Empire
Empire is a Shopify theme by Pixel Union ($360). Tested on 2026-09-12 with Google Lighthouse via PageSpeed Insights on its own demo store, it scores 52 for mobile speed and 61 for desktop speed, 91/91 for SEO and 90/86 for accessibility (mobile/desktop, 0–100). Those are medians across its 4 tested presets; mobile speed across every tested page ranges from 38 to 66. On its marketplace it is rated 4.2 out of 5 from 480 reviews.
Scores
| Mobile | Desktop | |
|---|---|---|
| Speed | 52 | 61 |
| SEO | 91 | 91 |
| Accessibility | 90 | 86 |
| Best practices | 94 | 95 |
Median of 4 presets · measured 24 times since 2026-09-11 · Lighthouse via PageSpeed Insights · 0–100, 90+ is good.
Why not 100 — Circuit home page
Mobile
Speed 38 · 62 points to gain
- −22.8 Largest Contentful Paint medium effort
- −19.2 Total Blocking Time medium effort
- −11.5 Cumulative Layout Shift medium effort
- −4.9 Speed Index medium effort
- −3.6 First Contentful Paint medium effort
- 450 ms Reduce unused CSS high effort
SEO 85 · 15 points to gain
- −7.7 Links do not have descriptive text low effort
- −7.7 Links are not crawlable medium effort
Accessibility 87 · 13 points to gain
- −3.2 `button`, `link`, and `menuitem` elements do not have accessible names. medium effort
- −3.2 Background and foreground colors do not have a sufficient contrast ratio. medium effort
- −3.2 Links do not have a discernible name medium effort
- −3.2 Touch targets do not have sufficient size or spacing. medium effort
Best practices 96 · 4 points to gain
- −3.8 Browser errors were logged to the console medium effort
Desktop
Speed 65 · 35 points to gain
- −26.7 Total Blocking Time medium effort
- −4.5 Largest Contentful Paint medium effort
- −3.6 Speed Index medium effort
SEO 85 · 15 points to gain
- −7.7 Links do not have descriptive text low effort
- −7.7 Links are not crawlable medium effort
Accessibility 83 · 17 points to gain
- −4.4 Buttons do not have an accessible name medium effort
- −3.1 `button`, `link`, and `menuitem` elements do not have accessible names. medium effort
- −3.1 Background and foreground colors do not have a sufficient contrast ratio. medium effort
- −3.1 Links do not have a discernible name medium effort
- −3.1 Touch targets do not have sufficient size or spacing. medium effort
Best practices 96 · 4 points to gain
- −3.8 Browser errors were logged to the console medium effort
Presets and pages
| Preset / page | Speed | SEO | A11y | Speed | SEO | A11y | Tested |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| mobile | desktop | ||||||
| Depot demo ↗ | 51 | 92 | 89 | 58 | 92 | 86 | 2026-09-11 |
| category ↗ | 58 | 92 | 93 | 57 | 92 | 85 | 2026-09-12 |
| home ↗ | 44 | 92 | 84 | 58 | 92 | 87 | 2026-09-11 |
| Empire demo ↗ | 61 | 92 | 90 | 63 | 92 | 86 | 2026-09-11 |
| category ↗ | 55 | 92 | 93 | 57 | 92 | 85 | 2026-09-12 |
| home ↗ | 66 | 92 | 86 | 68 | 92 | 87 | 2026-09-11 |
| Circuit default demo ↗ | 46 | 89 | 90 | 58 | 89 | 84 | 2026-09-11 |
| category ↗ | 54 | 92 | 93 | 51 | 92 | 85 | 2026-09-12 |
| home ↗ | 38 | 85 | 87 | 65 | 85 | 83 | 2026-09-11 |
| Forma demo ↗ | 52 | 89 | 90 | 63 | 89 | 85 | 2026-09-11 |
| category ↗ | 59 | 92 | 93 | 78 | 92 | 85 | 2026-09-12 |
| home ↗ | 45 | 85 | 86 | 48 | 85 | 85 | 2026-09-11 |
Show this score on your site
A live badge: it always shows Empire's current score and links back here. Paste this where the theme is sold or documented.
<a href="https://themestested.com/theme/shopify/empire"><img src="https://themestested.com/badge/shopify/empire.svg" alt="Empire speed score on Themestested" height="20"></a>
Add ?device=d for the desktop score, or ?metric=seo / ?metric=a11y for SEO or accessibility.