Inventory Model

How products, variants, inventory items, and levels relate to each other

Shopify’s inventory system has a specific structure. Understanding it helps you make sense of the data you see in Stockful.

The Hierarchy

Inventory in Shopify follows a clear hierarchy:

1. Product — a sellable item in your store (e.g., “Classic T-Shirt”)
2. Variant — a specific version of a product (e.g., “Blue / Large”)
3. Inventory Item — the physical stock record for a variant, containing cost and tracking info
4. Inventory Level — the quantity of an inventory item at a specific location

How They Connect

Product (Classic T-Shirt)
├── Variant (Blue / Large)
│   └── Inventory Item
│       ├── Inventory Level @ Warehouse A → 50 units
│       └── Inventory Level @ Retail Store → 12 units
├── Variant (Red / Medium)
│   └── Inventory Item
│       ├── Inventory Level @ Warehouse A → 30 units
│       └── Inventory Level @ Retail Store → 8 units

Each variant has exactly one inventory item, but that item can have inventory levels at multiple locations.

What Stockful Tracks

Stockful monitors every level in this hierarchy:

• Products and variants sync daily to keep names, images, and metadata up to date
• Inventory levels sync in real time — every change in Shopify is captured instantly
• Inventory items sync to track cost information and tracking status

When Stockful shows “inventory” for a product, it’s aggregating the inventory levels across all variants and all locations for that product.