Goal: Control which sales channels each variant of a Shopify product appears on, independently of the parent product. This is useful when you want to sell a specific size, color, or format on only some channels - for example, showing a limited edition variant on your Online Store and Buy Button but hiding it from the Shop app.
The easiest way is to export the products you want to update, edit the resulting spreadsheet, and re-import it. The export already includes the right identifier columns and the current per-variant publication state, so you only have to flip the values you want to change.
Video walkthrough: Watch the step-by-step video
Prerequisites:
You have Altera installed on your Shopify store
The product and its variants already exist in your store
The sales channel you are targeting is already installed on your store (e.g., Online Store, Point of Sale, Shop, Buy Button, Facebook)
Step 1 - Export the products you want to update
Go to Apps > Altera in your Shopify admin and click Export, then select Products.
Click the edit icon next to the Sales Channels field category and select Variant Published on Sales Channel. The product-level Published: columns are already selected, because Sales Channels is a default category. Use the export filters to narrow the export to just the products you need - for example, by handle, vendor, or tag.
Click Start export and download the resulting spreadsheet when it's ready.
Step 2 - Edit the Variant Published columns
Open the spreadsheet. For each sales channel you opted in to, there will be one Variant Published: [Channel Name] column (e.g., Variant Published: Online Store, Variant Published: Shop, Variant Published: Buy Button). Each variant row shows its current publication state for every channel.
Change values as needed:
Set a cell to
TRUEto publish the variant on that channel.Set a cell to
FALSEto unpublish the variant from that channel.Leave a cell blank to keep the current state unchanged.
You can delete rows for variants you do not want to touch - only the rows you keep will be updated. Leave the Handle, Variant ID, and Variant SKU columns alone so Altera can match each row back to the right variant.
Step 3 - Re-import the file
Back in Altera, click Upload file and select your edited spreadsheet. Review the analysis preview to confirm the product and variant count, then click Start import to apply the changes.
Outcome
Each variant is published or unpublished on the channels you changed. The parent product's publication state is left untouched. You can verify by opening a product in your Shopify admin, opening a variant, and reviewing its Sales channels section.
Example - Hiding one size from the Shop app
After exporting, edit the Variant Published: Shop cell on the Large row from TRUE to FALSE:
Handle | Variant SKU | Variant Published: Online Store | Variant Published: Shop | Variant Published: Buy Button |
| COTTON-TEE-SM | TRUE | TRUE | TRUE |
| COTTON-TEE-MD | TRUE | TRUE | TRUE |
| COTTON-TEE-LG | TRUE | FALSE | TRUE |
After importing, the Large variant is hidden from the Shop app but still available on the Online Store and Buy Button.
Limitations
Variants can't be scheduled. Shopify publishes a variant right away. A future date in a
Variant Published At:column is ignored with a warning (PRD113).The parent product must be published on the channel first. A variant cannot appear on a channel where the parent product is not published. Publish the product on the channel before publishing the variant.
Blank cells are skipped. Leaving a
Variant Published:cell blank does not unpublish the variant - it leaves the current state alone. UseFALSEexplicitly to unpublish.
Next Steps
Product fields reference for a full list of product and variant columns