When you export items from Business Central to Shopify, you can now designate up to three item attributes as Shopify product options. This capability allows you to define products in Shopify with independent options like color, size, or material to create variants based on different combinations of these attributes.

This capability lets you control how item attributes translate to Shopify's product structure. When you mark an item attribute with the Incl. in Product Sync field set to As Option, the connector exports that attribute as a Shopify product option during synchronization. Each item variant with different attribute values becomes a distinct Shopify variant with properly structured options.

For example, if you have a t-shirt item in Business Central with Color and Size attributes marked as options, the export creates a Shopify product with Color and Size as options you can select. Each item variant (Red/Small, Red/Large, Blue/Small, Blue/Large) appears as a separate variant in Shopify with the correct option values.

How it works

You configure item attributes at the item level in Business Central. When you're ready to sync:

Open the Item Attributes page and identify which attributes should become Shopify product options.
Set the Incl. in Product Sync field to As Option for the attributes you want to export.
Assign attribute values to your items and item variants. Make sure that the item has a maximum of three attributes that you mark with the As Option value.
Export items to Shopify.

The connector validates your configuration before export. If you try to export an item with more than three attributes marked as options, Business Central skips the item and logs the reason in the Shopify Skipped Entries page. Similarly, if you have duplicate attribute value combinations across variants (such as two variants that both have a Color attribute set to Black), the export fails with a clear explanation in the log.

When you add a new item as a variant to an existing Shopify product using the Add Item as Variant action, the connector verifies that the new item has the same attribute structure as the original product and that the attribute value combination is unique.

Limitations

This feature isn't available when you turn on the UoM as Variant toggle in the Shopify Shop card. Conversely, if you have item attributes configured for synchronization, you can't turn on the UoM as Variant toggle. This mutual exclusivity prevents conflicts between two different variant management approaches.