Shopify Store Audit Checklist, With a Free Health Checker

A store audit sounds like a project for an agency. Much of it is not: a large share of the problems that hurt search visibility and shopper confidence can be seen in the page a browser receives. A missing meta description, a product page with no returns link, a site that does not redirect to HTTPS or a page blocked from indexing can all be found by reading the HTML and the response headers.

This Shopify store audit checklist follows the four areas the free ORVX Shopify Store Health Checker reviews, explains how its score is built, and is clear about what an automated check cannot see.

Every example and amount on this page is illustrative. It shows the method and is not a benchmark, a quote or advice.

How the checker works

You enter a store address. The checker fetches the public page, follows the site's robots.txt, samples a small number of other pages such as one product page, and runs each check. Every check ends in one of four states: pass, warning, fail, or not evaluated. It shows what it observed, why the check matters and what to do about it, then lists the most important fixes first.

There is no login and no app install. The checker reads what any visitor's browser would receive, nothing more.

The checklist

SEO

• Page title present and a sensible length, so search results do not cut it off.
• Meta description present and a sensible length.
• Canonical URL declared.
• One main heading (H1) and a logical heading structure.
• Indexable: no noindex directive keeping the page out of search.
• Structured data (JSON-LD) present.
• Image alt text on the images that carry meaning.
• Open Graph tags for social sharing.
• Broken internal links, from a small sample.

Store experience

• Mobile viewport set, without blocking zoom.
• Visible contact information.
• Shipping policy and returns policy linked.
• Cart reachable from the page, and store search.
• One sampled product page showing price, images, a description and an add to cart button.
• Form fields with labels, links and buttons with names, and a declared page language.

Technical

• Served over HTTPS, and HTTP redirects to it.
• The page answers 200 OK, without a long redirect chain.
• HSTS and basic security headers.
• robots.txt and an XML sitemap.
• HTML document size.

Performance

When Google PageSpeed Insights measurement is available, the checker reports the Lighthouse performance score and Core Web Vitals. Google's thresholds for a good experience, at the 75th percentile of page loads, are Largest Contentful Paint within 2.5 seconds, Interaction to Next Paint of 200 milliseconds or less, and Cumulative Layout Shift of 0.1 or less. When measurement is not available, performance is shown as not evaluated rather than guessed.

How the score is built: a worked example

Each check has a weight. A pass counts its full weight, a warning half, and a fail nothing. A category score is the weighted share of evaluated checks that pass, out of 100. Checks that could not be evaluated are left out of both sides of the sum, so a store is never marked down for something the checker could not see.

As an illustration only, suppose the SEO checks for one store come out like this:

The evaluated weights add up to 13.5 and the points to 10.25, so the SEO score is 10.25 / 13.5 x 100 = 76, rounded. If structured data had been observed and failed instead of being unobservable, the denominator would become 14.5 and the score would drop to 71. That difference is why "not evaluated" is shown separately and never counted as a fail.

How to act on the results

1. Start with high-priority fails, such as a page that cannot be indexed or a missing title. They affect the whole page.
2. Fix policy and contact links next. They are cheap to add and answer questions shoppers ask before they buy.
3. Treat warnings as a to-do list, not an emergency.
4. Re-run the check after each change to confirm the fix is visible in the HTML.
5. For a single campaign landing page or product page, the Landing Page Conversion Auditor goes deeper on the elements that help a shopper decide.

Common mistakes when auditing a store

• Chasing the score instead of the fix. A score is a summary; the observations are what to act on.
• Reading "not evaluated" as "missing". It means the checker could not see it, often because a script draws it.
• Auditing only the home page. Product pages are where buying decisions are made.
• Installing apps to fix every warning. Each app adds scripts to the page. The Shopify App Detector lists what a store already loads.

What the checker cannot see

It reads the HTML the server sends. Content a theme or app draws with JavaScript after load may be invisible to it. It uses public data only: it cannot see a store's sales, traffic, conversion rate or customers, and estimates none of them. Broken-link and product checks use a small sample, not a full crawl. There is a daily limit on checks per visitor, shown on the tool page.

From the storefront to the numbers behind it

The storefront is one part of the business. ORVX Core connects to your Shopify store and reports what happens after the visit: revenue, product costs, gross profit, refunds and net profit, per order and product. To compare with a rival's public catalog, try the Competitor Store Analyzer.

Through the $1.9M Commerce Initiative, 10,000 eligible Shopify stores can use ORVX Core free for 12 months, with no credit card. After the year, Core is the standard $19 per month or $190 per year if you choose it. All free tools are in the ORVX tools hub.

Frequently asked questions

Do I need to install anything or connect my store?

No. The checker reads the public storefront the same way a visitor's browser receives it. No Shopify login, app install or authorization is involved.

Can I check a store that is not mine?

You can check any public page. The checker respects the site's robots.txt and stops if it meets a bot check, so some stores cannot be read.

Why are some checks marked not evaluated?

Because the checker could not observe them, usually because a script draws that part of the page after it loads, or because a measurement service is not available. Those checks are left out of the score rather than counted as failures.

Does a high score mean my store converts well?

No. The score measures what is observable in public HTML and headers. It says nothing about traffic, sales or conversion rate, which are not public.

How often should I run it?

After any theme change, app install or major content update, and before a busy season.

Sources

• The $1.9M Commerce Initiative: terms and FAQ (ORVX, checked 26 October 2026)
• Web Vitals (web.dev (Google), checked 26 October 2026)