Channel comparison
Google Shopping vs Pinterest: feed requirements compared
Pinterest borrows Google's attribute names but asks less of a feed: most of what Google requires conditionally is optional here. What Pinterest does demand is a genuinely good image, because the image is the listing rather than a thumbnail, and a separate feed for each market.
Where the two specifications diverge
The 5 attributes one channel treats differently from the other. Everything else is identical and is listed further down.
| Attribute | Google Shopping | What that means | |
|---|---|---|---|
| brand | Required in some cases | Optional | Stricter on Google Shopping. |
| condition | Required in some cases | Optional | Stricter on Google Shopping. |
| gtin | Required in some cases | Optional | Stricter on Google Shopping. |
| item_group_id | Required in some cases | Optional | Stricter on Google Shopping. |
| mpn | Required in some cases | Optional | Stricter on Google Shopping. |
Differences a table cannot show
Requirement levels are the easy part. These are the differences in values, structure and delivery that break a feed copied from one channel to the other.
The image is the product, not a thumbnail
On Google a weak image costs a little click-through. On Pinterest the image is the entire unit of discovery, and vertical or near-square crops materially outperform the landscape images many Shopify themes produce. Sending the same image_link to both channels is the most common missed opportunity here, and mapping a dedicated image where the store has one is worth more than any attribute change.
One feed per locale, not one feed with locales
Google accepts a feed per target country and can also handle several countries in one feed with the right settings. Pinterest expects a separate data source per country and language combination. A Shopify store selling into four markets needs four generated feeds, which is a pipeline decision rather than a mapping one.
Identifiers barely matter here
Google treats gtin, mpn and brand as a conditional chain and warns when it cannot match an item. Pinterest treats all three as optional. Feeding them is still worthwhile, but a catalogue of own-brand goods that struggles on Google will not struggle on Pinterest for the same reason.
Refresh is once a day, at a time you pick
Pinterest fetches a scheduled data source once every 24 hours and has no sub-daily option and no routine push API. A sold-out product can stay pinned as available for most of a day. The only lever is regenerating the feed shortly before the scheduled fetch, which narrows the window as far as the channel allows.
No product taxonomy attribute
Google uses its own taxonomy in google_product_category to decide which vertical rules apply. Pinterest does not take that attribute, so categorisation comes from the title, description and its own classification. The taxonomy mapping is not wasted, it simply does nothing on this channel.
Reusing one feed for the other channel
What actually has to change, in the order it is worth doing.
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Start from the Google feed and remove nothing
Pinterest ignores what it does not use, so the fastest correct first step is to publish the existing mapping and let the unused attributes ride along. Nothing in the Google feed will cause a Pinterest rejection.
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Choose the image deliberately
Look at what image_link currently resolves to. If it is a theme-resized landscape crop, find out whether the store has a portrait or square alternative, in a metafield or as a second product image, and map that instead for this channel only.
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Split the feed by market
Generate one feed per country and language pair, each with its own currency, its own prices and its own product URLs. This is the part that catches stores out, because a single multi-market file looks correct and simply will not behave.
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Schedule regeneration just before the daily fetch
Pick the fetch time in Pinterest, then regenerate shortly before it. Regenerating on an unrelated cadence means the channel systematically reads data that is up to a day older than it needs to be.
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Leave the identifiers in place
They are optional here but cost nothing to send, and they are the fields that let Pinterest tie your item to the same product elsewhere. Removing them because the channel does not require them is a false economy.
Every attribute, side by side
All 16 attributes documented in this knowledge base, as Google Shopping and Pinterest each treat them.
| Attribute | Google Shopping | |
|---|---|---|
| availability | Required availability | Required availability |
| brand | Required in some cases brand | Optional brand |
| condition | Required in some cases condition | Optional condition |
| custom_label_0 | Optional custom_label_0 | Not documented here — |
| description | Required description | Required description |
| google_product_category | Recommended google_product_category | Not documented here — |
| gtin | Required in some cases gtin | Optional gtin |
| id | Required id | Required id |
| identifier_exists | Optional identifier_exists | Not documented here — |
| image_link | Required image_link | Required image_link |
| item_group_id | Required in some cases item_group_id | Optional item_group_id |
| link | Required link | Required link |
| mpn | Required in some cases mpn | Optional mpn |
| price | Required price | Required price |
| sale_price | Optional sale_price | Optional sale_price |
| title | Required title | Required title |
Frequently asked questions
Can I use my Google Shopping feed for Pinterest?
Yes, with two caveats. Pinterest wants one data source per country and language, so a multi-market file needs splitting, and the image is worth choosing separately because on Pinterest the image is the listing rather than a thumbnail.
Does Pinterest require GTINs?
No. gtin, mpn and brand are all optional on Pinterest, where Google treats them as conditionally required. Sending them is still worthwhile for matching, but their absence will not hold a catalogue back here.
How often does Pinterest fetch a feed?
Once every 24 hours, at a time you choose, with no sub-daily schedule and no routine push API. Regenerating the feed shortly before that fetch is the only way to keep price and stock as current as the channel allows.
What image size should a Pinterest feed use?
Favour vertical or near-square over landscape, and send the largest original you have rather than a theme-resized version. Pinterest displays the image at a size where a small or badly cropped file is immediately obvious.
Both specifications in full
- Google Shopping Google Shopping is the surface where Google displays product listings from a merchant's catalogue, fed by a product feed uploaded to Google Merchant Center. Google's product data specification is the most detailed of the major channels, and the one whose attribute names the other channels tend to borrow.
- Pinterest Pinterest turns an uploaded product feed into Product Pins, which are shoppable pins that carry live price and availability from the catalogue. Its feed specification borrows Google's attribute names, and its distinguishing requirement is that every item needs a genuinely usable image, because the image is the entire unit of discovery on Pinterest.
Errors on either channel
- Image link cannot be crawled An image crawl failure means the channel could not retrieve the file at image_link, or retrieved it and judged it unusable. On Shopify the URL itself is rarely wrong, so the cause is usually a rate limit hit during a first full crawl, a temporary CDN response, or an image whose content breaks policy rather than one that is genuinely missing.
- Mismatched value: availability The availability mismatch error means the feed says an item is purchasable but the crawled landing page suggests otherwise, or the reverse. On Shopify it is usually a stale feed after a sell-out, or an availability value derived from inventory quantity alone without accounting for variants that do not track inventory or that allow overselling.
Related concepts
- Feed scheduling Feed scheduling is the arrangement where a sales channel fetches a feed from a fixed URL on a repeating timetable instead of the merchant uploading a file. It matters because the interval between regenerations is the window in which a channel can be wrong about a price or a stock level, and most mismatch disapprovals are caused by that window being too wide rather than by a bad mapping.
- Product identifiers Product identifiers are the values that let a sales channel recognise that your listing and someone else's describe the same physical product: a GTIN, or a manufacturer part number together with a brand. They matter because a channel that can identify a product can attach reviews, specifications and competing offers to it, and one that cannot has to treat your listing as an unknown object.
- Product feed A product feed is a structured file listing every item a shop sells, with one row per purchasable item and one column per attribute the destination understands. Sales channels use it to build their own copy of a catalogue, which is why a feed is a translation of a shop's data into another system's schema rather than an export of it.
Primary sources
Channel specifications change. These are the official documents this page is based on.