Prepare a Shopify product variants CSV
One product can have several purchasable variants. A T-shirt offered in two sizes should stay one product with two variants, rather than become two unrelated listings. The grouping key and option values determine that structure.
Published October 12, 2026 · Practical guide by Catalog Ready
Choose an explicit parent reference
Give each product a parent reference shared by its variants. Keep that parent reference separate from the SKU of each variant. In Catalog Ready, select variants mode and map the supplier parent column explicitly.
Avoid grouping by title alone. A supplier may use similar names for distinct products, and those should not be merged. If the supplier provides no parent reference, add one to the source after checking the catalogue.
Title,Price,Parent reference,SKU,Option1 name,Option1 value Cotton T-shirt,19.90,TS-100,TS-100-M,Size,M Cotton T-shirt,19.90,TS-100,TS-100-L,Size,L
Keep option names consistent
If the first option is Size, all variants in that product should use Size for the same option. A row using Color in that position needs to be corrected or placed in a different group. Each selected option needs both its name and its value.
Use consecutive options and review each existing combination. If the supplier provides only Medium/Black and Large/Blue, the output should contain exactly those two variants. It should not invent Medium/Blue or Large/Black.
Check duplicate combinations and SKU warnings
Two variants in the same product cannot represent the same option combination in this preparation workflow. Resolve the duplicate, or explicitly exclude the unwanted source row. The report preserves the exclusion and its source reference.
A repeated SKU is a review warning, not a universal statement about what Shopify permits. Check whether it represents an accidental duplication or a supplier convention. Keep identifiers as text to preserve leading zeros; once a spreadsheet has removed those zeros, the tool cannot recover them reliably.
Keep shared fields and variant fields separate
A product group needs a coherent title and vendor. Prices, SKUs and weights can differ between its variants. Catalog Ready checks inconsistent product-level fields and generates an output grouped by the explicit parent key.
The export includes product-level information on the first row of a group and variant details on subsequent rows. It uses the selected Shopify CSV profile and sets new products to draft. See the official Shopify documentation for the current template and field dependencies.
Understand the limits before importing
This workflow prepares new products. Updating existing variant options can have consequences for existing variant identifiers and third-party integrations; do not use this export as a replacement for a planned migration or update.
Inventory preparation is limited to a single-location store. Multi-location stock needs its own inventory workflow and is omitted when you select that setting. Test the output in a development store and inspect every option before a production import.
Check a supplier catalogue before importing
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