Managing collections on your sales channels

After you create a collection, you need to make sure that it's available on the sales channels that you use. You can also specify a future date when the collection will be published.

Plan requirements for managing collections on your sales channel

The Shopify Starter plan doesn't support grouping your products into collections to make it easier for customers to find them by category. If you require the ability to create collections, then you need to upgrade to a higher plan such as Basic Shopify, Shopify, Advanced Shopify, or Shopify Plus. Learn more about the different plan features.

Adjusting the availability of a collection

You can publish or hide a collection from your active sales channels by changing the collection's availability settings. There are a few reasons that you might want to hide a collection:

  • It's a collection of seasonal or sale products that you want to make available for only part of the year.
  • You want to sell only one type of product with a particular sales channel.
  • The products in the collection don't meet the eligibility requirements for a particular sales channel.

Considerations for adjusting the availability of a collection

Before you adjust the availability of a collection, review the following considerations:

  • Making a collection visible to the Online Store sales channel doesn't automatically link the collection to your store's menus. To help customers find a collection in your online store, you need to add a link to it from your store's menus.
  • Changing the collection availability doesn't change the availability of the individual products within the collection. If you want to make a product available or unavailable, then you need to update the product.

Change the availability of a collection

Desktop
  1. From your Shopify admin, go to Products > Collections.

  2. Click the collection. The Sales channels section displays the sales channels where the collection is available.

  1. If you want to change a collection's availability settings, then click Manage.
  2. Check each sales channel where you want the collection to be available. The collection will be hidden from any sales channel that is unchecked.
  3. Click Done.
  4. Click Save.
iPhone
  1. From the Shopify app, go to Products > Collections.
  2. Tap the collection that you want to edit.
  3. In the Sales Channels section, tap Edit.
  4. Select each sales channel where you want the collection to be visible. The collection will be hidden from any sales channel that isn't selected.
  5. Tap to save.
Android
  1. From the Shopify app, go to Products > Collections.
  2. Tap the collection that you want to edit.
  3. In the Sales Channels section, tap Edit.
  4. Select each sales channel where you want the collection to be visible. The collection will be hidden from any sales channel that isn't selected.
  5. Tap to save.

Change the publish date of a collection

You can set a specific publishing date for a collection to become available in your online store.

Steps:

  1. From your Shopify admin, go to Products > Collections.

  2. Click a collection.

  3. In the Sales channels section, click the calendar icon beside Online Store.

  4. Set the date and time that you want to publish the collection.

  5. Click Save.

Edit the search engine listing for a collection

You can edit the text that's displayed in search engine results for a collection. Descriptive titles and descriptions can help new customers to find your online store and encourage them to click the link. Learn more about search engine optimization.

When you make changes to a collection's search engine listing, you can view a preview of how it might display.

If you enter more than 70 characters for a title, or if you enter more than 320 characters for a description, then your text might get cut off in search engine results.

Steps:

  1. From your Shopify admin, go to Products > Collections.

  2. Click the name of the collection that you want to edit the search engine listing for.

  3. In the Search engine listing section, click the pencil icon.

  4. In the Page title field, enter a descriptive title for your collection. The title displays as a link in search engine results.

  5. In the Meta description field, enter a description for your collection. Consider including relevant keywords and your store's name to help new customers find your collection.

  6. Optional: Adjust the collection's URL:

    1. In the URL handle field, you can change part of the web address for your collection. The web address can't contain any spaces.
    2. Select whether to create a redirect from the old URL to the new URL. This ensures customers who click a link to the old URL are redirected to the new URL instead of landing on an 404 "page not found" page.
  7. Click Save.

Can’t find the answers you’re looking for? We’re here to help.