Change a product's status in Shopify
A product status decides whether customers can buy the product. This tutorial moves the Trail Crew Tee from Draft to Active, and sets out what each status means, so a product is never live before it is ready or hidden after it should be selling.
Written · Shopify admin, desktop steps · 5 minutes read
The worked example
| Product | Trail Crew Tee |
| Status before | Draft |
| Status after | Active |
| Statuses | Active, Draft, Archived, Unlisted |
| Archived products start again as | Draft |
Download the record: trail-crew-tee-status-record.csv (199 bytes).
A status record for the Trail Crew Tee: the change from Draft to Active, the date, and what each status allows.
1Open the product
From your Shopify admin, go to Products and click Trail Crew Tee. The Status section sits on the product details page.
2Read the current status
The status shows as Draft, which means the product details need to be completed before the product can be sold. New products are Active by default, so this shirt was set to Draft while the listing was being finished.
3Change the status to Active
In the Status section, select Active from the drop-down menu. Active means the product details are complete and the product is ready to be sold.
4Save the product
Click Save. The product can now be bought, but only in a sales channel it is published to, so check the Publishing section as well as the status.
5Know the other two statuses
Archived means the details are complete but the product is no longer for sale, and it is hidden from your storefront and the main product list. Unlisted means the product can be sold but cannot be discovered: it has a page, reached only by its direct web address.
6Change several products at once when needed
To change the status of several products at the same time, select the products in the product list and edit them in bulk. In the bulk editor, the Status options include Archived, which the single product page does not offer in the same menu.
The arithmetic
No money figures are involved here. The table restates the status rules from the help page, so the check is that each row matches the page:
| Status | Customers can buy it |
|---|---|
| Active | Yes, if published |
| Draft | No |
| Archived | No |
| Unlisted | Yes, by direct link only |
Only Active and Unlisted products can be bought, and both need publishing to the sales channel. A product that is archived must be unarchived before its status can change, and it comes back as Draft.
Held at the counter
Active does not mean published. Customers can buy a product only when it has an Active or Unlisted status and is published to that sales channel. An Active product left out of the online store channel still does not show on your storefront.
Archived is not in the single product status menu. You cannot pick Archived from the Status drop-down on the product page. Archive from More actions, or set it in the bulk editor, or you will hunt for an option that is not there.
Duplicates and unarchived products start as Draft. Products created by duplicating another product, and products you unarchive, are set to Draft by default. If a copy of a live product goes missing from the store, check its status first.
Sources
- Product status and availability — Shopify's help pages: the four statuses, what each means, the default statuses, and the bulk editor note.
- Adding and updating products — Shopify's help pages: archiving moves a product to the Archived tab, and unarchiving sets it to Draft.