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How to Import an AliExpress Product to Shopify Without an App

Two ways to add an AliExpress product to Shopify by hand: the product form and a CSV import, with every column explained and what not to copy over.

5 min read

If you are testing a product, you do not need an importer app to get it into your store. You need one when orders start coming in and you want them sent to the supplier automatically. Until then, adding the product by hand takes a few minutes and gives you full control over what the shopper sees.

There are two ways to do it: the Shopify product form, or a CSV file.

Before you start: what to take from the listing

Open the AliExpress listing and collect:

  • The facts: what the product is, materials, dimensions, weight, battery capacity, what is in the box. These live in the spec table and the description.
  • The variants: every colour, size or model the supplier sells, and the price of each. Prices often differ per variant.
  • The photos: the gallery images, and any variant images. Right-click a photo and open it in a new tab to get its address.

Leave these behind:

  • The title as it is. Supplier titles are keyword strings of 100 characters or more. Write a short title instead.
  • Notes meant for the marketplace: packaging disclaimers, "kind reminder" paragraphs about damaged boxes, instructions to contact the seller before leaving feedback.
  • Brand names and logos that are not yours, in the text or in the photos.
  • Description images with Chinese text or another store's watermark. See what to do with them.
  • Claims you cannot back up, such as medical benefits or "best quality" statements.

Option 1: add the product in the Shopify admin

  1. In Shopify admin, go to Products and click Add product.
  2. Title: a short name that says what it is (Shopify allows up to 255 characters, but around 40 to 60 reads well on a phone).
  3. Description: your own text, written from the facts you collected. Shopify's editor accepts formatted text, or HTML if you switch to the code view.
  4. Media: upload the photos. Uploading copies them into Shopify, so they keep working if the supplier changes their listing.
  5. Price: your retail price. Compare-at price only if you really sold it at that price before. Cost per item: the supplier price, so Shopify can show your margin.
  6. Variants: add an option (for example Colour) and its values. Shopify creates one variant per value; set each price and attach its photo.
  7. Shipping: tick that it is a physical product and enter the weight from the listing.
  8. Search engine listing: a page title (Shopify accepts up to 70 characters and suggests keeping to about 60) and a meta description (up to 320 characters).
  9. Set the status to Draft while you check it on your phone, then Active.

This route is the best one for a single test product. It is slow for products with many variants.

Option 2: import a CSV

Shopify can create products, with all their variants and images, from a CSV file: Products, then Import. The file has one row per variant and one row per extra image, and the rows of one product share the same URL handle.

These are the columns that matter for a dropshipping product, in the names Shopify's current template uses:

Column What goes in it
Title The product title. Only on the first row of the product.
URL handle The product's address, for example sunset-projection-lamp. The same on every row of the product.
Description The product description as HTML. First row only.
Vendor, Type, Tags Your own labels for filtering in the admin.
Status draft until you have checked the page, then active.
Published on online store Whether it shows on your storefront.
Option1 name / Option1 value For example Color / Black. Up to three options. A product without options uses Title / Default Title.
SKU Your variant code. Keeping the supplier's variant id here makes orders easier to match.
Price, Compare-at price, Cost per item Per variant.
Requires shipping, Weight value (grams) Per variant, from the listing.
Inventory tracker, Inventory quantity, Continue selling when out of stock How Shopify handles stock you do not hold yourself.
Product image URL, Image position, Image alt text One image per row, as a public https address.
Variant image URL The photo shown when that variant is selected.
SEO title, SEO description The search engine listing.

The row layout is the part people get wrong:

  • First row: every product field, plus the first variant and the first image.
  • Each further variant: URL handle, option values and variant fields only. Leave Title and Description empty.
  • Each further image: URL handle, Product image URL and Image position only.

Shopify downloads the images from the addresses in the file during the import. If an address does not open in a private browser window, the image will not import.

What changes when orders come in

A product you created by hand is not linked to the supplier. When someone buys it, you place the order on AliExpress yourself. That is fine while you test. If the product starts selling, an importer such as DSers, AutoDS or Zendrop can link the product to the supplier and forward orders. Check how your importer links a product that already exists in your store before you import the same product a second time, or you may end up with two copies. More on how DropAI fits next to those importers.

The faster way to do both

The slow part of either route is writing: the title, the description, the bullet points, the specs in plain words and an FAQ, in a language your buyers read.

DropAI does that part from the AliExpress link. Paste the link, and in about a minute you get the whole page written from the listing's facts. Then you export either a self-contained HTML block to paste into the Description field (option 1), or a Shopify product CSV with the columns above already filled in, variants, prices and images included (option 2). The CSV imports as a draft so you can check it in Shopify first.

The preview is free and needs no account. Try it with your product link.