Automated collections with metafields
Automated collectionsuse selection conditions to automatically include matching products. You can add up to 60 selection conditions in a single collection, and you can specify if products need to meet all conditions or any condition to be included in the collection.
Complete the following actions before you create an automated collection by metafields:
- add in your metafield definitions
- activate automated collections
- add the values to your products or variants
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Benefits of automated collections by metafields
Automated collections by metafields help you create more accurate collections for your products and variants compared to product tags. For example, you can set up a collection using the tags that includered. However,redis used for product color, andurgency-redis used for fulfillment urgency. In this example, your collection would have products that are both the colorredand have a fulfillment urgency ofurgency-red, because they both includered. In this example, tags aren't going to work for your colorredcollection.
Because metafields are part of your data model, you can integrate this same data across Shopify, such as your online store. You can use metafields to be more specific in your collections. You can create metafield definitions for color, and then create a collection that only pulls in products that have the color value you want for the collection. You can create a metafield definition that is for fulfillment urgency, and then create a collection that only pulls in products that are marked with an urgent fulfillment value. Metafields provide more flexibility and structure than tags.
Limitations
Automated collections by metafield conditions have the following limitations:
You can only use product or variant metafield definitions and values in your automated collections.
If you add a metafield to a variant and create an automated collection for that metafield, then your automated collection will pull in the whole product with the other variants.
Theactivate automated collectionssetting has a maximum of 128 definitions per product metafield definitions and variant metafield definitions.
You can't delete a metafield defintion until the collection is updated to remove the metafield definition as a condition.
Metafield definitions and supported conditions
Only certain metafield product and variant definitions are supported with specific conditions.
| Metafield definition type | Supported conditions |
|---|---|
| True or false | equals |
| Integer | equals greater than less than |
| Decimal | equals greater than less than |
| Rating | equals greater than less than |
| Single line text (one value and list of values) | equals |
Activating the automated collections setting
To use a metafield definition for automated collections, you need to activate the setting in your metafield definitions.
Learn more aboutcreating custom metafield definitions.
Create automated collections with metafield definition conditions
You can add a condition to include products or variants with a particularmetafield.
The first column of the drop-down list for your automated collection conditions is the name of your metafield definition. The second column is your supported conditions, such asequals. The third column is for your metafield values and is a drop-down list or text box. Only metafield definitions with theautomated collections setting activateddisplay.
For example, to set up a condition that selects products with the metafield definitionColorand the value#FF0000:
Steps:
Learn more aboutautomated collections.