Importing products to your Online Store

A CSV file contains plain text entries separated by delimiters. Each entry represents a cell in a spreadsheet, each line represents a new row, and each delimiter (comma, semicolon, or tabulation) indicates where one entry ends and another entry begins. 

Note: the delimiter should be the same throughout the file

You can view and edit CSV files in plain text editors (e.g., Notepad for Windows, Sublime Text, TextEdit for Mac) or in spreadsheet editors (e.g., OpenOffice, LibreOffice, Google Sheets). Spreadsheet editors are usually more convenient.

CSV file contents

Each line in a product import file represents a list of attributes (name, SKU, description, price, etc) associated with a certain product in your store. 

Skipping the first line

The first line in the file may represent catalog column headers. If you want to delete them, check the Skip first line option in your import settings so this line is excluded from the product attributes. To do this:

1. Go to Catalog > Products and click Import Products.

2. Find the Skip First Line option:

Delimiters

Delimiters indicate where one product attribute ends and another one begins. Online Store supports three delimiters in CSV files: commas, semicolons, and a tabulation.

Encoding

Online Store supports more than ten charsets, including UTF-8, UTF-16, and US-ASCII. When you import your CSV file, please select the same encoding used in your CSV file for proper import.

If you don’t know how your CSV file is encoded, try UTF-8. It’s the most universal charset.

Numbers format

Online Store requires CSV imports to:

• use a dot (a full stop) to separate the decimals (e.g., 3.5 or 10.99)
• not use a separator for large numbers (e.g., 1350, not 1,350)

Importing CSV file

To see the import settings in your Online Store go to Catalog > Products and click Import Products.

Note: Product import in Online Store recognizes 25 product attributes. This means your CSV may contain up to 25 columns. View this article for a description of each attribute.

Here's how to proceed with product import:

1. Click Import Products.
2. In the dialog window, click Choose file and select the CSV file from your computer.
   
3. Select the delimiter used in your file (comma, semicolon or tabulation).
4. Select the character encoding used in your file.
5. Choose columns according to the structure of your import spreadsheet. Drag and drop columns to precisely match the column order in your file. Uncheck the columns that are not used in your original import file. Use the Skip column option to exclude up to three columns.
6.  If you would like to import all products and replace existing products and categories (for example, if you are changing your catalog completely) check the option Delete all products and categories before import.
   
   Warning: This will delete all the products that are in your store.
   
7. Click Import.

 Sample CSV file

Attached to this article is a sample CSV file to use as a template for creating your own CSV files. It includes an example of a product with comma-separated values.

This feature is available on all Online Store plans.

Other helpful articles

Selling products and services using Products block

Adding new products

Product block

Enable Pay What You Want pricing in Online Store