Set up drop-down menus in your online store

You can use drop-down menus to group products, collections, or pages together and make it easier for customers to navigate your online store. For example, if you have a lot of products then you might want to add them to collections and then use a drop-down menu from the main menu to organize the collections. This can help a customer to find the type of products that they're looking for.

You can also add, remove, or edit menu items in drop-down menus, or in your default menus.

Note

Footer menus can display only top-level items. Drop-down menus can't be used in your online store footer.

You can view and change your online store menus from the Menus page in your Shopify admin.

Note

In most cases, you need to create an item before you can link to it. For example, you need to create a collection before you can add the collection to a menu.

Nesting menu items to build drop-down menus

You can build drop-down menus by creating or moving menu items so that they're nested below a top-level item. The top-level item displays in the main menu on your online store, and the nested menu items display in a drop-down menu. The top-level item can have up to two levels of nested drop-down menus.

All themes will display nested items as drop-down menus from the main menu, and some themes will display nested items as drop-down menus in other locations.

The appearance and location of the main menu and drop-down menus in your online store depend on your theme. Some themes will display an icon beside the name of a drop-down menu in the main menu to help customers recognize that a drop-down menu is there.

Note

Make sure that you update your theme so that it displays all three menu levels on your online store.

Add a drop-down menu from the main menu

You can add a drop-down menu from any of the menu items in the main menu.

Steps:

Desktop

1. From your Shopify admin, go to Content > Menus.

2. Click the name of your main menu.

3. Choose one of the main menu items to be the header for your drop-down menu, or add a new menu item to be the header. If you don't want the header to link to anything, then you can enter # in the Search or paste a link field for the header menu item.

4. To add a menu item to include in the drop-down menu, complete the following tasks:

   1. Click Add menu item.
   2. In the Name field, enter a name for your menu item.
   3. In the Search or paste a link field, enter or select a destination for your menu item.

5. Click Add, and then click and drag the menu item to nest it below the header menu item.

6. Click Save menu.

iPhone

1. From the Shopify app, tap the … button.
2. Tap Content > Menus.
3. Tap the name of your main menu.
4. Choose one of the main menu items to be the header for your drop-down menu, or add a new menu item to be the header. If you don't want the header to link to anything, then you can enter # in the Search or paste a link field for the header menu item.
5. To add a menu item to include in the drop-down menu, complete the following tasks:
   1. Tap Add menu item.
   2. In the Name field, enter a name for your menu item.
   3. In the Search or paste a link field, enter or select a destination for your menu item.
6. Tap Add, and then tap and drag the menu item to nest it below the header menu item.
7. Tap Save.

Android

1. From the Shopify app, tap the ☰ button.
2. Tap Content > Menus.
3. Tap the name of your main menu.
4. Choose one of the main menu items to be the header for your drop-down menu, or add a new menu item to be the header. If you don't want the header to link to anything, then you can enter # in the Search or paste a link field for the header menu item.
5. To add a menu item to include in the drop-down menu, complete the following tasks:
   1. Tap Add menu item.
   2. In the Name field, enter a name for your menu item.
   3. In the Search or paste a link field, enter or select a destination for your menu item.
6. Tap Add, and then tap and drag the menu item to nest it below the header menu item.
7. Tap ✓.

Note

You can change the default main menu for most themes by editing the settings in the theme's Header section.