How to add a popup to BigCommerce

By Mert Özeren, Customer Success Specialist at Popupsmart · Updated September 24, 2026

To add a popup to BigCommerce, paste Popupsmart's one-line embed code into Script Manager or your theme's base.html, then build and publish the popup in Popupsmart. Popupsmart needs no app from the BigCommerce App Marketplace, and every popup after the install is built, targeted and changed from the Popupsmart dashboard.

BigCommerce's own newsletter tool is a sign-up box, usually in the footer, not a popup.

Add a popup to BigCommerce

Setup at a glance

Runs on: BigCommerce
Where the code goes: Storefront → Themes → Edit Theme Files → base.html
Add-on: No app needed

Before you start

You need access to the store's control panel and a Popupsmart account; a developer isn't on the list.

A BigCommerce control panel login with permission to edit themes or use Script Manager.
A free Popupsmart account. The free plan covers one website and one live popup, so you can finish this guide without paying.
The address your shoppers use for the store, which Popupsmart verifies after the install.

Paste the embed code into a copy of your theme, then apply the copy. Working on a copy keeps the original theme untouched if you need to go back. The next section covers Script Manager, which adds the same code without editing theme files.

Step 1: Copy your embed code

getting the embed code

Click Copy to clipboard. The code is one line, <script src="https://cdn.popupsmart.com/bundle.js" data-id="…" async defer></script>, and the data-id belongs to your account.

copying the embed code

Step 2: Make a copy of your theme

In your BigCommerce control panel, click Storefront in the left-hand menu.

bigcommerce dashboard

Click Themes, then open the Advanced dropdown on your current theme.

themes bigcommerce

Click Make a Copy.

make a copy

Name the copy and click Save a Copy.

saving a copy

Step 3: Open the theme files

When the copy appears under Themes, click its … menu and choose Edit Theme Files.

edit theme files

BigCommerce reminds you that it doesn't offer technical support for customizations made by editing theme files. Click Edit theme files to continue.

continue edit theme files

Step 4: Paste the code into base.html

In the file editor, open templates, then layout, then base.html. It is the layout every storefront page uses. Paste the embed code just before the closing </body> tag and click Save File.

save file on editor

The screenshot shows the code at the end of the home page template, home.html. Code placed there loads on the home page only; base.html puts it on every page.

Step 5: Apply the edited theme

Go back to Themes, open the copy's … menu and click Apply.

apply store changes

Choose the theme style your store uses and click Continue. The copy goes live on your store straight away.

theme to apply

Step 6: Add and verify your store

Back in Popupsmart, hover over the profile icon at the bottom left and click Websites. Click + New website at the top right.

adding a new website

Enter your store's address and click Save.

enter your website and click save

If the store shows as Unverified, click Unverified, then Verify website, and go back to the dashboard and click Refresh. The guide to verifying your website covers the other cases.

Click + New Campaign, name the campaign, choose your BigCommerce website and pick a ready-made or blank template.

creating a new campaign

Design the popup in the builder, then click Save and Publish.

creating saving and publishing bigcommerce popup

A confirmation appears when the campaign is live. Open your store in a private window and check that the popup appears when its trigger fires.

publish step of a bigcommerce popup

Script Manager or theme files: which should you use?

Script Manager is the simpler place for Popupsmart's code on a Stencil theme: it adds the script to your storefront without editing theme files, and it ties the script to your cookie consent settings. According to BigCommerce's Script Manager guide, it sits under Storefront › Script Manager (in Channel Manager on Multi-Storefront) and works only on stores using Stencil themes.

Click Create a Script and fill in:

Placement: Footer.
Location: Storefront pages, which covers every page except checkout and order confirmation.
Script category: the category that describes what the script does. BigCommerce's cookie consent banner uses it: shoppers who opt out of that category don't get the script. Shoppers can't opt out of Essential, which BigCommerce describes as scripts the site and its services need to work.
Script type: Script. Paste the embed code with its <script> tags; Script Manager won't save code without them.

Click Save, then add and verify your store in Popupsmart as in Step 6. When I set this up with a customer, I choose Storefront pages rather than All pages, so the popup code stays off the checkout and order confirmation pages.

The theme files suit a store that manages its theme in code. Use one method, not both: the help center warns that adding the code to the same site twice can make it malfunction.

BigCommerce has no built-in newsletter popup. According to BigCommerce's newsletter settings guide, the store comes with a newsletter sign-up box, usually in the footer, and a subscribe checkbox at checkout. As of September 2026, both are controlled under Marketing › Email Marketing, where Show Newsletter Summary adds a short description to the box without turning it into a popup.

