FAQ for import CSVs into Shopify using “EZ CSV Import, CSV Export app”
This is for the app Shopify Import and Export CSV.
- An easy way to use the CSV app to do updates on products
- Example CSV file to import and create products
- First method for how to update inventory numbers in Shopify: using SKU
- Second method for how to update inventory numbers in Shopify: updating the variants that a product has
- Example CSV file to set Harmonized System Code (or HS Tariff code)
- What do each of the column names mean in the example CSV file?
- Example of metafield
- Example of variant metafield
- What is a Option Name and Option Value?
- Error: The variant ‘Default Title’ already exists.
- Error: Invalid Taxonomy
- More than 10,000 unique taxonomies found in CSV
If you want more example CSV files, I have lots more I use to test the app with. Just send me an email hello@programmerhat.com
An easy way to use the CSV app to do updates on products
Do an export of all the products in the CSV app. Then delete all rows except for the products you want to update.
Then you can update the CSV, and use the “Import” function in the app.
Example CSV file to import and create products
This creates 3 products: “Example Hat”, “Example Pants”, “Example T-Shirt”.
This also creates 3 variations on “Example T-Shirt”, so this examples teaches you how the variations work in Shopify.
https://ecomapps.programmerhat.com/csv-import/csv/regression_blank_gids.csv
First method for how to update inventory numbers in Shopify: using SKU
This is the preferred method for updating inventory numbers. Because the 2nd method requires you to update ALL the variants in a product, whereas this 1st method allows you to update only specific variants in a product (the app finds the variants using SKUs).
Here is a example CSV file.
https://ecomapps.programmerhat.com/csv-import/csv/update_inventory_using_sku.csv
It’s a very simple CSV file. There are only two columns you need: 1) SKU, 2) Variant Inventory Qty.
Here is a tutorial video on how to use the example CSV file.
Second method for how to update inventory numbers in Shopify: updating the variants that a product has
This second method is not as ideal as the first method described in the previous section, because it requires replacing ALL the variants in a product with new inventory numbers, instead of being able to update only certain variants (using the SKU to specify the variant).
As such, look at this example CSV file. You need to use the “Handle” field to identify a product. This will replace the existing variants with new variants, hence updating the inventory numbers as a result.
The two important column names are “Variant Inventory Tracker” and “Variant Inventory Qty”. You will see in the example CSV that “Variant Inventory Tracker” should have all “shopify”, and the “Variant Inventory Qty” should be a number.
https://ecomapps.programmerhat.com/csv-import/csv/regressioninventory.csv
Example CSV file to set Harmonized System Code (or HS Tariff code)
The important column is “Harmonized System code”.
https://ecomapps.programmerhat.com/csv-import/csv/test_hs_code.csv
What do each of the column names mean in the example CSV file?
Perhaps the easiest way to do learn the meanings of each of those column names is to create 2-5 products in Shopify, then use the “Export” CSV function in the app, then you can examine which columns have the values that you put in for each product.
More specific documentation (work in progress. I should add more. Email me if you need more hello@programmerhat.com)
Track Inventory?
The column name to use is “is variant tracked?“. Possible values in the column are either “true” or “false”. Example CSV file: https://ecomapps.programmerhat.com/csv-import/csv/test_inventory_tracked.csv
Then you should see 1 product’s inventory is tracked, while 1 product’s inventory is not tracked. See screenshot:
Sales Channel
Here’s an example CSV file you can use. I use it to test the column: https://ecomapps.programmerhat.com/csv-import/csv/test_channel.csv
The column name to use is “Channel”.
I’ve noticed that if the “status” of the product is “active” (and by default it is active), then the “Online Store” channel will always be active. You can make the status of the product “draft” to prevent “Online Store” channel from being automatically added.
Also if you want to have multiple channels for a product, you’d wanna comma-delimit the channels, like this: “Online Store, Google & YouTube”.
Example of metafield
Metafield column name needs to be in a special format: “Metafield: <key>.<name> [type]”. For example: “Metafield: csvapp_namespace.csvapp_key [single_line_text_field]”
Here’s an example CSV that creates a metafield on the product with handle “example-hat-1”: https://ecomapps.programmerhat.com/csv-import/csv/metafield_regression.csv
Example of variant metafield
Variant metafield column name needs to be in a special format: “Variant Metafield: <key>.<name> [type]”. For example: “Variant Metafield: csvapp_namespace.csvapp_key [single_line_text_field]”
Here’s an example CSV that creates a variant metafield on the product with title “CSV app – test variant metafield”, and with tag “csv”: https://ecomapps.programmerhat.com/csv-import/csv/test_variant_metafield.csv
What is a Option Name and Option Value?
This is a critical concept for understanding variants. Shopify uniquely identifies variants of a product based on Option Name and Option Value.
Here is a screenshot of variants as an example:
The Option Name is “Size”, and the possible Option Values are S, M, L.
So for variants of a product, the Option Values must be different between the variants. For example here: one variant has Size “S”, another variant has Size “M”, another variant has Size “L”.
Now in your CSV, variants cannot have duplicate values for the same variant.
Hope that clears it up. If not, please email me asking me to explain this better.
Error: The variant ‘Default Title’ already exists.
Variants are uniquely identified by Option Name and Option Value.
You have variants here based on the “handle” or “title” as the identifier, but you didn’t give them unique Name/Value combos.
Look at this example CSV which successfully creates products. One of them has variants, and notice how the Name+Value are different: https://www.programmerhat.com/faq-for-import-csvs-into-shopify-using-ez-csv-import-csv-export-app/#Example_CSV_file_to_import_and_create_products
Error: Invalid Taxonomy
The app is trying to find the ID of the taxonomy you wrote in the CSV.
The app gets the list of taxonomies from Shopify: https://help.shopify.com/txt/product_taxonomy/en.txt
In that large text file, the IDs are on the left, and the category/taxonomy is on the right. The separator is the dash “-“.
Example: the ID for “Animals & Pet Supplies” is “1”, which is the second row in that text file.
More than 10,000 unique taxonomies found in CSV
You are getting this error because Shopify only has only around 5596 valid taxonomies.
Since your CSV file has more than 5596 taxonomies listed, it cannot be correct, therefore the app has thrown an error.
You can see the full list of Shopify product taxonomies here: https://help.shopify.com/txt/product_taxonomy/en.txt
Scroll all the way to bottom. You can see the number “5595” — that indicates there are only 5595 valid taxonomies in Shopify.
To be a valid taxonomy, your taxonomy must be at least one of those rows in that “en.txt” link.