Shopify Slide Cart vs Pop-up vs Full Cart

As soon as a customer clicks ‘Add to cart’, their shopping journey has officially begun.

But imagine a customer adding multiple items to their cart and wanting to review them before checkout.

Ecommerce shopping carts were designed for this particular reason.

Online shopping carts have changed over the years. Gone are the days when customers still needed to wait just before checkout to assess their cart. Shopify slide cart and pop-up cart have changed how shopping carts are displayed.

That doesn’t mean the traditional full cart is out of style. But which cart works best for your business? In today’s article, we will take a deep dive into shopping carts, their types, and benefits to help you pick the best one.

First, let’s get the basic definition out of the way.

What is an Online Shopping Cart?

An e-commerce shopping cart is an online shopping tool that helps users manage their cart items when they are shopping. It’s identical to the physical shopping cart, where customers can add or remove items during shopping.

However, when you are shopping offline, it’s difficult to view total costs or adjust quantities before checkout. This is where online shopping carts shine.

Online shopping carts allow shoppers to manage items in their cart, whether they are on a phone or a desktop. Imagine this as a virtual cart that can pop up on screen, slide through one side, or cover the screen.

If you are running a Shopify store, there are three ways shopping carts can be displayed on screen. Let’s discuss each of them one by one.

3 Ways to Display Shopping Carts on a Shopify Store

#1 Pop-up cart

Shopify slide-out cart showing countdown timer and exclusive bundle discount on multiple products, including Burn Bright T-shirt and Head for the Hills Sweater

An example of a pop-up cart view in iCart

When enabled, a pop-up cart will appear as soon as a customer adds an item to the cart. It helps the customer to add or remove items before proceeding to checkout. Here, the shopping cart pops up in the middle of the screen.

#2 Slide cart

Shopify slide-out cart with a reserved cart feature and a discount offer

An example of a slide cart view in iCart

In the slide cart, products are displayed on the side of the screen. It is also called a cart drawer. Here, the customers can easily view their cart, make changes, all the while still remaining on the product page.

Both these carts appear on the product page. Let’s understand the difference between them.

Difference Between Shopify Slide-out Cart vs Pop-up Cart

Feature Shopify Slide Cart Shopify Pop-up Cart
Appearance Appears as a slide in a panel from the side of the screen. Pops up as a window in the centre of the screen.
User experience Doesn’t interrupt the user flow. Interrupts the user flow.
Size Takes a small portion of the screen. Takes up most of the screen.
Content visibility Users can clearly see the content of the product page. The product page is not clearly visible.
Benefit Less intrusive. It can be accessed via browsing. Grabs more attention to the cart.
Want to give your checkout page a unique look? Here’s how to customize the style of your Shopify store’s checkout page. to protect your business and build trust.

#3 Full cart

Shopify full cart with promotional messages, including 10% discount unlock and time-sensitive free gift offer

An example of a full cart view in iCart

While both the pop-up cart and the slide cart appear on the product page, a full cart appears on the checkout page. A full cart helps customers to have a final view of their items before proceeding to payment.

You can either use custom coding to add these carts to your store or use Shopify upsell apps such as iCart Cart Drawer Cart Upsell. This app gives you access to add a slide cart, a pop-up cart and a full cart to your Shopify store.

Want to give your checkout page a unique look? Here’s a complete guide to using the iCart app in your Shopify store.

Now that we have gone through all the types of shopping carts, let’s discuss the common features you should add to the cart.

What Should be Included in a Shopify Slide Cart?

Although Shopify slide-out carts vary in terms of functionality, they need to have below features for a better shopping experience.

Progress Bar

Shopify cart offering quantity discount and product bundles with a progress bar for unlocking free gift

Progress bar displayed in iCart

This feature needs to be added at the top of the Shopify slide cart. A progress bar shows how close the customer is to complete the checkout. The progress bar also has discount tiers to encourage customers to complete the checkout faster to unlock rewards.

Cart Items

This feature lets you customize the cart items section. You can add show/hide different options such as product variants, quantity picker, vendor names, compare at price, and an urgency timer.

Checkout Button

You can customize the checkout button by adding the terms and conditions, and the ‘Continue Shopping’ button to increase the average order value.

