Product feed

How does a product feed work?

Each product gets one entry. Google’s Merchant Center accepts product data as a text feed, an XML feed or through an API. Required attributes include an ID (up to 50 characters, ideally the SKU), a title (up to 150 characters), a description, a price with ISO 4217 currency such as 15.00 USD, an availability value, a link and an image link. Attribute names with several words use underscores, for example image_link.

Google matches products to queries using this data. Price and availability must match the landing page and checkout. Google lists common problems such as incorrect product category or GTIN values, missing variant attributes (for example item group ID, color or size), low-quality images and conflicting data between feed and website.

Besides Google, feeds supply marketplaces, social shops and comparison sites. Each channel defines its own format.

Example

An excerpt of one entry in the RSS 2.0 format with Google’s g: namespace (shortened, made-up values):

<item>
  <g:id>SKU-1001</g:id>
  <title>Hiking backpack Alpin 30 l</title>
  <description>30-liter backpack for day hikes</description>
  <link>https://example.com/backpack-alpin-30</link>
  <g:image_link>https://example.com/img/alpin-30.jpg</g:image_link>
  <g:price>89.90 EUR</g:price>
  <g:availability>in_stock</g:availability>
</item>

Last updated: October 7, 2026