Actuate Digital

25/08/2026

If you've been paying attention to what Shopify is doing with its theme architecture, you'll have noticed Horizon. It launched as part of the Summer 2025 Edition and it's the most significant change to how Shopify themes are built since Online Store 2.0 arrived in 2021.

It's worth understanding what's actually different, because the answer affects decisions about new builds, redesigns, and whether stores on older themes should be thinking about moving.
Horizon is a framework, not just a theme
This is the important distinction to make upfront.

Horizon isn't a single theme you install. It's a new theme framework that powers a collection of free themes. At launch Shopify released ten themes built on the Horizon framework, with more being added. The framework itself defines how blocks are structured, how the editor works, and how AI tools integrate with the design system.

The themes built on it all share the same underlying architecture. Different aesthetics, same foundation.

If you've been paying attention to what Shopify is doing with its theme architecture, you'll have noticed Horizon. It launched as part of the Summer 2025 Editio

11/08/2026

This is a meaningful change that a lot of Shopify brands haven't heard about yet.

As of April 2026, Shopify has made native B2B features available on Basic, Grow, and Advanced plans. Not just Shopify Plus. If you've been selling wholesale through workarounds, separate stores, or third-party apps because B2B functionality was locked behind a Plus licence, that's no longer the case.

Here's what's actually changed and what it means for your business.
What's now available on all plans
The features that have moved down from Plus are genuinely useful for brands running a wholesale operation alongside their retail store.

- Company profiles: You can now create B2B company accounts with multiple contacts, locations, and assigned payment terms. This is the foundation of any proper wholesale relationship. Previously you'd have had to replicate this with customer tags and hacks.

This is a meaningful change that a lot of Shopify brands haven't heard about yet. As of April 2026, Shopify has made native B2B features available on Basic,

28/07/2026

Most Shopify store owners think about their theme in terms of how it looks.

Does it feel premium? Does it match the brand? Does it look like the competitor sites we admire?

Those are reasonable questions. But they're the wrong ones to start with. A theme can look beautiful and quietly destroy your conversion rate at the same time. I see it regularly. And the gap between a store that looks good and a store that actually converts is almost always in the details most people never think to check.
The theme isn't neutral
When you pick a theme, whether it's a free Shopify theme or a premium one from the marketplace, you're inheriting a set of design decisions someone else made. Those decisions were made generically, for a broad range of stores and products. Not for yours.

That matters more than most people realise.

Most Shopify store owners think about their theme in terms of how it looks.Does it feel premium? Does it match the brand? Does it look like the competitor sit

12/07/2026

If you run a Magento store, you've probably heard the word Hyvä a few times recently. Maybe from your developer. Maybe from another agency. Maybe just floating around at an event or in a LinkedIn comment thread.

Most explanations either go too technical too fast or stay so vague they tell you nothing useful.

This is my attempt at an honest middle ground. I've been building on Magento for years and working with Hyvä since it started gaining serious traction. Here's what it actually is, what it does, and why it matters for your business.
First, some context on the problem it solves
Magento is a powerful platform. For mid-market and enterprise ecommerce, there's still nothing that matches it for flexibility and control.

But its default frontend, the part of the platform your customers actually see and interact with, has always been its weak point. The traditional Magento frontend is built on a system called Luma. And Luma is slow.

Not slow in a vague, hard-to-measure way.

If you run a Magento store, you've probably heard the word Hyvä a few times recently. Maybe from your developer. Maybe from another agency. Maybe just floating

12/12/2025

Yummy Xmas treat delivered to the office, thank you 🤩

08/12/2025

We are super pleased to announce that we are finalists! 🥳