Ecommerce Website Design: 25 of the Best Storefronts

March 3, 2023

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Today anyone can have an ecommerce storefront. But creation alone doesn’t guarantee an instant hit.

Many brands turn to innovative ecommerce website design to differentiate in a vertical and create a unique, memorable shopping experience.

But how much does modern ecommerce website design matter?

Well, it’s been found that 38.5% of online shoppers cite outdated website design as the top reason they’ll leave an ecommerce site. What’s more, 61.5% of online shoppers cite bad navigation as their reason for bouncing.

In other words, appealing ecommerce website design plays a huge role in what shoppers think of your brand and whether they’ll convert.

Today, we’re looking at the anatomy of effective ecommerce websites, with 25 examples of brands knocking their ecommerce experiences out of the park.

Settle in, and let’s get to it.

Skip ahead:

What makes a successful ecommerce website design?

Colors, fonts, and images are critical to conveying your brand experience online, but that’s not all. To create a high-converting shopping experience, you must tick these checkboxes too:

It’s fast-loading

With the first five seconds of page load having the highest impact on conversion rate, your ecommerce site needs to be Sonic-the-Hedgehog fast (even despite rich media you want to include).

Slow sites deter customers, and can prevent them from ever returning. We found that 54% of shoppers who encounter slow load times say they don’t want to shop on that site again.

A big part of the best ecommerce website designs is not only how brilliant a site looks but how fast the store loads. Page speed also impacts your store’s SEO.

Leading ecommerce brands are optimizing their Shopify storefronts using insights from Google Lighthouse audits and aiming for load times less than two seconds.

#cta-visual-pb#<cta-title>Build optimized store pages faster<cta-title>In Shogun Page Builder, you get a drag-and-drop visual builder that allows you to create mobile-friendly store pages quickly without needing to code—including image optimization for fast loading.Start designing today

 

It’s engaging

To keep shoppers browsing, the design has to be captivating.

Rich merchandising makes your site feel different from competitors and creates that captivating X factor.

For example, shopping for cookware on the Our Place website versus Amazon is quite different. Our Place prioritizes rich merchandising throughout the site—like background video, high-quality imagery, remerchandising, and more.

Toggling between colors on FromOurPlace.com
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The Our Place experience feels elevated and unique compared to Amazon’s now generic shopping:

Amazon pan product page
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It’s trustworthy

Ever shopped on a site and felt it was a little…suspicious? Like, “is this a legit brand?” or, “will I get my package on time?” suspicious.

If a customer deems your site untrustworthy on the first visit, it’s tough to win them back.

That’s why trust signals like high-quality visuals, customer reviews, company contact information, trust seals, secure delivery via HTTPS, and more need to be a core part of your ecommerce website design.

This is especially important for new stores establishing brand recognition. And especially true for how your checkout operates.

It’s made for mobile

Last but not least, building an ecommerce website with A+ mobile commerce functionality is key.

With people spending about five to six hours per day on mobile devices, crafting a responsive ecommerce web design made for smaller screens is important as it’s likely how many customers will experience your site.

#cta-paragraph-pb#Want to nail your omnichannel marketing experience? See our best practices and examples.

25 of the best ecommerce website design examples

Whether you’re gathering ideas for your brand’s upcoming design revamp or are curious about what other ecommerce stores are up to, here are 25 of the best ecommerce website design examples we hand-picked from the following verticals:

Apparel

1. Fabletics

Athletic wear brand, Fabletics, uses a blend of animation, bold text, and flashy imagery to stand out from other sites and convey function and fashion.

The models in these images strut from the gym, the office, and while running errands, showing the versatile nature of Fabletics items. This is editorial—it feels luxe and we see the clothing in context of use vs. in a portrait studio setting.

Fabletics home page
Fabletics Style Quiz banner
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Showing the flexibility of their products in this way indicates Fabletics is focused on product discovery and conveying the fashion-forward quality of their athleisure wear.

2. Generation Tux

This suit rental brand completely simplifies the customer journey with a sleek experience.

Not only is the site clean and modern—mirroring their products—but shoppers can customize their rental with a Home Try-On feature.