Product Upsell

Shopify cart highlighting popular products with a countdown timer for an additional 10% off and product recommendations

The product upsell widget is active in iCart

In this feature, you can add options to show upsell items such as Shopify recommendations, any specific product, recent purchase or items from the abandoned cart.

Product Recommendations

Recommended products from Shopify recommendations to a specific collection of products. Make sure to add a layout of products per row to showcase different items.

Custom HTML

With this widget, you can add custom buttons using the HTML code. If you have access to developers, this is a great widget to customize the style based on your brand.

Product Bundle Widget

Shopify slide-out cart displaying product discounts, free shipping, and time-limited offers

The product bundle feature in iCart

This widget will allow you to create product bundles in your Shopify slide cart. You can add multiple options to create bundles, such as Shopify recommendations or specific products. Moreover, add an option to select the number of items you need in the bundle.

Shopify applications like iCart offer all these features and more, helping merchants earn maximum revenue before checkout. With iCart, customers can create upsell and cross-sell strategies with an easy drag-and-drop slide cart builder.

Online shopping carts provide benefits for both customers and sellers. Let’s understand the benefits on each side.

Discover how top brands use product bundling to maximize profits with these 9 real-world product bundle examples.

Benefits for Sellers

Increased Conversions

An easy-to-use shopping cart can increase your online conversions with various widgets. With features like progress bars, product upsell, and product recommendations, customers are encouraged to buy more to unlock rewards.

Data for Informed Decision-making

Every time a customer purchases something from your store, abandons their cart, or spends time browsing, data is collected on the back-end. Data from these shopping cart interactions can be used to study customer behavior and upgrade your store.

Reduce Cart Abandonment Rate

Customers abandoning their carts is a major issue for all merchants. With an intuitive shopping cart, sellers can entice customers to complete the checkout process. This is achieved through easy-to-manage cart features, as well as discounts and rewards.

Benefits for Customers

Easily Manage Cart Items

The best benefit of online shopping carts for customers is that they can easily manage their cart items on the product page through the Shopify slide cart. They can add or remove items and even save the cart for future checkout.

Rewards & Offers

Merchants don’t just add shopping carts to their store for quick checkout. They recommended upsell items and product bundles with discounts so that customers can save money and time to get multiple products in the same order.

A Fantastic Shopping Experience

Adding a slide cart or a pop-up in your customer’s shopping journey enhances their shopping experience. When they can easily manage their items, get rewards, and complete a faster checkout, they keep coming back to the store.

Which Shopping Cart Solution is Best for Me?

Every online cart solution has its benefits. For example, a slide cart is less intrusive for the users than a pop-up cart, but a pop-up cart grabs more attention to the cart items for the users.

Then you have the full cart that appears just before checkout. This helps sellers to provide a final push to upsell or cross-sell items.

Instead of wasting time on choosing the best one, install Shopify applications such as iCart. Upsell apps like iCart help you add the shopping cart of your choice to your store. With its advanced analytics feature, you can decide which cart solution works best for your store.

FAQs

1. How to add a slide cart to my Shopify store?
There are two ways to add a Shopify slide cart to your store. Either you can manually add the cart drawer feature through custom coding in your theme, or you can use apps such as iCart to add a slider cart to your store.

2. What’s the difference between a slide cart and a pop-up cart?
The slide cart appears from the side of the screen. It’s less intrusive, and the product page is still visible to the users. The pop-up cart appears at the centre of the screen. It’s intrusive, but it grabs more attention from the user to the cart.

3. How can I track customer behaviour in my Shopify slide cart?
You can use Shopify’s built-in analytics to track time taken for checkout, items added or removed, and cart abandonment rate. When cart drawer apps like iCart are installed, you can use iCart’s analytics feature to easily track customer behaviour.

4. Which common features can I add to my Shopify slide cart?
Progress bar, cart items, checkout button, product bundle, product recommendations, and custom HTML are some of the common features you need to add to your Shopify slide cart.

5. Do I need to optimize the Shopify slide cart for mobile devices?
Yes, if you are using custom coding, you need to perform mobile optimization to show the slide cart properly. However, if you are using apps like iCart, it automatically optimizes your cart for all devices.

Vineet Nair

About the author

Vineet is an experienced content strategist with expertise in the ecommerce domain and a keen interest in Shopify. He aims to help Shopify merchants thrive in this competitive environment with technical solutions and thoughtfully structured content.

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