Tutorials

How to Bulk Edit Barcode

The barcode is the GTIN, UPC, EAN, ISBN, or any other scannable identifier you store on a variant. This guide shows how to set it from another field, tack text onto either end, find-and-replace, trim length, strip everything before or after a marker word, or wipe it entirely.

Barcode is a variant field. Each product variant has its own barcode; the action runs once per matched variant. A product with three variants gets three barcode updates.

No format check. The app accepts whatever you type — there's no UPC/EAN/GTIN validation. If your barcodes need to be exactly 12 or 13 digits, double-check the Edit Preview before running.


Step 1: Pick the Barcode field

In the Configure Product Edits panel, click Select Field.

The Select Field button in the Configure Product Edits panel

Barcode lives under Variant Fields.

The Select Field modal with Barcode marked under Variant Fields

Click it. The configuration panel switches to a How to edit Barcode dropdown defaulting to Set text to value, plus a value input.

Configuration panel after picking Barcode: How to edit Barcode is set to Set text to value, with an empty Set the barcode to this value input below


Step 2: Choose how to change the barcode

Ten actions are available.

Direct value

  • Set text to value — every matched variant gets this exact barcode. Pair with a dynamic value (see Step 3) so each variant still gets a unique result.
  • Remove barcode — clears the barcode field entirely.

Adjust the existing barcode

  • Add text to end — append text (e.g. a check-digit suffix).
  • Add text to beginning — prepend (e.g. a vendor prefix).
  • Remove text from end — strip a suffix.
  • Remove text from beginning — strip a prefix.
  • Search/Replace — swap one substring for another, optionally case-insensitive.
  • Limit length of text — cap the barcode at N characters.
  • Remove text from a word to the end — find a marker, delete it and everything after.
  • Remove text up to and including a word — find a marker, delete it and everything before.

The inputs change based on what you pick.


Step 3: Enter the value

Set text to value

Type the new barcode in the Set the barcode to this value input, or build it from a dynamic field.

Use dynamic values to keep barcodes unique. Click Add dynamic value above the input. A modal opens letting you pick from product or variant fields (SKU, Title, Vendor, Variant ID...) with optional capitalization.

Picking Variant SKU inserts the token {{variant.sku}} at the cursor. Combine with literal text (e.g. BC-{{variant.sku}}) to compose new barcodes.

Set text to value with {{variant.sku}} entered; Edit Preview on the right shows the matched variants with their current barcodes

Setting a literal value with no dynamic token across many variants gives every variant the same barcode. That defeats the point of a barcode — point-of-sale scanners can't distinguish them. Always include a per-variant token ({{variant.sku}}, {{variant.id}}, etc.) when bulk-setting.

Search/Replace

Two inputs — what to look for, and what to replace it with — plus a Case insensitive checkbox.

Search/Replace mode with "ACS" in the search field and "RETIRED-ACS" in the replace field

Use this to clean up a temporary marker, retire a vendor prefix, or fix a typo across the catalog. Leave the replace field blank to delete the matched text outright.

Add / Remove text from end or beginning

A single input. Whatever you type gets appended, prepended, or stripped from the matching end of every barcode.

Limit length of text

A number input plus a checkbox.

Limit length of text mode with Maximum Text Length set to 30 and Don't trim the text in the middle of a word checked

  • Maximum Text Length — defaults to 30. EAN-13 is 13 digits, UPC-A is 12, GTIN-14 is 14 — set this to whatever your scanners need.
  • Don't trim the text in the middle of a word — pulls the cut back to the previous word boundary so barcodes don't end mid-token. Most barcodes have no word boundaries, so this rarely changes the output.

Remove text from a word to the end / up to and including a word

A single input — the marker. Everything from that marker onward (or up to and including it) is stripped. Useful when barcodes share a trailing or leading boilerplate segment.

Remove barcode

No input — the panel just shows the dropdown. The Edit Preview shows each matched variant's barcode going to (empty).

Remove barcode action selected with no input; Edit Preview on the right shows variants with Barcode set to —

Barcodes are fine to leave blank. Unlike Price, an empty barcode doesn't break Shopify orders. But your POS, inventory tools, and Google Shopping feed may all rely on it — clear them only when you genuinely want them gone.


After the run

  • Barcode changes are reversible from the History page using Undo.
  • Search/Replace and the Add/Remove actions are not idempotent — re-running them keeps modifying the barcode. The Edit Preview on the right shows the proposed new barcode per variant; scan it before you run.
  • The app does not validate that barcodes are unique across your catalog or check digits. If a clean GTIN is mandatory, export the result and verify externally.
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