@Liquify , does that allow you to help a store access and utilize the 2K variant if you are working on it?
This years-long delay is ridiculous… They have talked about it for too long, many other platforms haven’t had this kind of restriction on quantity for years. Shopify needs to get on with it and launch the feature already.
@JR-TMR nope - sorry. As devs we get access to features before they become public but we can’t make them public - it’s for testing & building things.
Regardless of how stupid the original decision was to use 100 variants and 3 options (we’ve been annoyed with it for over a decade). The problem here is that it was done this way and a lot of things are built around it being that way. There’s app and theme changes here to co-ordinate with 3rd parties which is no small task. There’s some quite fundamental changes being enforced and I think is where the delay is.
This was promised in the Shopify Editions in early 2024 but then nothing since. I don’t understand why they promote something then years go by with no update. Shopify is the worst for keeping customers updated, they never respond to any threads we just get left in the dark.
Thanks for sharing this - I just used the variant extension developer preview to test an import of a single product with 287 variants (t-shirt with 7 sizes x 41 colors)… works like a charm there but the same file was rejected in a standard development store ("Line 2-288: Validation failed: Exceeded maximum number of variants allowed "). Hopefully the general release date is getting closer.
Current Status (as of April 2025) is that Shopify has technically built the 2000 variant limit but available in Developer Preview only right now - not live for general stores yet.
You can’t just enable it yourself on a live or even a normal dev store - only Shopify internallyor through special dev preview stores. @Renars above saysMatrixify has updated to support the new limit through the API but themes and other apps still need updating. Issue: it’s not just a backend change. Front-end, admin, and all 3P apps need to handle bigger product data, which isn’t that simple for an SaaS Platform like Shopify. Shopify has been built in a way that makes a lot of things great to use but this feature has a lot of technical friction.
The Admin now technically supports up to 2048 variants per product in dev preview. So eventually, you won’t need a 3P app just to view/edit these bigger products. But 3P apps will still be needed if you’re doing bulk imports, bulk edits, migrations - managing 2000 variants manually in Shopify Admin will be very difficult.
People are frustrated…yes, because Shopify originally said “January 2025” and now it’s already April. Ask Shopify support to give you early access but with no guarantees. Some people have asked and still haven’t gotten it.
what, on a theme that’s not a developer theme
I’m not sure what considered a developer theme.. this is the theme i have. its showing me a september 30th general access release date
this might be it, thank you!
Let me know! Next we need a 3 variant limit solution…
Just got this from Shopify Support asking when this will be available.
Thanks for reaching out with your interest in the Feature Test Drive. It’s a fantastic opportunity for Shopify Plus merchants to get a head start on new features and updates. Currently, I noticed that your store is currently on the Basic plan, which means this particular early access feature is currently available to Plus store plan.
But here’s the great news: these updates will automatically roll out to all Shopify stores in just a couple of months! So, there’s no need to hurry—time flies, and before you know it, you’ll have access to these exciting new features as well.
I asked the question about 3 variants as well as total variants, this is what Support said
Currently, this specific feature is on pause, but here’s the exciting part, the developer team is actively working on it to bring this option to life for your business soon!
Easy for them to say time flies. But we are on the plus plan. I actually thought that this was only for plus users but good to hear that they’re rolling it out to everyone
This feels like the same bullbleep Shopify has been saying for the past 12 months. They can’t seem to get their engineers to make it work. As for 3rd parties, they’ve had a year to get ready for the change. No sympathy for them at all.
I would not make any plans based on anything Shopify says. They’ve been saying similar things for a year now.
Agreed. Extremely disappointing.
Update from Shopify… Drum Rolll NOT AVAILABLE UNTIL 2026 Maybe
(this is copy and pasted from chat I just got off)
I really appreciate your patience, Dylan! Checking with someone from the Technical team, I can confirm to you that you are correct. This is currently available for Shopify Plus merchants and is an ‘Early access’ not even roll out yet for Plus merchants, so the information you saw about it being available on 2025 was this Early access for Plus merchants.
I ask them for an estimated date for a total roll-out or release, and they have informed me that they cannot provide a date yet, but it is estimated that this can be rolled out in the future in 2026
So, yes, there is no public documentation about this yet because it is not roll out yet, there is just an early access for Plus as I mentioned above
Yeah Shopify have always been very poor with deadlines / release dates.
What exactly does early access mean? Can i use it reliably? or does it mean its in beta and i can have problems with it?
Yeah potentially, although at that point it would usually be smaller issues / edge case problems.
