Goal: Connect the Color option (or any variant option) to the matching category metafield across hundreds or thousands of Shopify products at once, instead of one product at a time. Shopify calls this connecting a variant option to a category metafield or product metafield: the option values then reference metaobject entries (linked metaobjects) instead of plain text. Connected options give you color swatches on the storefront, structured data behind each value, and a single source of truth, so you can update an option value in one place.

In the Shopify admin you connect an option one product at a time: edit the product, open the option, and use Connect to metafield (shown as No connected source until you pick one) to choose the category metafield. With Altera you do it in bulk from a spreadsheet, and your existing variant IDs are preserved so no other variant data is lost.

Prerequisites:

In your Shopify admin, open the product (or products) you want to convert and choose More actions > Export with Altera. For a full catalog, open Altera directly and start a Products export with your usual filters.

Select only the fields you need so the import stays fast and doesn't touch unrelated data. Include ID, Handle, and Title for reference, plus Variant ID, Option1 Name, Option1 Value, and Option1 Linked To. Add the Option2 and Option3 equivalents if your products use more than one option.

Choose Excel format, click Start export, then download the file when it's ready.

The Option1 Linked To column expects the full path of a metafield definition that points at a list of metaobjects. For Shopify's standard color attribute, the value is product.metafields.shopify.color-pattern.

To look this up in your store, go to Settings > Custom data > Products, open Assigned to categories, and find the category attribute you want (for example, shopify.color-pattern). Prepend product.metafields. to get the full reference.

A quick alternative is to link one product manually in the Shopify admin, export it with Altera, and copy the value from the Option1 Linked To column.

Open the exported spreadsheet and paste your metafield reference (for example, product.metafields.shopify.color-pattern) into Option1 Linked To for every variant row you want to convert. Repeat with Option2 Linked To or Option3 Linked To if you're linking those options too. Leave an option's Linked To column blank to keep it as plain text.

If a product uses more than one option (for example, Size and Color), keep every option's Name and Value columns filled in for each variant row, even for options you aren't linking. Shopify rebuilds the variant's full option set on import, so omitting an option can cause it to be dropped.

Altera converts each Option1 Value into a metaobject handle during import. If your option values already match the metaobject handles (for example, Black maps to the color metaobject with handle black), you don't need to change anything. If your values are custom text like Stealth Black, replace the value with the matching metaobject handle from Content > Metaobjects so the import can resolve it.

Save the file under a new name (for example, link-variants.xlsx).

Go to Apps > Altera in your Shopify admin and click Upload file. Select your edited spreadsheet, wait for the analysis to finish, then click Start import. As rows complete you can click through to any updated product to confirm the conversion is working before the full import finishes.

Your variant options are now connected to the category metafield, and their values are metaobject entries instead of plain text. Open an updated product in the Shopify admin: the option shows the metafield as its connected source, and each option value is shown as a metaobject entry (for example, the actual color entry) that you can click through and edit in one place. For the standard color metafield, themes that support swatches now show a color swatch for each value on the storefront.