Overview

Amazon lets sellers on the Professional plan upload dozens or thousands of new products at once by using inventory file templates. The method replaces the one‑by‑one “Add a product” screen with a single file upload, cutting catalog‑setup time dramatically. Sellers with large assortments should master this workflow to keep launch schedules on track.

Key Points

• Professional plan required — Only sellers enrolled in the Professional selling plan can access bulk‑upload templates; individual‑plan accounts must add items manually.
• Tab‑delimited text format — Templates are plain‑text files (.txt) where each column is separated by a tab character, ensuring compatibility with Amazon’s upload engine.
• Initial wait time — New accounts may need to wait 90 minutes or longer after registration before the bulk‑upload feature becomes active.
• Data may differ from the detail page — When multiple sellers share a catalog, the information you submit can be overridden by contributions from other sellers, so the final detail page may not match your original file exactly.
• Brand Registry gives more control — Registering a brand through Amazon Brand Registry grants owners the ability to lock certain attributes, reducing the risk of unwanted changes from other sellers.

How Bulk Listing Works

1. Download the category‑specific template — In Seller Central, navigate to Inventory → Add Products via Upload and select the appropriate category (e.g., “Home & Kitchen”). The downloaded .txt file contains column headers such as sku, product‑id, price, quantity, title, bullet‑point 1, image‑url, etc. For example, a seller of 500 kitchen gadgets would receive a template with 30 mandatory columns.
2. Populate the file with your product data — Open the file in a spreadsheet program that preserves tab delimiters (e.g., Excel, Google Sheets). Fill each row with a unique SKU and the required attributes. If you are listing a stainless‑steel whisk, you would enter the SKU “SW‑001”, the UPC “123456789012”, a price of “12.99”, and a quantity of “250”. Missing required fields will cause the entire upload to be rejected.