What should I fix first this week?
Step-by-step conversion guides, from the product page checklist to cart abandonment and free shipping thresholds, with every screen and setting named.
CartHacker Newsletter
Free e-commerce newsletter with step-by-step guides to grow sales on your platform
Get conversion guides you can apply the same afternoon, Core Web Vitals fixes and every new CartHacker tool and store app as it ships. Shopify owners get Shopify steps, WooCommerce owners get WooCommerce steps.
Subscribing takes a free CartHacker account, which is how each issue knows your platform. No card, and one click unsubscribes. Already have an account? Log in to subscribe
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CartHacker Newsletter
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Sample issue
- Guide How to Find the App That Is Slowing Down Your Shopify Store Step by step, including the code an uninstalled app leaves in theme.liquid
- Guide How to Edit Your Shopify Theme Code Without Breaking Your Store Duplicate the theme first, then edit, then roll back if you need to
- Store app Trust Seals & Badges Badges under Add to cart, installed with one line in theme.liquid
- Guide Why Your WooCommerce Store Is Slow, Starting With the Server PHP workers, object cache and cart fragments, in the order to fix them
- Guide WooCommerce Hosting: What Makes a Store Fast, and What to Pay For Shared, managed or a VPS, judged by server response time
- Free tool Core Web Vitals Monitoring Load times from real shoppers, added with the free WPCode plugin
- Guide The Product Page Checklist: What Gets Shoppers to Press Add to Cart Checks that work on BigCommerce, Wix, PrestaShop and custom builds
- Guide How to Get Your Products Into Google Shopping for Free Merchant Center free listings, and how to avoid a misrepresentation suspension
- Free tool Store Speed Test Core Web Vitals and the slow apps behind them, for any store address
- Guide Shopify or WooCommerce? Real Costs and Real Speed Numbers Twelve months of costs at three revenue levels
- Guide How Much Shopify Really Costs Each Month Plan, payment fees and typical app spend, worked out
- Guide Is Dropshipping Still Worth It? The Numbers Before You Start Product, ad, payment and return costs per order
CartHacker Premium members read every guide 2 weeks before the newsletter sends it.
What each issue of the CartHacker newsletter brings to your store
Why is my store slower than last month?
Core Web Vitals fixes that name the app or setting behind the slowdown, and show what the change did to the numbers.
Is there a new tool for my store?
Every new CartHacker tool and store app as it ships, starting with the Product Feed Manager and the Volume Discounts Engine.
Did something change that hurts my sales?
Google ranking updates, Shopify checkout changes and plugins that start breaking sites, with what to do about each one.
Free newsletter or CartHacker Premium: when each new guide reaches you
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Free account- New guides as they go public
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- New tools and store apps as they ship
- Changes that affect your store
- One-click unsubscribe in every issue
CartHacker Premium
Pro- Every new guide 2 weeks before the public
- 50 trust badges in 30 languages, switched automatically
- 180 days of Core Web Vitals, per page
- All 39 PDF tools, unlimited and never uploaded
- 200 QR codes, tracked and editable after printing
- No ads on any guide or tool
- Product Feed Manager and new tools included
The newest CartHacker guides, and the platform each one is for
How to subscribe to the CartHacker newsletter in four steps
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Create a free account
Use email and a password, or one click with Google.
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Switch the newsletter on
Tick Send me the newsletter, or use the switch in Settings.
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Confirm your address
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Pick your platform
Choose Shopify, WooCommerce, another platform or pre-launch under Settings, Store.
Why does a Shopify issue differ from a WooCommerce issue?
Because the two platforms fail Google's speed checks for different reasons, so most fixes written for one miss the real problem on the other. In the Chrome UX Report data the HTTP Archive published for August 2026, 76.5% of 443,647 Shopify sites passed all three Core Web Vitals on mobile, against 39.5% of 557,369 WooCommerce sites. Most of that gap starts server-side.
Only 12.7% of WooCommerce sites had a good server response time (Time to First Byte), the wait before the first byte of the page arrives, which hosting, PHP workers and caching decide. Every photo and script queues behind it. That is why only 43.7% of WooCommerce sites passed Loading (Largest Contentful Paint), against 87.3% on Shopify, which runs the servers itself. Shopify fails somewhere else: Responsiveness (Interaction to Next Paint) passed on 87.4% of its sites, the lowest of the five platforms measured, and app JavaScript is the usual cause.