Generation Tux Home Try-On feature
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Customers choose the items they want in their home try-on using an easy drag-and-drop menu—even if it’s just pants and a jacket.

Curious to see what a pink shirt, blue jacket, and pant combo would look like? This feature lets you preview these combinations so you get the exact look you want.

Generation Tux's customizable suit tool
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Plus, there’s great inspiration throughout the site:

Inspiration on GenerationTux.com
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Shoppers can check out the inspiration gallery and click directly to the product page of a suit they want to learn more about. A great way to weave in product discovery!

#cta-visual-pb#<cta-title>Design stunning storefronts fast<cta-title>Build and customize high-converting landing pages, product pages, collections, homepages, and more with the best page builder for Shopify.Start designing for free

3. Faherty

This laidback apparel brand built an ecommerce site design that embodies California surf chill—from the product photography and background videos to the fonts and page layouts.

However, the Faherty site differentiates with shoppable brand videos. 

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These videos add uniqueness to the site and offer another really cool way for shoppers to discover products. This, plus features like the virtual shopping assistant, make it clear Faherty is focused on the customer.

4. PANGAIA

PANGAIA uses biotech to create eco-friendly loungewear. They tell their brand story without taking away from the actual shopping experience through editorial-style photography, background videos, and educational site pages.

Each product page includes a callout box, highlighting the eco-conscious materials used to make the product, plus a breakdown of the environmental offset of the product.

Pangaia product page
Pangaia eco-conscious product information

It’s clear this information is important to PANGAIA’s customers and is another avenue to be transparent about brand values. Their Shogun-built store pages hit exactly the right notes for their target audience.

5. Warby Parker

Eyewear maker, Warby Parker, couples convenience with style with their ecommerce website design.

The site is clean, crisp, and uses high-quality imagery to indicate product caliber. Their product pages create an especially engaging shopping experience.

Warby Parker's At Home Try-On feature
Warby Parker's At Home Try-On feature
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The brand knows eyewear is not one-size-fits-all. Their “Find your width” feature helps customers choose the right frames for the best fit, which adds confidence to the buyer experience.

What’s more, the ‘What’s Included’ section on each product page quickly answers FAQs, like “Do I need to buy a case?”

What's included in every Warby Parker order

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Lastly, customers can choose five frames to try on at home for free.

With their top website design, it’s clear Warby Parker is simplifying the eyewear experience online and helping their customers feel confident.

Food and Beverage

6. De La Calle

You’ll be thirsty for all nine flavors of De La Calle’s tepache (a Mexican fermented beverage) after exploring this site.

The design articulates the brand’s cool, chill, ready-for-a-good-time vibe with lively photography, scrolling text, and fun animated background videos.

The dynamic remerchandising of the entire product page to match each flavor’s unique color palette/personality also makes for an engaging shopping experience.

De La Calle Watermelon Jalapeno product page
De La Calle Orange Turmeric product page
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The founders’ Mexican origins inspire the design and branding, and it makes you want to enjoy one (or two!) in the sunshine with friends.

7. La Colombe Coffee Roasters

Philadelphia based-coffee brand La Colombe features more than just coffee and coffee-drinking accessories on their site.

In addition to how they merchandise their products—subscriptions, gift sets, and bulk orders—La Colombe’s brew guides offer a step-by-step tutorial on how to brew your best cuppa yet.

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This unique video content initiative makes the shopping experience more compelling through education and anticipation (e.g., customers look forward to receiving their new Chemex brewer and La Colombe blend to start their morning right).

8. SOMOS Foods

SOMOS Foods, a Mexican food brand, nods to their colorful, bright roots throughout their website.

This Shopify store feels anything but standard—from the live “Countdown to Taco Tuesday” counter on the homepage…

SOMOS Foods taco tuesday countdown
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…to the cool background video featured in the hero section of SOMOS Foods’ Our Story page and on the product pages.

Through rich visual merchandising, shoppers get a taste of this vibrant brand and their history while finding delicious meal ideas and learning how to make them at home for loved ones—just like the founders of SOMOS.