	BigCommerce's newsletter sign-up	Popupsmart
What it is	A sign-up box, usually in the footer, and a checkbox at checkout	A popup on the pages and for the visitors you choose
When it shows	It's part of the page; there's no trigger	Exit intent, scroll depth, time on page, inactivity or a button click
Where the leads go	The store's subscriber list, which you export as a CSV file	Klaviyo, Mailchimp, SendGrid or another of the 19 destinations the help center lists
A/B testing	Not documented	From the Advanced plan
Price	Included with your store	Free plan; paid plans from $39 a month
Setup	Tick Allow Newsletter Subscriptions	One script in Script Manager or `base.html`

If a footer box is enough and you already import the subscriber CSV into an email app, BigCommerce's built-in sign-up does the job at no extra cost. A popup earns its place when you want to ask at a chosen moment, such as when a shopper is about to leave or has scrolled through a product page, and to send each signup straight to your email tool instead of through a CSV export. One caution from the same guide: for stores in the EU or selling to EU shoppers, ticking the newsletter checkbox by default risks non-compliance with GDPR.

A free BigCommerce email popup is a Popupsmart campaign on the free plan, which is permanent, not a trial: one website, one live popup and 5,000 pageviews a month, with Popupsmart branding. Install the code as above, start a campaign with an email form, and connect the tool that keeps your list in the campaign's Integration section.

Popupsmart then sends every email address the popup collects to that tool, so the leads don't sit in Popupsmart or in a CSV file. The Klaviyo popup guide and the Mailchimp popup guide walk through a connection, and phone numbers and SMS consent can go to Klaviyo, Mailchimp and HubSpot. A webhook, Zapier or Make covers a tool that isn't among the 19 destinations.

A BigCommerce popup shows on the pages its campaign targets, not the template you paste code into. Keep the code on every storefront page and give each campaign a URL rule that shows or hides it where the address contains or matches a keyword, such as /sale. You can move a popup to other pages later without editing the theme again.

The trigger deserves the same attention as the page. Across 500 Popupsmart campaigns analysed in 2026, 95.4% fire as soon as the page loads and only 2.0% use exit intent, as the exit-intent study reports, so when a popup fires is the lever most campaigns never pull.

A store's popups usually grow the list or save the sale:

Free shipping in exchange for an email: the free shipping popup recipe.
A last offer at the cart for shoppers about to leave: the cart abandonment popup recipe.
A product launch with a countdown and a signup: the countdown popup recipe.
A last try at a bounce on any page: the exit-intent popup recipe.

A Popupsmart popup doesn't hold up your BigCommerce pages: the embed code loads asynchronously (async defer), so the browser finishes building the page before it fetches Popupsmart. The popups themselves are built and stored in Popupsmart, not in your theme's files.

When a BigCommerce popup doesn't appear, check where the code went first, then the shopper's consent settings and the store's verification:

The code is on the home page only. If you pasted it into home.html, move it to templates/layout/base.html, or use Script Manager.
The edited copy isn't the live theme. The code runs only after you apply the copy you edited; check which theme is current under Themes.
The shopper opted out of the script's category. With the cookie consent banner on, a Script Manager script in a category the shopper declined doesn't load for them.
The script was just saved. BigCommerce caches scripts for 20 seconds, so a new script can take a moment to appear.
The code is installed twice. Keep the theme file code or the Script Manager script, not both.
The store isn't verified, or the address doesn't match. A campaign runs only on a verified website, and www.example.com and example.com are different sites to a browser. Add the address your shoppers actually use.

Still stuck? Contact Popupsmart support with your store's address and the campaign name.

💬

From the support queue: What I check first on a BigCommerce store is where the code went. Code in home.html loads on the home page only, and a Script Manager script in a category the shopper declined doesn't load for them at all; from the outside, both look like a broken popup. Then I check that the theme copy with the code is the one applied, and I test in a private window with the consent banner accepted.

Do I need a BigCommerce app for popups?

No. Popupsmart runs from its embed code, added through Script Manager or to your theme files, so there is nothing to install from the BigCommerce App Marketplace.

No. You paste one line of code into Script Manager or your theme's base layout once. Everything else, from the design to the targeting, happens in Popupsmart's visual editor.

Yes, with the right method. Script Manager is available on stores using Stencil themes, and if you edit files instead, the base layout every storefront page uses has a closing body tag where the code goes.

Yes, through Script Manager. The script category you choose when you add Popupsmart's code is what BigCommerce's cookie consent banner uses, so a shopper who opts out of that category doesn't load Popupsmart. BigCommerce recommends Script Manager over the legacy Footer Scripts field for this reason.

Do Popupsmart popups work on mobile?

Yes. Popupsmart popups are responsive, and you can switch the editor to the mobile view to check and adjust how a popup looks on a phone before you publish it.

How to add a popup to BigCommerce

Before you start