The fastest way to add a catalogue, and the easiest way to make a mess.
PREPARING THE FILE
Export a sample first: Products > All Products > Export. That gives you the exact column names WooCommerce expects, which is far more reliable than building a file from documentation.
Fill in your data using those columns. At minimum you need Name, Regular price, and ideally SKU and Categories.
IMPORTING
- Products > All Products > Import.
- Choose the file and continue.
- Map each column to the correct WooCommerce field. Check every row of the mapping screen; wrong mappings are the usual cause of a bad import.
- Run the importer.
BEFORE YOU START
Take a full backup. An import that goes wrong is much easier to undo from a backup than to unpick by hand. Raise max_execution_time to 300 in cPanel > MultiPHP INI Editor. Import ten products first and check the result before running the whole file.
AFTERWARDS
Spot-check products for category, visibility, price and stock. Imports frequently leave products without a category or as draft.
