Importing is for the seller with forty things on a spreadsheet already. It never puts anything on sale: every row becomes a draft, and you publish from Inventory when you are happy.
That is the safety net worth understanding before you start. A typo in a price cannot go live from here.
Where it lives
Seller → Listings → Import from a file, described as A spreadsheet becomes drafts.
1. Get the shape right
Download a sample file gives you the format. What the file should look like lists every column it understands.
Save as CSV. Not .xlsx — a spreadsheet saved in Excel's own format gives you Couldn’t open that file — save it as CSV and try again.
The two columns you must have
Title and Price. Without them you get No “title” column — name one of the columns Title, and the same for price. Nothing is read until both exist.
The rest, all optional
Stock, Description, Condition, Category, Tags, Brand, Weight in grams, Length in cm, Width in cm, Height in cm, Photo links.
The box measurements are worth filling in even though they are optional. A courier bills the greater of actual weight and volume, so a big light parcel costs you more than the scale suggests — and this screen is the only place you can fix fifty of them at once.
It recognises what your spreadsheet already calls things
You do not have to rename your columns to match ours. Price also answers to amount, cost, mrp, rate or selling price. Stock answers to quantity, qty, count or units. Photos answers to photo, image, images, image url, photo url or picture. Condition answers to the words sellers actually type — sealed, mint, pre-owned, for parts — not just the app's own five.
One ordering detail that matters if you re-import your own export: where a file carries two columns that could both match, the more exact name wins wherever it sits. A file with both "Type" and "Category" matches Category, not Type.
Item id (edits that item)
The column that changes what the file does. With an id in a row, that row edits an existing listing instead of making a new one. Leave it out for new items.
This is the bulk-edit route: export your inventory, change one column across fifty rows, import it back.
And the rule that makes that safe — a column your file does not carry is left alone. A missing Description column does not empty fifty descriptions. Only the fields your file actually puts a value in are written.
2. Read the preview
Choose a CSV file, and the screen shows you what it read before anything is created.
Columns we matched— which of your headings became which field. Check this first. A column it did not match is listed asnot in your file, and that is where a silent mistake hides.What we read— row by row, asRow {n}, with the problem named on any row that has one.- The split —
Make {made} and change {updates}, so you know before you press it how much of the file is new items and how much is edits.
Problems that stop a row
No title on this rowThe price isn’t a number: “{value}”— usually a currency symbol or a stray spaceThat price is too highNo item of yours has that idNothing on this row was different— an edit row that changes nothingThis auction already has bids, so its settings are locked.This one is sold or waiting to be paid for, so it can’t be changed
One problem that does not stop a row
No photo link — it stays a draft until you add one. It still becomes a draft. You add the photo in the app. This is deliberate: a seller with the text ready and the photos still on their phone should not be blocked.
Photo links have to be real web addresses — up to six an item; extra links are ignored.
3. Make the drafts
Create {n} drafts, or Make {made} and change {updates} where the file does both.
Everything lands in Drafts, and afterwards you get {n} drafts are waiting in your Inventory with See your drafts. Anything refused appears under Skipped with its reason, so you can fix those rows and use Import another file.
4. The settings the file cannot carry
A spreadsheet has no column for delivery, auction format or timer. Start from a template applies a saved set of those to everything in the import, and No template leaves them at your defaults.
Make a template before a big import. Otherwise you are opening fifty drafts to set the same delivery option fifty times.
How much at once
200 rows at a time. A longer file is read down to the first 200; split it and run the rest as a second import.
Questions people ask
Will anything go on sale by accident?
No. Every row becomes a draft. Publishing is a separate step you take in Inventory.
Can I import photos?
As links — Photo links, up to six per item, each a real web address. Files on your phone have to be added in the app.
Can I use this to change prices in bulk?
Yes, and it is the best use of it. Export, change the Price column, keep the id column, import. Columns you leave out are untouched.
Why does it say a column is not in your file when it is there?
Check the spelling of the heading and that the heading row is the first row. Blank rows above the headings are the usual cause.
Can I undo an import?
The drafts are just drafts — delete the ones you do not want. An import that edited existing listings is not undoable, which is the reason to read What we read before pressing the button.
More: your first listing, how to write a listing title, how to photograph an item.