The Nikolsky Cathedral, one of the oldest urban churches, is first mentioned as a wooden structure located next to the Resurrection Church by Afanasy Vekov in 1629. It is known that in the 17th century, monastic cells were present at the churches. By the end of the same century, the church became a cathedral. In 1710, the wooden church was destroyed by fire. The stone cathedral was built in 1756 and consecrated by Metropolitan Seliverst of Suzdal and Yuriev. On the northern side, merchant D.V. Korinilov added an altar in honor of St. Mitrophan of Voronezh, the Wonderworker. Until 1867, the Nikolsky Cathedral served as a warm cathedral church, later becoming a library, sacristy, and regimental church. In the 19th and early 20th centuries, Shuya merchants, while reconstructing churches according to modern architectural traditions, considered the small Nikolsky Cathedral, reminiscent of a Russian hut, as a potential candidate for demolition. It was planned to build a new warm church to the left of the main temple. Archpriest Dunaev, the rector of the Resurrection Cathedral, described the Nikolsky Cathedral at the end of the 19th century: "the walls are not made of solid masonry, but their middle is filled with rubble and poured with lime mortar. The iconostasis is new, almost all the icons in it are old, but not Byzantine, rather Russian. The ancient icon of St. Nicholas the Wonderworker, located to the right of the royal gates, is especially venerated. There are no miraculous icons in the temple. The walls are painted blue, there is no painting on them, but there are several painted medallions on the vaults."

The Nikolsky Cathedral is a pillarless single-domed church with an original volumetric composition reminiscent of a wooden cell church, and decor in the classical style. The main volume, rectangular in plan and elongated along the north-south axis with a three-part altar, is connected to an elongated refectory, which is slightly lower but forms a single rectangular space with the church. Both parts of the building are covered with a gable roof. The main volume is topped with a cylindrical drum with an onion-shaped dome. Rectangular windows are evenly distributed on the facades, marked by late large triangular pediments on brackets. The original entrance on the southern facade of the square is adorned with a portico of four paired Corinthian columns. Previously, there were separate burials near the church. During the Soviet era, the Nikolsky Cathedral housed the city archive. The church is now returned to the church and belongs to the Shuya representation of the Holy Nicholas Shartom Monastery.