9. Smashmallow

Smashmallow may be selling something simple—flavored marshmallows—but this ecommerce experience is anything but!

Smashmallow uses tons of playful animations, infinity scrolling (when the content of the page is loaded as customers scroll), and vibrant illustrations throughout the site—creating their own branded world.

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The site is brimming with inspiration between the Recipe page and the #SmoreBetter page, which includes delicious and easy-to-follow recipes featuring Smashmallow products, rich videos, brand collaborations, and more.

10. Good Culture

Good Culture’s ecommerce website design indicates they’re a brand that values transparency—from the product pages with nutritional information and simple copy across the site.

Clean, simple site design with plenty of whitespace and pops of color also nods to Good Culture’s promise of only using “simple ingredients” in their products.

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The Products page is a long scroll page with jump links, making it easy to hop to different product sections to learn more.

In addition, the design on the B Corp and About Us pages mirror their standard of quality and commitment to doing good—from the straightforward copy to the playful visuals and high-resolution images.

#cta-visual-pb#<cta-title>Build as many pages as you like<cta-title>The sky’s the limit for ecommerce brands that are scaling rapidly—more users, more pages, more storefronts, less hassle.Start designing today

 

11. Omsom

Asian food brand, Omsom, offers an ecommerce shopping experience that’s equal parts dynamic and memorable. I mean…just look at this home page!

Omsom home page
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Omsom nails personalization from the start; When a customer first lands on the site, they’re greeted with a video message from one of the founders.

Omsom home page welcome video
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From there, in a choose-your-own-adventure way, customers can learn more about Omsom’s products, get to know the brand, or get help choosing products to try.

With this video, Omsom introduces themselves to customers and offers to assist with product discovery and education.

12. Olipop

Soda alternative Olipop’s ecommerce site brings a new twist to classic soda branding. This site includes fun, bright, bubbly branding—from product images and detail photos to subtle animations on product pages:

Remerchandising on Olipop.com product page
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What’s more, Olipop recently revamped this page with a design that makes it easier for customers to toggle between flavors, resulting in a more dynamic experience and a 25% conversion rate increase!

Tweet from Melanie Bedwell at Olipop
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And, with Shogun Page Builder, they can quickly create gorgeous landing pages that precisely match the messaging for their most important marketing campaigns.

13. Oatly

Oatly’s ecommerce site makes shopping for dairy milk alternatives anything but standard and boring.

Horizontal scrolling, a cartoon cursor, subtle animations across the site, brand videos, and an atypical navigator bar (shoppers click on icons and branded images to explore the site) make this custom site engaging and unique.

Oatly home page
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Other fun pages on the site include their “Brainwashing” page, which features educational content like “Milk Myths” and “Help Dads” videos (content explaining how dads aren’t always the best at living a plant-based lifestyle and how you, the customer, can help them).

Talk about a funny and on-brand way to connect with your audience!

Beauty and Skincare

14. Glossier

Makeup and skincare brand Glossier’s website speaks to the brand name through glossy images and a sleek shopping experience (easy add-to-cart buttons for featured products).

The models featured in the brand imagery are of varying skin colors, which signals to customers they have products that work on all skin types and tones—like on the Boy Brow product page:

The Boy Brow product page on Glossier.com
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Plus, the UX elements make the experience feel like a native app (e.g., horizontal scrolling or add-to-cart buttons under every featured product on the home page). The high-quality imagery doesn’t slow down the page speed, which is key for boosting CVR and keeping eyes on the site.

15. TULA Skincare

Prestige skincare brand TULA Skincare uses high-quality imagery to take their Shogun Frontend-powered ecommerce website to a new level.

Using a combination of high-quality flat-lays, texture closeups, and studio shots—all using the brand’s signature teal color scheme—make TULA feel “Instagram-worthy,” and implies to customers that TULA is of a higher caliber than other brands.

TULA.com home page
Vibrant product images on TULA.com
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Customers can expect a certain quality based on the exceptional look and feel of this site. Plus they were able to increase site speed by 35% after launching on Shogun Frontend.

