How to Display Product Variations in WooCommerce (2025)

It’s fairly common to sell multiple variations of a single product—this shirt in this or that color, that sticker 2″x2″ or 4″x4″. Whatever product variations you have in mind, WooCommerce allows creating those variations for your product pages.

In this post, we’ll briefly cover what WooCommerce does with product variations and then walk you through how to set them up.

What are WooCommerce Product Variations?

While you may not know the term, you’re probably extremely familiar with product variations. This is when a single item comes in various options, such as different sizes, colors, flavors, or scents.

Example of a WooCommerce product with Variations enabled

Each product variation will need its own Stock Keeping Unit (SKU) number to differentiate it from the others. However, variants are often displayed on a single product page, with a selector to minimize confusion and ensure customers see all available options. You don’t want to fill your site with URLs covering the same product in different color and size combinations, right? That’s where variations come in.

Additionally, you can keep the price the same for each variation or adjust the cost depending on customers’ options. For example, this Amazon listing shows different prices for different MacBook Pro hardware but doesn’t adjust the cost for the color. All of these variations are important to your customer, but how you handle them on the backend needs to be catered to your needs.

In short, you might want to implement product variations on your WooCommerce site for many different reasons. Fortunately, the popular eCommerce plugin makes it easy to do so.

How to Display Product Variations in WooCommerce (2 Ways)

Displaying product variations in WooCommerce is actually quite simple, especially if you’re already familiar with the plugin. Below, we’ll walk you through the process. However, note that for the purposes of this post, we’ll assume you already have your online store up and running and know how to create and edit simple products in WooCommerce.

Using  WooCommerce’s Built-in Variation Options (Method 1)

This uses WooCommerce’s built-in tooling for assigning Woo attributes to particular products as variations.

Step 1: Create a Variable Product

WooCommerce enables you to set up product variations out of the box. First, you’ll want to add Attributes to your store. Attributes can be applied to any product.

Now, we need to assign attributes to particular products. Select “Products > Add New” to create a new product, or scroll down to the “Product data” section for an existing product. Using the drop-down menu at the top, set the product type as “Variable Product.”

The product options change accordingly. For instance, there’s no longer a field where you can enter the price for the item (you’ll be able to include this information later with the variables).

Step 2: Add Product Attributes

Next, click on the “Attributes” tab. You can either add a “New Attribute” or use the drop-down menu to select an existing one. The default options are color and size, but you can also create custom attributes if you like.

Click on the “Add” button to apply your chosen attribute. Under each Attribute, you can add “Values,” such as specific colors or specific sizes. This adds specific types of your attributes to your product.

It’s important to enable both the “Visible on the product page” and “Used for variations” options. Then, you can list your attribute values (such as small, medium, and large or red, yellow, and blue) on your actual product page.

Step 3: Generate Your Variations

Now, you can go to the “Variations” tab. There, you can directly apply your new attributes to the product or view the ones you’ve already created. You can add them manually or have every permutation (combination of all your attributes) added to your store.

The second option will automatically generate WooCommerce product variations for every possible combination of attributes you’ve specified. For my example, I had 3 sizes and 2 colors, giving me a total of 6 variations. The more attributes (and values) you use on your products, the more variations are created.

Then, you can fill out the product information for each variation, just as you would if they were distinct items. As we mentioned earlier, each variation will need its own SKU number for inventory management purposes:

If relevant, you can also specify different prices for each variation and provide shipping and tax information. After doing this for each of your WooCommerce product variations, click “Save Changes.”

Step 4: Preview and Publish Your Variable Product

At this stage, there may be other data you need to add to complete your product page. Once you’re done entering all the relevant information, you can save all your changes and preview the item:

Check the variation selector(s) and make sure all the options exist. If everything looks as it should and you’re ready to start selling this product, you can make the page live by clicking the Publish button in the editor.

Using  Store App’s Bulk Variation Plugin (Method 2)

As we’ve seen, WooCommerce includes everything you need to set up product variations. However, as you noticed, if you have a lot of attributes and a lot of values assigned to those attributes, then you can end up with an unruly number of variations to manage acrros your store. For that, we recommend a plugin that can help you manage all that data work.

WooCommerce Bulk Variations Manager makes creating and pricing thousands of product variations super easy. You can save more time and effort by managing everything from a single interface rather than individually setting up prices for each variation. All you have to do is select a base product, set a base price, add attributes, and apply price differences for all variations in one go.

Unlike WooCommerce’s default limit of 50 variations at a time, this plugin allows you to add, update, or delete thousands of variations instantly. For instance, set a base price of $14 for a regular t-shirt, then deduct $0.50 for the white colored and add $1.50 for medium-sized and $3 for large sizes.

As shown above, you can also use differential pricing to customize prices based on certain attributes. It automatically calculates and changes the final costs for all variations. This helps manage complex variable products quickly, whether apparel, electronics, or any other industry needing detailed product options.

If you hate tedious manual tasks, this plugin can be your ideal tool for updating prices, stock, or attributes across multiple variations in seconds. Plus, you can enjoy regular updates and dedicated support – all for just $79 per year. Best of all, it’s developed by StoreApps, an official WooCommerce extension partner.

Get Store App’s Bulk Variation Manager

Conclusion

Enabling product variations in WooCommerce can give your customers a better online shopping experience and minimize the number of product pages you must create and manage. Fortunately, you can use WooCommerce’s default functionality to set them up in no time.

Displaying product variations in WooCommerce requires just a few steps:

1. Create a variable product.
2. Add product attributes (such as size and color).
3. Generate your variations so each has a unique SKU number (and price, if applicable).
4. Preview and publish your variable product.
5. If you need to bulk edit these, including editing pricing, Bulk Variation Manager can help.

Do you have any questions about product variations in WooCommerce? Ask away in the comments section below!