Frequently Asked Technical Questions

How does Shogun avoid the "Flash of Content" problem?

Shogun prevents a flash of content by intercepting the page request before any content is rendered by the browser, redirecting to the appropriate variant using Shopify view parameters. Rather than manipulating the DOM after load, this server-side routing ensures the correct content is delivered immediately. After rendering, Shogun updates the browser’s address bar to reflect the original URL the user navigated to.

Does Shogun impact my page performance?

With all rendering handled by the Shopify platform, Shogun ensures we have all the necessary data to decide which variant to render during the initial page load, interrupting the process as early as possible to prevent unnecessary delays. There will be a very minimal performance impact because the user's browser starts to load the initial request and then needs to make another request to get the selected variant.

​Our performance impact is significantly reduced compared to other testing platforms because we don't have to make external calls to determine variant selection. This subsequently requires swapping content on the page, leading to the flash of content problem.

Why am I seeing Shogun activity in my store’s activity log?

You may notice occasional Shogun-related activity appearing in your store’s activity log. This is completely normal and expected behavior.

Shogun periodically updates certain metafields that the app injects into your store. These metafields enable split testing on themes and price testing features.

These regular updates are essential; they refresh the values within those metafields to ensure that your optimizations continue to run smoothly. Without these updates, the tests could time out prematurely.

If Shogun is ever uninstalled, these metafields and their updates will automatically stop, and any tests that might have been left running when the app was uninstalled will also then stop.

Why do I see no data being tracked on my test?

Shogun adds a line of code in the theme.liquid file of your theme. This line is added inside the head.

{% render 'shogun-optimizer' %}

Please ensure this is active and added, and is not commented out in the theme.

If you notice any issues, please reach out to our support team.

Why am I getting no traffic to my test?

If your test isn’t receiving any traffic, it usually means that no users are meeting the conditions required to enter the test. A few common reasons include:

  • The page you selected as the “original” variant isn’t actually being used anywhere on the site.
  • The template you selected isn't applied to any live pages or products.
  • The audience settings don’t match any current visitors.

Even if a test is set up correctly, it won’t run unless the page or template it’s based on is actively in use and receiving traffic. This can happen, for example, if a test is created on a page that isn’t linked anywhere or isn’t live.

For template-based tests, we recommend verifying that the template is currently in use by at least one live product or page before initiating the test. Otherwise, no visitors will qualify, and the test will show zero traffic.

What impact would performing an A/B test have on crawlability or indexability?

Performing an A/B test has no negative impact on crawlability or indexability of your site.

Whether you’re running a standard A/B test or a split-URL test, search engines will continue to crawl and index your pages normally. This is because:

  • A/B testing tools use client-side logic that runs only for real visitors, not for search engine crawlers.
  • Crawlers receive the original page directly from your server (Shopify), without being redirected or shown variations.
  • The test does not change your canonical tags, metadata, schema, or sitemap.
  • Shopify continues to serve each URL normally, so search engines treat all pages as they did before the test.

As a result, your SEO signals remain intact and indexing is unaffected by the presence of an A/B test.