Product vertical
Consumer electronics
Electronics is the vertical where identifiers are least negotiable, because every unit has a manufacturer barcode and channels use it to compare your price against everyone else selling the same model. In the EU, energy-labelled goods additionally need a certification declaration.
Categories this covers
The Google product taxonomy branches these rules apply to. Match your own products against these paths before assuming the extra requirements are yours.
- Electronics
- Electronics > Audio
- Electronics > Computers
- Electronics > Video
- Home & Garden > Kitchen & Dining > Kitchen Appliances
Attributes this vertical changes
These sit on top of the attributes every feed needs. A requirement shown here applies because of the category, not because of the channel.
| Attribute | Requirement here | Why |
|---|---|---|
| gtin | Required | Every unit has a manufacturer barcode, and matching on it is how the channel builds the comparison a shopper sees. An empty gtin here is a data gap, never a product without an identifier. |
| mpn | Required | Model numbers are how electronics are actually identified, and they distinguish regional variants of the same product that share little else. |
| brand | Required | Manufacturer brands are the primary way shoppers navigate this vertical, and brand with mpn is the fallback identifier pair when a barcode is missing. |
| condition | Required | Refurbished and open-box stock is normal here and sells alongside new. Declaring condition is what stops a refurbished unit competing as new and being reported for it. |
| certification | Required in some cases | Carries EU energy label data for product groups covered by the labelling rules, such as large appliances, displays and light sources. Older feeds used energy_efficiency_class for the same purpose. |
| multipack | Required in some cases | Required where you have bundled identical units yourself, such as a two-pack of smart plugs, so the pack is not matched against a single unit. |
| is_bundle | Required in some cases | Required for a main product sold with accessories, such as a camera with a lens kit, which is otherwise matched against the bare body and looks overpriced. |
What catches consumer electronics stores out
Price comparison is unforgiving when matching works
A correct gtin puts your listing directly against every other seller of the same unit. That is the point of the identifier, and it means a mapping fix can move an item from invisible to visibly expensive. The answer is still to get the identifier right, but it is worth knowing which problem you have just revealed.
Regional variants share a model name and nothing else
The same device sold in the UK and the EU can differ in plug, frequency band and included accessories while carrying almost the same name. The mpn and the gtin are what separate them. Mapping a generic model number across regions creates matches that are wrong in ways a shopper discovers after delivery.
Bundles are matched against their cheapest component
A console sold with two games and no is_bundle declaration is matched against the bare console. Your listing then looks expensive against sellers of the component rather than competitive against sellers of the bundle.
Refurbished stock imported as new
Refurbished units are commonly loaded into Shopify as ordinary products with nothing but a word in the title to distinguish them. Condition has to come from a tag, a metafield or a collection, and getting it wrong is the kind of error that affects account standing rather than a single item.
Energy labelling is not derivable from the catalogue
The certification data for a labelled appliance comes from the manufacturer and the EU product registry, not from anything in your store. It has to be stored per product as data you have obtained, which means a metafield and a process for filling it rather than a mapping rule.
Where these values come from in Shopify
Shopify has a field for some of these and nowhere to put the rest. Both cases are worth knowing before you start mapping.
- gtin
- From the variant barcode. In this vertical suppliers can nearly always provide the full list, so bulk-filling it is a practical task rather than an aspiration.
- mpn
- From a metafield holding the manufacturer model number. The SKU is usually your own reference and is the wrong value, even though it is the tempting one.
- brand
- From the Shopify vendor field where it has been maintained as the manufacturer rather than the supplier, which is worth verifying across the catalogue before trusting it.
- condition
- From a tag or collection identifying refurbished and open-box stock, defaulting to new for everything else.
- certification
- A metafield populated from manufacturer documentation. There is no Shopify field for it and no way to infer it from the catalogue.
Frequently asked questions
Why do electronics feeds fail on identifiers so often?
Because every unit has a barcode, so an empty gtin is read as missing data rather than as a product without an identifier. Shopify makes the barcode field optional, which means large imported catalogues arrive with it empty.
Should I use my SKU as the MPN for electronics?
No. The mpn is the manufacturer's model number, which is how the channel matches your listing to the same device elsewhere. Your SKU is an internal reference and gives the channel nothing to match against.
How do I feed a bundle, such as a camera with a lens?
Set is_bundle so the channel knows the item is a main product sold with accessories. Without it, the listing is matched against the bare body and looks overpriced next to it.
What is the certification attribute for?
It carries EU energy label information for product groups covered by the labelling rules, such as large appliances, displays and light sources. The data comes from the manufacturer rather than from anything in your Shopify catalogue.
Attributes involved
- gtin The gtin attribute is the globally unique barcode number a manufacturer assigns to a product, covering UPC, EAN, JAN and ISBN formats. Channels use it to match an item against the same product sold elsewhere, and on Shopify it comes from the variant's barcode field, which is optional in the admin and therefore frequently empty.
- mpn The mpn attribute is the part number a manufacturer uses to identify a product in its own catalogue, and it serves as the fallback identifier when an item has no GTIN. Unlike a GTIN it is only unique within one manufacturer, so it is meaningless to a channel unless the brand attribute is supplied alongside it.
- brand The brand attribute is the name of the brand a product belongs to, and it is what makes a manufacturer part number meaningful and a listing eligible for brand-based matching. On Shopify it maps most often from the vendor field, which is unreliable because merchants commonly use vendor to record a supplier or distributor rather than the consumer-facing brand.
- condition The condition attribute declares whether an item is new, refurbished or used. Its requirement level is one of the sharpest differences between channels: Google only needs it when an item is not new, while Meta expects it on every item, so a feed built for one and pointed at the other fails on every row.
Errors this vertical runs into
- Missing value: GTIN The "Missing value: GTIN" issue means a channel believes a product has a manufacturer-assigned barcode but the feed did not supply one. On Shopify it almost always traces back to the variant barcode field, which is optional in the admin and therefore left empty across large parts of most catalogues.
- Invalid value: GTIN The "Invalid value: GTIN" error means the feed supplied a value in the gtin attribute that is not a structurally valid Global Trade Item Number. Unlike a missing GTIN this is usually a disapproval rather than a warning, because a wrong identifier matches the item to the wrong product rather than to none.
- Missing value: brand The "Missing value: brand" issue means a channel expects a brand name for a product and the feed did not supply one, or supplied a placeholder it treats as empty. On Shopify it usually means the vendor field is blank, or holds a supplier or internal category rather than the brand a shopper would recognise.
Related concepts
Channels this applies to
- 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.
- Meta Meta's product catalogue is the data source behind Facebook and Instagram Shops, Advantage+ catalogue ads and dynamic retargeting, populated by a product feed uploaded to Commerce Manager. Its attribute names largely mirror Google's, but its accepted values and its handling of variants differ enough to break a feed copied straight across.
- Microsoft Advertising Microsoft Advertising runs product ads across Bing, Yahoo and the Microsoft Audience Network from a catalogue uploaded to Microsoft Merchant Center. Its feed specification is closely modelled on Google's, which makes it the cheapest additional channel to launch once a Google Shopping feed already exists.
Primary sources
Channel specifications change. These are the official documents this page is based on.