16. ColourPop

Makeup brand ColourPop offers products that look a lot like art supplies—an artist’s dream! This fun ecommerce site is brimming with—you guessed it—color. But the site isn’t overwhelming to explore.

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Ample whitespace gives each image space to shine. The grid layout keeps the site organized and easy to navigate, which would otherwise be a challenge due to the vibrant product imagery.

If shoppers need some direction, the top bar navigation and footer makes it easy to shop by category and narrow down their search

For customers wanting to add a dash of personality to their Colourpop palette, the “build your own palette” feature allows for easy customization and makes for an engaging site element:

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17. Bite

Bite—a plastic-free toothpaste alternative—knows how to keep customers on their site.

The Bite site uses parallax scrolling—when the website background moves slower than the foreground—to create a stunning visual experience.

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This technique keeps eyes on the site; you want to scroll the entire page. The toothpaste bottles floating down the screen as customers scroll echos the Bite brand—playful, unique, and simple.

Parallax scrolling is not just an eye-catching design element—it helps convey the quality of Bite’s products. This isn’t toothpaste you’ll find at your corner convenience store…it’s elevated dental care.

18. Hims and Hers

Hims and Hers—a telehealth company—recognizes that men’s and women’s healthcare needs vary, so they’ve split their ecommerce experience into two sites.

The sites may look different in terms of layout, but the branding ensures the sites are cohesive.

For Hers, skin and hair care is at the forefront of the site. A large background video with a simple CTA encouraging shoppers to take the Hers hair quiz suggests the brand is focused on helping customers find their unique routine.

The home page of forhers.com
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For Hims, hair loss and mental health are the primary focal points on the home page. This site includes trust signals like the option to speak with a doctor and copy like “Believe the hype” speak to concerns their male-identifying customers may have like product efficacy and discretion.

The home page of forhims.com
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Product detail pages, like the spironolactone for hair loss page, are equal parts engaging and educational.

A product page on forhers.com
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These pages include expanding video and closeups of the supplements, details on the product like what it treats, who should take it, etc., information on how to order, sample treatment plans, and more.

Both Hims and Hers sites are as engaging as they are informative and trust-building. Customers looking to improve their health don’t need to go far!

Lifestyle and Miscellaneous

19. Made by Nacho

“Cat-crafted cat food” brand Made by Nacho uses a combination of 3D-looking images and illustrations, punchy copy, and a layout that directs the eye down the page in their ecommerce website design, making this a stand-out site.

From micro animations on the Our Story page…

Made by Nacho
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…to Nacho’s Tasting Menu, which features different pairings of cat food

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It’s clear Made by Nacho is determined to 1) surprise and delight and 2) stand out as an elite cat food option to their target audience—shoppers who want only the best for their cats.

Fancy Feast who? ;)‍

20. Clare

Finding the perfect paint color is easy (and fun) with Clare’s sleek, elevated product images (e.g., on-wall examples of paint colors and high-quality color closeups of swatches), gifs that show how to use their stick-on paint swatches to test colors, and helpful product pages packed with relevant information, bundled paint kits, and more.

Clare.com swatch gif
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Context photos on product pages show what different types of paint colors look like on different surfaces (trim vs. wall), which helps customers find (and verify) their perfect color match.

Clare.com product page
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Lastly, the color quiz helps customers find the perfect color depending on the room size, type, amount of sunlight the room gets per day, and more.

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With this ecommerce web design, it’s clear Clare wants their customers to feel confident about their selections and empowered to complete their next project.

21. Stikwood

Home decor brand Stikwood uses their Shogun Frontend-powered progressive web app (PWA) to convey the quality of their products.

Using background video, high-resolution imagery, and dynamic product exploration tools like the Material Explorer and space visualization tool, Stikwood helps customers find the right product for their next DIY project.

Stikwood's space visualization tool
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With a flexible frontend created with Shogun Frontend, Stikwood can add robust ecommerce features to their site without performance lags or glitches, making for an even smoother shopping experience.

22. Away

Away’s products are on the more expensive side; you can buy the same size suitcase for a fraction of the cost on Amazon.

