Shopify Sections vs Blocks

What is the difference between Shopify Sections and Blocks?

This can be confusing if you're new to Shopify, but there is a big difference.

Sections take up the full width of the page.

Sections are the main building blocks of Shopify stores. You can add and drag them anywhere on the page (besides header and footer areas).

Blocks go inside of Sections.

They’re a smaller unit of content. You can add and drag them around inside of their parent section.

Below you can see sections in blue, and blocks in pink

What are global theme blocks?

On Horizon generation themes (2025+), Shopify added a Blocks folder to themes. 

The blocks in this folder don't belong to just one section - they can be used across the entire theme.

This also makes it very easy for store owners to install custom blocks to their theme. 

This is not the case with older themes. On legacy themes such as Dawn, blocks belong to a parent section, and cannot be used outside of it. 

What is block nesting?

Blocks used to only be one level deep:

Section > Blocks. 

Now we can go multiple levels deep with blocks:

Section > Block > Block > Block > Block.... up to 8 levels deep!

This allows for a much more flexible, page-builder like structure.