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As your WooCommerce store grows, so does the complexity of managing your products. Handling everything manually can slow you down and leave too much room for costly errors. That’s why finding efficient ways to export products in WooCommerce becomes essential for maintaining accuracy and saving time.
Managing a large WooCommerce store with thousands of products manually? That’s a recipe for burnout. Updating product details, adjusting prices, or shifting items around can eat up hours, and let’s be honest, mistakes are bound to happen.
A wrong entry here, a missed update there, and suddenly you’re dealing with messed-up listings, inventory issues, and unhappy customers.
That’s where WordPress data migration plugins come to the rescue. They automate bulk product exports, cut down on errors, and seriously smooth out your workflow. In short, they make handling big stores a whole lot easier.
In this article, we’ll walk you through the different ways you can bulk export WooCommerce products, quickly and effortlessly.
Key Takeaways:
- Migrating products is a crucial aspect of managing an online store, but manually handling them can be challenging.
- WordPress and WooCommerce have built-in options to import and export products, but they are limited in their capability and offer only basic functionality.
- Plugins like WooCommerce Product Import Export are ideal for exports because they automate the process, ensuring smooth and accurate workflows.
There are several reasons why a store owner would choose to export their products, especially bulk export. Some of the common scenarios are listed below.
- Bulk Update – Exporting products to a spreadsheet or CSV file allows you to make bulk edits to product information, such as prices, descriptions, or stock levels, more efficiently.
- Transfer products – If you plan to switch to a different eCommerce platform or another WooCommerce site, exporting your products ensures a smooth migration to the new environment.
- Data Backup – Exporting products and their associated data creates a backup of your product data, protecting it from accidental deletions or data loss due to technical issues.
- Multi-channel Selling – Exporting your product catalog lets you easily list your products on platforms like Google Merchant Center or Amazon. This enables you to sell across multiple marketplaces and channels by generating product feeds compatible with different platforms.
Did You Know: Whether you’re editing prices, moving to a new platform, or listing on Google or Amazon, a proper export can save you time, minimize errors, and open up new growth opportunities.
Store owners may have several other reasons for exporting product data. Whatever the reason, you can easily export the required data using the export methods detailed below.
Exporting WooCommerce products can be done quickly using built-in tools or free plugins. Depending on your requirements, whether it’s a simple list or detailed product data, you can choose from the WordPress export tool, WooCommerce’s native export feature, or a plugin for more advanced options.
Here, we will explore the three practical ways to do so.
1. Using WordPress Export Tool
WordPress offers built-in tools for exporting data from your WordPress account, such as posts, pages, products, media, etc., in XML format.
To export your products and product data using the built-in WordPress export tool,
- Navigate to Tools > Export from your WordPress dashboard.
- Choose what to export as Products.
- Click on the Download Export File button.
This will download an XML file with your product information. You can import this file using WordPress’s built-in Import tool.
2. Using the Default WooCommerce Export Option
In addition to the export tool, you can use the default export option in WooCommerce to export your WooCommerce products using a CSV file.
To export WooCommerce products and product data to a CSV file,
- Go to Products > All Products from your WordPress dashboard.
- Here, click on Export.
- You will be asked to select the columns, product types, and product categories that should be exported. Choose the required data.
- You can also opt in to export the custom meta for the export fields if you like.
- Once selected, click on Generate CSV.
This will download a CSV file with the product information that you asked for.
Here is a snapshot of a sample export CSV file.
Exporting WooCommerce product data is as easy as that, even with the default options.
Limitations of the Built-in WooCommerce Export Tool
While the built-in WooCommerce export feature is convenient for basic needs, it falls short when it comes to more advanced requirements. Here’s where it can limit you:
1. Limited Selective Export Options
The default tool allows you to filter products by type and category, but if you need finer control, such as exporting products based on custom attributes, specific tags, or stock status, you’ll find it lacking.
Store owners with complex inventories might struggle to isolate exactly the products they need.
2. No Customization of Export Columns
The built-in exporter does not allow you to adjust or rearrange the columns in your export file. If you need a CSV with only specific fields, such as product name, SKU, and price, or want to exclude irrelevant fields like dimensions or tax details, you’ll need to edit the CSV afterward manually, adding extra steps and time to the process.
3. Fixed Export File Format
WooCommerce’s built-in tool only exports product data in a CSV format. If you require different formats, such as XML or XLSX, for compatibility with other systems (like ERPs, CRMs, or marketplace integrations), you will need to rely on external plugins or third-party tools to reformat the data.
If you have any such requirement, you might have to rely on dedicated third-party plugins to help you with the process. Next, we will explore one such plugin that simplifies product export while providing greater control, allowing you to manage the process more effectively.
3. Using a Free Plugin
Even though WordPress and WooCommerce, by default, offer tools to help you with the export process, you may not be able to attain your advanced requirements. For example, if you only want to export products that are currently in stock, there is no point in using the export tool or the WooCommerce feature.
