Why can't I add a section in the Shopify theme editor?

A section appears in the theme editor's Add section list only if that section's file contains a presets array in its schema. If it has no presets it can still render, and it can still be edited, but it can never be added, moved or removed from the editor. That is the rule, and it explains most of the cases where a section is plainly present in the theme and plainly absent from the picker.

We counted it rather than assuming. On 10 September 2026 we read every section file in 12 real Shopify themes from our own build archive, 295 files in total, and parsed each schema. 209 of them (70.8 percent) declare presets and are addable. 86 (29.2 percent) do not, and the same seven filenames account for almost all of them in every single theme. The tables below are that count.

What decides whether a section shows up in Add section?

Shopify's own documentation is unambiguous about it: "Section and block files must define presets in their schema to support being added to JSON templates using the theme editor." Files without presets "should be included in the JSON file manually, and can't be removed using the theme editor."

So any section in your theme is in one of four states, and only the first two put it in the picker.

Nothing in the theme editor tells you which state a section is in. The picker just does not list it, and there is no message explaining the absence.

How many sections does my theme have that I have not used yet?

This is the most common answer by a distance, and it is the good one. The section is in the picker, you have simply never scrolled to it. Every theme we measured shipped more addable sections than its homepage was using, by a wide margin.

Between 8 and 10 unused sections per theme. If you are looking for something like a testimonials strip, an FAQ block or a countdown, open Add section and read the entire list before concluding it is not there. The name in the picker comes from the preset's name field, not the filename, so a file called halcy-proof.liquid can appear as "Trust badges" and a file called halcy-gallery.liquid appears simply as "Gallery". Searching the picker for the filename finds nothing.

Why can't I move or delete my header, footer or announcement bar?

Because they are not part of the template. In all 12 themes we measured, exactly three sections were rendered statically from the layout file, one for the announcement bar, one for the header and one for the footer.

Shopify's rule here is short: "Statically rendered sections can't be removed or reordered by merchants." They appear in the editor sidebar, usually pinned above and below the movable list, and clicking them gives you their settings and nothing else. There is no delete option and no drag handle, and that is by design rather than a permission problem or a bug in your theme.

If you genuinely need the announcement bar gone, look inside its settings for an enable checkbox, which most themes provide. Failing that it is a code edit to layout/theme.liquid, and code edits are replaced by the next theme update.

Why can't I remove the product section from my product page?

Same rule, different location. The main content section of each template is deliberately built without presets so it cannot be deleted, because a product page with no product section would be a broken page.

The seven files without presets were identical across 10 of the 12 themes we read:

• main-product
• main-collection
• main-blog
• main-cart
• main-search
• main-contact
• product-recommendations

The two remaining themes had eight, because their header file also carried no presets. You can still click any of these in the editor and change their settings. You cannot reorder them against the sections around them, and you cannot remove them.

The section exists in the code but not in the editor. What do I add?

If you have opened the file and confirmed there is no presets block, adding one is four lines. It goes inside the schema object, after settings, and the minimum viable version is just a name:

  "presets": [
    {
      "name": "Gallery"
    }
  ]
}

That is copied verbatim from a working section in one of the themes we measured, and the closing brace there is the end of the schema object. Save the file, reload the theme editor, and the section appears in the picker under that name. Two cautions. Shopify advises that "Sections with presets shouldn't be statically rendered", so do not add presets to a section that layout/theme.liquid already calls by name, or you will end up able to place a second copy of your own header. And if you are editing a theme you bought, this change is overwritten the next time the developer ships an update.

The alternative, which survives updates, is to add the section to the template JSON by hand. In templates/index.json you add an entry under sections keyed by any unique id, then add that same id to the order array. A section listed in order renders. A section defined but left out of order does not, which is a quiet way to lose an hour.

Why is the Add section button greyed out or doing nothing?

Check how many sections that page already has. Shopify's documented ceiling: "JSON templates and section groups can render up to 25 sections, and each section can have up to 50 blocks." Hit 25 and the editor stops letting you add more.

For scale, across the 120 JSON templates in the 12 themes we read, the busiest single template held 11 sections. So the limit is real but generous, and if you are near it on a homepage the page is probably too long for a phone anyway.

The other common cause is the wrong template. Sections can declare enabled_on or disabled_on rules that restrict them to particular template types, so a section built for product pages will not offer itself on the homepage. None of our 12 themes used those rules, which means every addable section in them is offered everywhere, but Theme Store themes use them heavily.

Why can't I add my app's block to this section?

This one is not about presets and it catches a lot of people out. An app block can only be added to a section whose schema explicitly accepts one, by listing a block of type @app. No @app entry, no app block, regardless of what the app's install instructions say.

We checked our own themes and the result was blunt. Of the 295 section files, 106 supported blocks at all, and zero declared an @app block. On those themes an app that installs as an app block had nowhere to go, and the merchant saw an empty Apps tab in the block picker with no explanation. That was a gap in our themes rather than a fact about Shopify, and the symptom looks identical from the merchant's side either way.

Update, 10 September 2026. We fixed it the same day we measured it. Newly generated Themr themes declare @app on the product, collection, cart and article sections and render app blocks in place, and they ship an apps.liquid wrapper so an app added as its own section picks up the theme's width and spacing instead of Shopify's unstyled fallback. That is five app block slots per theme where there were none. A theme you downloaded before that date still has zero, and the fix is the one entry described here: a blocks array containing a single object whose type is @app, plus a loop in the section that renders it.

If you are evaluating a theme and you already know which apps you need on the page, this is worth checking before you commit. The full diagnosis, including the difference between an app block and an app embed and the two edits that fix a section, is here: why you can't add your app's block to your Shopify theme.

A five minute checklist

1. Open Add section and read the whole list slowly. The label comes from the preset name, not the filename, so it may be called something you did not expect.
2. Confirm you are on the right page in the editor. The template dropdown at the top centre says which one. Homepage sections and product page sections are different lists.
3. Confirm you are editing the live theme. Online Store, then Themes, and check which one is labelled Live.
4. Count the sections already on the page. At 25 the editor stops accepting more.
5. If it is still missing, open the file at sections/your-section.liquid in the code editor and search for the word presets. No match means the section can never appear in the picker, and that is the whole answer.
6. If it is a header, footer, announcement bar or a main- anything, stop looking. Those are pinned on purpose and cannot be moved or deleted from the editor.

Nothing above requires a support ticket or a developer, and none of it produces an error message, which is precisely why it eats an afternoon. If you want to see how a theme is put together before you install it, every theme in our free theme gallery has a live preview you can open. If what you are actually missing is a block rather than a section, the rules are different and are set out in the difference between a section and a block. Two related faults that also look like breakage and are not: a homepage that is blank after installing a theme, and colors that will not change when you edit the setting. If the theme will not install at all, that is usually a schema error in the ZIP.