Report Toaster will work for historical products as well.
Topic summary
A merchant seeks to view product creation/publish dates in Shopify to manage inventory clearance and analyze sales velocity. Shopify doesn’t display these dates natively in the admin interface, prompting discussion of workarounds.
Native Solutions:
- Adding
/products.jsonto the store URL reveals product metadata including creation dates, but displays only ~250 products at a time in raw JSON format - Store Activity log contains the data but cannot be exported
- Bulk Edit view: Select all products → Bulk Edit → Add “Online Store” column to see publish dates (works but slow for large catalogs; one user reported 1.5 hours to view 2,500 of 16,000 products)
- Adding
/events.jsonto individual product URLs shows limited event history
Third-Party Apps Suggested:
- Report Toaster, Better Reports, and Xporter Data Export Tool can generate exportable reports with creation/publish dates
- Most require paid subscriptions, though some offer free trials
Shopify Flow Workaround:
One user created an automated flow to tag products with creation dates, which can be applied retroactively to existing inventory using bulk actions.
Status: The discussion remains open with no perfect free solution. Users express frustration that this basic functionality isn’t built into Shopify’s reporting.