But the brand shows the quality of their products through design elements like luxe imagery, subtle animations like arrows moving with the cursor in the dropdown menu, and claims like “designed to last for life” make for an elevated shopping experience. Image closeups show how equally elegant and durable Away products are.

Away.com product page
Away.com product page
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What’s more, shoppers can add their initials to their Away products, which makes the buying experience personalized.

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Away’s online magazine “Here” offers city guides, travel inspiration, and even essays and interviews to spark the travel bug in their target customers.

Everything about this ecommerce experience says “if you travel the world with this bag, you’ll look great doing it.”

23. Brooklinen

The homepage of luxury bedsheet brand Brooklinen.com starts off with a bang—touting their award-winning bedding collections with a “Shop Best Sellers” button.

Brooklinen home page
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For customers who aren’t sure what kind of bedding they’re looking for—and who are perhaps a little skeptical about shopping for sheets online—Brooklinen’s engaging quiz helps them find the perfect products for their sleep style and comfort preferences.

Brooklinen product discovery quiz
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In addition, product image closeups, video explainers from the Brooklinen team detailing product specs, and product comparisons with info like “how it feels” offer shoppers tons of context to make a confident purchase decision.

24. The Sill

Online plant shop The Sill’s website is bright, colorful, and aesthetically pleasing using a mix of product and lifestyle visuals, easy-to-read fonts, and balanced whitespace.

It’s clear the brand is big on customer education with several features on the site:

  • The Sill highlights its “easy care” plants right away on the home page, which speaks to their target audience (folks who like plants but perhaps don’t know a ton about plant care).
The Sill home page
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  • Other collections like “large plants,” “live plants,” and “pet friendly” help customers find exactly what they’re looking for—whether it’s a large monstera or a faux fiddle leaf fig tree.
  • The Sill includes a helpful FAQ section with questions like “What if I’ve never had a plant before?” and “Where do you ship?”, which reduces shopper friction and hesitation about purchasing a plant.
  • Customers can even join The Sill’s Plant Care Library and Plant Care Assistant to learn more about their new plants, ask questions, access sales, and more.
The Sill Care Library
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25. Rifle Paper Co.

Rifle Paper Co. began as a stationery brand and has evolved into a lifestyle brand with a variety of products including jewelry, sleepwear, and home decor.

As a result, the brand has become a pro at rich visual merchandising, as seen throughout their ecommerce website—like on product pages, collections pages, and on the Our Story page:

Rifle Paper Co. Our Products page
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High-resolution product and lifestyle imagery give Rifle Paper Co. an elevated, editorial, and more aspirational feel as you shop.

The brand provides plenty of contextual imagery for shoppers to see the versatility of their designs closeup, and in great lighting.

Rife Paper Co.
Rife Paper Co.
Rife Paper Co.
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FAQ for exceptional ecommerce website design

How much does it cost to build an ecommerce website?

The cost of your ecommerce website will depend on several factors, like the platform you choose, the number of site pages, and the features you want to include.

If you choose to hire a web design agency to help with your site build, the average cost is anywhere between $3,000 – $100,000 for varying services.

What ecommerce website design trends should my brand consider?

Trends fluctuate but adding features like “quick add” cart buttons, try-before-you-buy interactions, and coupon/offer popups are excellent ways to boost conversions and build a relationship with your customers.

Related: Capture More Conversions With These 10 Tips (+ Examples)

Leverage your ecommerce website design to build trust and relay quality 

The ecommerce stores that become memorable brands have one thing in common: They use website design to create exceptional shopping experiences.

Stand-out ecommerce website design is multifaceted. It’s not enough to use the standard default theme and expect a surge of conversions or a cult following to assemble.

Brands who strive to scale must have ecommerce sites that convey their product quality, values, personality, and trustworthiness in every interaction.

 

#cta-visual-pb#<cta-title>Build landing pages that convert<cta-title>Create and customize landing pages with all the vital elements for conversions—all without needing to code.Start designing today

Kaitlyn Ambrose

Kaitlyn works on all things content at Shogun. ⚡

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