The variable product mode can be used to create products that can have many variations of of a single item, each of which may have its own SKU, price, and stock status. Variations are based on one or more attributes like size, color, material, etc. An example could be a T-shirt that comes in various sizes and colors.

Variations are generated based on Product Attributes. There are two main types of attributes

• Predefined: Attributes are pre-created in the product type, and then utilized by product author when creating the product. This is useful to keep a unifying structure across products.
• Custom: Custom attributes can be created by product author, making their product much more customizable and unique

The same product can consist of both predefined and custom attributes.

Custom attributes

Custom attributes can be created during post submission.

When creating a custom attribute, you can define

• Name
• Display mode
• Values or items

There are four display modes for Custom variations

• Dropdown
• Buttons
• Radio
• Cards
• Images
• Colors

While some of these require just a label, others may require an image, color selection and subheading.

Tip: When adding attribute values, you can use ENTER key after typing the label to quickly create another value.

A preview of Color and Buttons display mode being utilized for Color and Size attributes

And another example when using Buttons and Images display modes for Size and Color attributes

Predefined attributes

Predefined attributes are created on the product type editor in back-end. The label, display mode and values are predefined.

The available display modes are

• Buttons
• Radio
• Dropdown
• Colors

The product author can choose to use that attribute

and then pick from the available values

Generating variations

Product variations are automatically generated based on your attribute values

You can then proceed to configure them by adding prices, images, and manage stock

To speed up the process, you can Bulk apply settings to other variations based on an existing variation.

You can copy all settings such as

• All
• Image
• Stock
• Price

to all variations, or those sharing values with existing variation