This is where you would need a plugin with several customization and filtering options. The free WooCommerce Product Import Export plugin by WebToffee enables you to export only the data that you require, using several filters and advanced customizations.
Moreover, this plugin will also export the image metadata along with the product images, a feature unavailable in the default WooCommerce export feature.
Take a look at our video guide on importing and exporting products with WebToffee’s plugin.
Now, let’s go through the step-by-step process for exporting WooCommerce products using the Product Import Export for WooCommerce plugin.
Step 1: Install WebToffee Product Import Export for WooCommerce Plugin
The first step in exporting WooCommerce products using the plugin is to install and activate the plugin itself. Product Import and Export for WooCommerce is a free plugin that is available in the WordPress plugin directory.
For this,
- Navigate to Plugins > Add New Plugin.
- Search for “Product Import Export for WooCommerce” plugin.
- Then Install and Activate the plugin.
Step 2: Choose Product as Post Type to Export
Once the plugin is installed,
- Go to WebToffee Import Export (Basic) > Export.
- Choose the post type to export as Product.
Step 3: Select Advanced Export Method
You can then proceed to select the export method.
There are two export methods that you can employ to export the products. They are Quick export and Advanced export.
Quick export can be used if you want to export the whole of your products with all the basic export fields. With quick export, you can complete the export process with just a single click. Advanced export is preferred if you want to select and omit certain products or fields from your export file. You can do so with the help of several filtration, column selection, and advanced options.
- Let’s select Advanced export and proceed to the next step.
Step 3: Filter Product Export Data
Filter out the data that needs to be exported with the help of the filter options here.
You have several options, such as limiting the number of products, excluding the first n products, exporting specific products based on their categories, tags, etc, and more.
Once you have selected your required configuration, proceed to the next step.
Step 4: Map & Reorder Product Columns
Here you can select which columns of product data should be exported, the name of the corresponding column in the CSV file, the order of arrangement of the columns in the CSV, etc.
You can use the drag and reorder icons in this section to rearrange the positioning of the columns.
Once you have selected this, you can move forward to the next step.
Step 5: Export Products
You’ve reached the final step of the product export process. Just a few quick settings, and you’re done!
- Specify the Export File Name: Enter a name for your exported file to keep things organized. If you leave it blank, the system will automatically generate a filename for you.
- Set the Batch Size: Define how many products you want to export at a time, especially if you’re dealing with a large catalog.
- Choose the Delimiter: Select the appropriate delimiter for your CSV file (usually a comma, but some systems may require a different delimiter like a semicolon).
- Export the File: Once configured, click the Export button to generate and download your CSV file.
Pro Tip: You can also save your current export settings as a template, so you won’t need to repeat the entire process for future exports.
On exporting, a CSV file will get downloaded to your system. It will have all the columns and the products that satisfy the selected criteria.
In addition to the free plugin, WebToffee also offers a premium version of the Product Import Export plugin for WooCommerce.
This premium version of the WooCommerce product export plugin offers several customizations and filters that are not offered through the basic version of the plugin. For instance, the pro version supports the export of CSV, XML, XLS, and XLSX files. The plugin lets you schedule the export action, offers several advanced filters and column options, etc.
Some of the other key features of the plugin include:
- Supports All Product Types: Export variable, subscription, and custom product types with ease.
- Customizable Column Sorting: Sort product data columns based on your preferred criteria.
- Include Custom Field Data: Add third-party or custom field columns to your export file.
- Export Only Modified Products: Enable incremental exports for products updated since the last export.
- Automated Scheduled Exports: Set up recurring product data exports on your desired schedule.
- Export Product Images Separately: Export product images in separate zip files for easy access.
By default, WooCommerce exports the image URLs but not the image files themselves. If you need to export image metadata along with images or create a zip file of images, you’ll need a plugin like WebToffee’s Product Import Export (Pro).
It supports exporting images separately in a zip file alongside the product data.
No, exporting products is a read-only process. It simply pulls your product data into a file without making any changes to your live store. Your products, inventory, and site performance remain unaffected during or after the export.
To handle large exports smoothly:
– Set a smaller batch size during export (e.g., 50-100 products at a time).
– Schedule exports in smaller chunks to avoid server timeouts.
Yes, exporting custom product attributes and taxonomies is possible using advanced export plugins. The default WooCommerce export only includes basic attributes.
With the WebToffee plugin (both free and pro versions), you can export custom fields, additional product metadata, and taxonomy-based categories.
Exporting data from online retail outlets is highly important and challenging. It can be used to migrate data between WooCommerce sites, update product information in bulk, or back up data.
The product import export is a free plugin that lets you export all the data regarding your products to an external CSV or XML file. The plugin also lets you export product categories and product reviews in addition to the product data.
Hope this article was of interest to you. Feel free to drop a comment below if you have any questions or thoughts.
