Quickstart with custom sections without building Site themes

Custom section is a building block of the website page created by you or your developer. Sections are not limited in their content and therefore can cover any functionality. You can develop and publish sections without building fully functional themes as long as each of your sections has a completed style and functionality.

Sections are based on Typescript language and its Vue framework. You need proper knowledge of TypeScript to uncover the full potential of the feature.

Sections are built locally and then deployed to the Ecwid environment. After deploying, your custom sections will become available in the website editor. To apply any changes deployed to the existing section, remove and then reinstall the section in the editor.

Step 1. Sign up with Ecwid

To work with sections and themes, you need a store and API access.

Start your journey by submitting a new dev form from the following link: https://portal.ecwid.com/en-us/app-market-request.

Specify that you are working on a theme, leave some contact details, and share some of your existing projects/apps here. Our App team will review the form shortly and contact you by email to give a free test store with API access.

Feel free to email us anytime.

Step 2. Set up an application

Working with Site sections requires authorization and access to Ecwid API. We have a platform called application where you can configure permissions called access scopes and authorize different APIs. A private application that gives access to your store API only is called a custom application.

Set up a custom application for your Ecwid store right from the admin, it only takes a few seconds: #develop-apps

Step 3. Get access scope

With the app, you can access store data with API. However, you need to request additional permission to build sections: add_custom_blocks.

Email us with your application name or client_id and required access scope, so we can update the app for you.

Step 4. Initialize project files

Use CLI (Command Line Interface) to deploy the theme code to Ecwid. If your CLI doesn't yet support npm/npx commands, install the required package from the Node.js official website.

Please make sure that your local node version matches the minimum version required by the crane tool. Check the node and npm version by running the following commands:

node -v
npm -v

We recommend using Node.js LTS version 22+ to ensure stability and avoid compatibility issues.

Crane is a CLI tool for developing Site themes. Learn more about the Crane tool

With Crane, you can run sections locally and control their deployment with CLI. Use the following commands to set up a project folder, install all dependencies, and get the section template code.

• Create a project folder, go into it, and install dependencies:

mkdir my-theme-project
cd my-theme-project
npm install vite vue sass @lightspeed/crane@latest @lightspeed/eslint-config-crane@latest

• Initialize a new app inside the project folder (change my-app with your name for the app):

npx @lightspeed/crane@latest init --app my-app

• Go to the app folder and initialize a new section (change my-section with your name for the section):

cd my-app
npx @lightspeed/crane@latest init --section my-section

Now you are ready to start developing a section.

Step 5. Set up a project in IDE

We recommend using the free VS Code application with Vue and TypeScript extensions. Open the project folder there and check the file structure inside. Learn more about the structure

First, you need to set up the crane.config.json file, it will connect the sections you build locally with the application on Ecwid side. Open the file and copy the client_id and client_secret from your custom application to the file. Find these values at the bottom of the Ecwid admin > #develop-apps > Details page.

After the changes, your file should look like this:

{
    "app_client_id": "client_id", //replace with client_id from your app settings
    "app_secret_key": "client_secret" //replace with client_secret from your app settings
}

Step 6. Deploy example section to Ecwid

Before deploying, make sure your application is installed in the Ecwid admin. Go to Ecwid admin > My apps and check if your custom app is listed there.

Once you are ready to check how your code works in the store, go into the project folder and use the following commands to preview and build the section locally, then publish it to your Ecwid store:

cd ~/{proj_folder}/my-app 
npx @lightspeed/crane@latest preview
npx @lightspeed/crane@latest build
npx @lightspeed/crane@latest deploy

You should see a success message in CLI. Email us with details about your application and store if you have any errors in this step.

After that, check the version in the package.json file. You should see something like this:

{
  "name": "example-section",
  "private": true,
  "version": "0.0.2",
  ...
}

Version value starts with 0.0.1 and iterates automatically with each successful deployment. The value from the package.json file is the next deployment version. We recommend not editing it manually.

Now you can find your custom sections in the website editor in your Ecwid admin. Go to the editor and click the + Add section button in the side menu.