Create the items customers can buy and define how each item behaves in the catalog, inventory, tax, shipping, downloads, and checkout.
Products is the main catalog list for creating and maintaining items sold through the store.
Products are the sellable catalogue records customers browse and place in the cart. A product’s type determines where key commercial data lives: Simple products carry their own price/stock, Variable products delegate sellable combinations to variations, Grouped products collect related items, and External products direct the customer to another purchase URL.
Products do not calculate the whole checkout by themselves. Tax, shipping, inventory-hold, reviews and checkout behavior also come from Store Settings and related TruCommerce configuration.
Tax Categories/Rates determine tax treatment; Shipping Methods/Zones and physical data determine delivery; Attributes create variable-product choices; inventory settings affect stock holding/alerts; TruPayments supplies checkout payment methods.
Price/stock/visibility changes can immediately affect what customers can buy. Tax/shipping/category changes affect checkout or discovery. Variation problems should be diagnosed on the variation itself before changing the parent product.
Create reusable structure first when you need it: Categories, Tags, Attributes, Tax Categories, and shipping-related configuration. Also review Store Settings for currency, inventory, review, tax, and catalog defaults.
| Type | Use it for | Important consequence |
|---|---|---|
| Simple | A normal product sold as one purchasable item. | Price, stock, shipping/tax data, and optional virtual/downloadable behavior belong to the product itself. |
| Variable | A product with combinations such as Size/Color where each variation can be purchased separately. | Variations carry their own enabled state, SKU/identifiers, regular/sale price, stock/backorder rules, image, dimensions, tax/shipping classification, description, and optional downloads. |
| Grouped | A catalog item used to group related products. | Use it when the customer should discover related products together rather than treating the parent as one ordinary simple item. |
| External | A product promoted in the catalog but purchased at another URL. | Configure the External URL and Button Text so the call-to-action sends the visitor to the external destination. |
| Setting | How to use it |
|---|---|
| Stock Status | The customer-facing availability state used even when exact quantity tracking is not required. |
| Manage Stock | Turns quantity-based stock management on for the product/variation. |
| Stock | The quantity available when stock management is enabled. |
| Allow Backorders | Controls whether purchasing can continue after tracked stock is exhausted. |
| Low Stock Threshold | The per-item threshold used with low-stock monitoring/notifications. |
| Sold Individually | Use when a customer should not purchase more than one of the item in the same order. |
Tax Status and Tax Category determine how the item participates in TruCommerce tax calculation. Shipping Category and physical dimensions support shipping rules. A virtual item does not need the same physical fulfilment assumptions, while downloadable products can include download files plus a Download Limit and Download Expiry Days.
Store settings still matter
A product does not calculate checkout totals in isolation. Global tax behavior, shipping availability, stock holding, reviews, currency, checkout, and selling locations come from Store Settings and the related Tax/Shipping configuration.
For a variable product, assign the attributes that define customer choices and mark the values used for variations. TruCMS can then maintain purchasable variation records. Because each variation can have its own price and stock, troubleshoot a missing/unsellable combination at variation level rather than only on the parent product.
Use the list as a merchandising and inventory triage screen. Type tells you where price/stock rules live, SKU helps staff identify the item operationally, Stock warns about availability, and Price lets you spot obvious catalog mistakes before opening the product. Use View for the customer-facing result and Edit when the configuration itself needs to change.
A sellable product can appear in storefront browsing according to its state and Catalog Visibility. Changes to price and stock can immediately affect what customers can purchase. Changes to tax/shipping categories alter checkout calculations; attribute/variation changes alter the choices customers can select.
Store Settings · Attributes · Stock · Cart & Checkout
A product appears only while it is active, priced, in a sales channel and (when sold-out items are hidden) in stock. If it does not, see the Store FAQ.