updated by Shopify.

The good news:you can still update your themein nearly the same way Shopify updates themes, by bringing over your Theme Customizer configuration and key template files.

Need help with updating your theme? Just get in touch at [email protected] and we can help with the process outlined below.

Step-by-step: Manual Theme Update​

1) Add the latest theme version to your store​

Do one of the following:

  • Upgrade an older theme(if you still have it in your Themes list and Shopify shows an update prompt), or
  • Add the latest version from the Shopify Theme Store(useful if the original Theme Store theme is no longer available)

Do not publish the new theme yet.

2) Copy your template files from the live theme​

  1. Go to Online Store → Themes2. On your live theme, click … → Edit code3. Open the templates folder
  2. Copy all files from templates in the live theme into the templates folder of the new theme (overwrite the new theme’s template files)

Why this matters: your live theme’s templates reflect the structure your store is currently using, so copying them helps keep behavior consistent after upgrading.

3) Copy your Theme Customizer settings (settings_data.json )​

  1. In your live theme, open config/settings_data.json
  2. Copy the entire contents of the file
  3. In the new theme, open config/settings_data.json
  4. Paste the copied contents, replacing what’s there

This transfers your Theme Customizer configuration, including things like:

  • Section layout and ordering
  • Homepage composition
  • Theme settings (colors, typography, etc.)

4) Preview and publish when ready​

  • Preview the new theme and sanity-check key pages (home, product, collection, cart)
  • When everything looks right, publish the new theme

Important: Code edits do not transfer automatically​

When Shopify performs an automatic theme upgrade, they only preserve changes made in the Theme Customizer.

Any edits made directly in code (Liquid, CSS, JavaScript) are not carried over. That’s true whether or not Hyperspeed is installed, this is a limitation for all Shopify updates.

If you’ve made additional manual code edits outside of /templates (for example in sections/ , snippets/ , assets/ ), you may need to reapply those changes separately.

Do you need to upgrade?​

Shopify recommends upgrading only when a newer theme version offers something your current version doesn’t, such as:

  • Bug fixes you need
  • Compatibility updates
  • New features you plan to use

If your store is stable and performing well, staying on your current theme version is often completely fine.

Need help?​

If you’d like help with the migration, we can assist with transferring your Theme Customizer settingsin the same way Shopify handles an automatic theme upgrade. This includes layouts, sections, and theme settings configured through the customizer.

Please note that we don’t migrate custom code changes (such as manual edits to Liquid, CSS, or JavaScript). Shopify does not carry these over during automatic upgrades either, and those changes would need to be reapplied manually if required.

If you’d like us to help replicate Shopify’s upgrade behavior or want confirmation that your settings were transferred correctly before publishing, feel free to reach out at [email protected].