So a WooCommerce issue spends its time on the server: hosting, object caching, cart fragments and what WP Rocket or LiteSpeed Cache can and cannot fix. A Shopify issue spends it on apps, theme.liquid and the code an uninstalled app leaves behind. Stores on BigCommerce, Wix or a custom build get the work that applies everywhere: product pages, cart abandonment and Google Merchant Center. Not launched yet? Then the platform decision comes first.
| Platform | Sites | All three pass | Loading | Responsiveness | Stability | Server time |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Shopify | 443,647 | 76.5% | 87.3% | 87.4% | 92.5% | 81.9% |
| WooCommerce | 557,369 | 39.5% | 43.7% | 91.7% | 88.3% | 12.7% |
| Wix | 189,924 | 81.2% | 85.0% | 93.2% | 97.8% | 69.6% |
| Squarespace | 93,800 | 72.1% | 79.6% | 97.5% | 89.1% | 79.3% |
| BigCommerce | 11,704 | 63.7% | 85.3% | 96.8% | 73.0% | 63.9% |
Loading is Largest Contentful Paint, Responsiveness is Interaction to Next Paint, Stability is Cumulative Layout Shift, and server time is Time to First Byte, which Google treats as a diagnostic rather than a Core Web Vital. Sites are origins with enough Chrome traffic to be measured.
Source: HTTP Archive Core Web Vitals Technology Report, Chrome UX Report data for August 1, 2026, mobile, all regions and traffic ranks. Open the dataset
FAQ
Is the CartHacker newsletter free?
Yes. Subscribing needs a free CartHacker account and nothing else: no card, no trial and no countdown. CartHacker Premium is optional, and its members read every new guide 2 weeks before it opens to everyone, in the Premium early access card under Dashboard, Learning Center, while the free newsletter carries the same guides once they are public.
Why do I need an account to subscribe?
Because the account tells the newsletter which platform you sell on, and an email address on its own cannot. Without it, a WooCommerce owner would get Shopify instructions half the time, and generic advice that half fits both platforms is exactly what this newsletter exists to replace. It also keeps consent simple. Settings, Newsletter shows whether you are subscribed and switches it off in one click.
How often does the newsletter arrive?
When there is something worth your time: a new guide, a new tool or store app, or a change that affects your store. No daily schedule. Subscribers with a new account also get a series of 8 emails across its first 45 days: how to read your own Core Web Vitals, a first speed step for your platform, the free slowdown alert, the PDF and QR code tools, and twice, what CartHacker Premium adds.
Can I unsubscribe in one click?
Yes. Every newsletter email carries an unsubscribe link that works on the first click, with no login and no second confirmation, and mail apps such as Gmail can show their own Unsubscribe button next to the sender. Settings, Newsletter switches it off as well. Account email is separate: receipts, password resets, your Core Web Vitals Monitoring reports and the slowdown alert keep arriving, because they are about your account rather than the newsletter.
What does CartHacker Premium change about the newsletter?
The timing. Members read every new guide and case study 2 weeks before it opens to the public and before the free newsletter carries it, from the Premium early access card in Dashboard, Learning Center. Premium also removes every ad on CartHacker, includes every new CartHacker tool as it launches, keeps 180 days of Core Web Vitals history and raises the limit on every tool. See what CartHacker Premium includes.
What happens to my email address?
Your subscription is a setting on your CartHacker account, stored in our own database rather than in a mailing list service. When an issue goes out, Resend, the email delivery service CartHacker uses, receives your address and that one message, sent from news.carthacker.com, a sending domain kept apart from the one that carries your receipts and password resets. Nothing more. Your address is never sold and never handed to advertisers, and deleting your account removes it.
My store is not on Shopify or WooCommerce. Is the newsletter for me?
Yes. Choose Other platform under Settings, Store, and your issues carry the work that applies to every storefront: product pages, cart abandonment, free shipping thresholds, Google Merchant Center and Core Web Vitals checks that run on any store address. That covers BigCommerce, Wix, Squarespace, PrestaShop, Magento and custom builds. Shopify-only and WooCommerce-only guides go to their own editions.
I have not launched my store yet. Should I subscribe?
Yes, and pick Pre-launch as your platform. Your issues then start where you are: Shopify and WooCommerce compared on real costs and real speed numbers, what Shopify costs each month once payment fees and apps are added, and whether dropshipping still pays once ads and returns are counted. Switch the platform in Settings, Store the day you launch.
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