If a Shopify product shows its sale price but no crossed-out original price, the compare-at price is missing somewhere between your sale setup and the storefront. The usual places are the product data, the price Shopify calculates for the customer's market, and the theme or an app that displays it. A product can have a compare-at price in admin and still show none to customers in a specific market.
Use this table to find where to start:
| What you see | Where to look |
|---|---|
| The sale was set up as a discount | Discounts don't create a compare-at price |
| The compare-at price is empty, $0.00, or not higher than the price | Product and variant data |
| Only some variants or only collection cards lose the original price | Variant data or card price logic |
| Admin has a compare-at price, but no theme shows it | Market pricing and catalogs |
| Only some countries or logged-in business customers are affected | Market or B2B catalog |
| A fresh copy of the theme shows the original price, yours doesn't | Theme code, page builder, or app |
Narrow it down with two checks
First, open the product on your live storefront, open the page source (View page source in Chrome), and search for the compare-at amount as customers see it, such as 65.00. If the amount is in the source but not on the page, the theme rendered it and CSS, JavaScript, or an app hides it. If it isn't in the source, the theme either never received a compare-at price or chose not to show it.
Second, in Online Store → Themes, add Horizon, Shopify's free default theme, and leave it unpublished. Preview the same product and variant with the same country selected in your theme and in Horizon.
- Horizon shows the original price: start with your theme and apps.
- Horizon doesn't show it either: the cause is in your sale setup, product data, or market pricing.
Our guide to Shopify products that show Sold out explains the limits of this comparison.
Confirm the sale uses a compare-at price
A crossed-out price comes from the product's Compare-at price field, and Shopify shows a sale only when that value is higher than Price. Automatic discounts and discount codes don't change that field, so they don't create a crossed-out price through it. To show the original price crossed out on product pages, set the sale with compare-at prices.
If you raised a product's price for a new season, check that its compare-at price is still higher than the new price.
Check the product and variant data
- Inconsistent variants: Shopify notes that collection pages may not show a product as on sale when some variants have a compare-at price of $0.00, an empty field, or different values. Clear unused fields instead of leaving $0.00.
- The wrong variant is selected: if only one size is on sale, the original price appears only when that size is selected.
- Something rewrote the prices: a bulk edit, CSV import, or sale scheduling app can clear compare-at prices or swap the two columns. If many products lost their original price at the same time, check recent imports and the settings of any app that manages sale prices.
Check the price in the customer's market
With Markets, the prices in the product form are the store's base prices. A market can use a catalog to change the final price, the compare-at price, or both, and the storefront shows the final price for the customer's market. A product can have a compare-at price in its base prices and none in a market.
To check, open Markets → Catalogs, open the catalog assigned to the affected market, and search for the product. The Compare at price column shows what that market uses. If it is empty while the product has a compare-at price, the catalog is removing it. Viewing the product in admin with that market selected shows the same result and can make it look as though the product never had a compare-at price.
A catalog that doesn't include compare-at prices
Review the catalog's pricing:
- Price adjustment: a percentage increase or decrease applied to every product in the catalog. It can be 0%.
- Include compare-at price: when this is on, which is the default, the adjustment also applies to compare-at prices. When it is off, compare-at prices must be set manually in the catalog.
With the setting off, every product without a manual compare-at price in the catalog loses its crossed-out price in that market at once. The adjustment doesn't matter. A 0% adjustment looks especially harmless because prices don't change.
We found this setup while diagnosing a store where many sale items showed only the sale price, then reproduced it in a development store running Horizon. The variant's base prices are $64.00 USD with a compare-at price of $99.00:
The Canada catalog decreases prices by 5% with Include compare-at price turned off. Its Compare at price column for the same variant is empty:
A customer in Canada sees $88.00 CAD with no original price:
After we turned on Include compare-at price, the same page showed $88.00 CAD with $135.00 CAD crossed out. The compare-at price went through the same currency conversion and 5% decrease as the price.
If the market needs its own catalog, turn on Include compare-at price, then review products with manual prices, because a manual price still overrides the adjustment. If the catalog no longer serves a purpose, removing it can bring back the base prices, but it can also change which products the market sells and drop manual prices. Review both before you remove it.
Other market and customer settings
- Fixed prices: a fixed price set for a product in a market replaces its price there and needs its own compare-at price.
- EEA customers: if your primary market is outside the European Economic Area, Shopify lets you hide compare-at prices for EEA customers in the market's settings.
- B2B customers: logged-in company customers see prices from the catalog assigned to their company location. If only they lose the original price, check that catalog's compare-at prices. We haven't tested this case.
Check the theme and apps
If Horizon shows the original price and your theme doesn't, check these in a duplicate of your theme:
- Theme settings: some themes have sale price or compare-at options in the price block or product card settings. Horizon 4.2.0 has no option to turn the original price off.
- Card price logic: themes decide how a card picks its price. Some show a "From" price for products whose variants cost different amounts. Horizon 4.2.0 uses the selected or first available variant, so a card shows no original price when that variant isn't on sale.
- CSS or JavaScript: a custom style can hide the original price, and custom variant code can drop it when a customer changes options.
- Old customizations: custom price code from an earlier developer or tutorial, or a customization lost in a theme update. See what to do when a theme update removes customizations.
- Page builders and apps: page builder templates, currency converters, and wholesale or product option apps can render their own price with separate settings. Turn off app embeds one at a time to test.
If the cause is in theme or app code, our Shopify Bug Fix service can trace and fix it.
Verify the fix
After the change, retest in a private window:
- The product page for each affected variant
- Collection and search cards for the same products
- Each market where customers reported the problem
Before you restore crossed-out prices across a whole store or market, make sure each compare-at price reflects a real regular price. Many countries regulate how stores advertise a sale against an original price.