Shopify's SimGym Can Now Analyse Your Theme on Its Own — But why does it matter?

Shopify has updated SimGym so that you can run a full analysis on a single theme — no comparison required. It's a subtle change, but for merchants and developers trying to get more out of AI-powered tools, it removes a friction point that was genuinely getting in the way.

What SimGym actually does

SimGym uses AI shoppers to browse your store the way a real customer would. It looks at how easy your store is to navigate, whether your product pages communicate clearly, and where someone might get stuck — and it reports back with specific findings, not just a list of generic recommendations. 

Previously, you needed two themes to use it. One to test, one to compare against. That meant setting up a draft theme just to have something to benchmark with, which was a bit of a barrier if you just wanted honest feedback on what you already had live.

What's changed

You can now select any theme — live or in draft — and run a standalone analysis. From your Shopify admin, head to the SimGym app, choose "Analyse a theme," pick the theme you want to look at, and optionally narrow the scope to specific areas: homepage, product pages, collection pages, or cart.

The output is a set of findings specific to your store, not a templated report. You'll see what's performing well, where there's room to improve, and concrete next steps.

Why this is worth paying attention to

For merchants, it's the kind of structured feedback that usually requires either hiring someone to review your store or waiting long enough to have meaningful A/B data. SimGym gives you a faster route to that same insight — and you can revisit it whenever you're considering a design change.

For developers and agencies, it's a useful audit tool. Before starting a redesign or recommending changes to a client, you can use SimGym to identify the specific areas that need attention. That makes conversations with clients more grounded — you're presenting findings rather than opinions.

The ability to focus the analysis on a particular section of the store is also a useful touch. If you're working on a checkout flow or iterating on product page layout, you don't need to wade through findings about parts of the store you're not touching.

The bigger picture

Shopify has been gradually building out a set of AI-assisted tools for store owners and developers. SimGym sits within that direction — not as a flashy feature, but as something that, used consistently, can help you make more informed decisions about your store without needing a dedicated research budget to do it.

If you haven't used it yet, it's worth trying it out. The bar to getting started is lower than it used to be, so it's well worth exploring.

Get in touch with Bounce to discuss this and other AI tools - after all, the possibilities are becoming more expansive every week.