Item Specifics

Item specifics tell buyers what you’re selling, and are crucial to your search visibility and sales. The more data you give us about your listings, the better we can match you with buyers in search.

About Item Specifics

Item specifics such as brand, make, model, size, colour and style are key to helping shoppers find your items on eBay. They match with the filters that buyers use to refine their search results so we can match you with the right buyers, at the right time. The more data you give us about what you’re selling, the better we can match your item with buyers in search.

To get the best results from your listings, add as many item specifics as you can and be aware of those that are required in your categories.

Item Specifics Requirements

To help you succeed, we’re continuing to expand item specifics requirements in certain categories. You will only be able to publish your new or revised listings in these categories, once you’ve filled out the required information. We recommend using our selling tools to review and update your existing listings (read more below). Here is an overview of the current requirements:

Additional item specifics recommendations will be effective 9 September 2020 in Jewellery & Watches, Sporting Goods and Industrial categories.
Required and recommended item specifics in Electronics and Home & Garden categories were due to be introduced from the end of March but will now be effective from 9 September 2020.
Certain item specifics have been required in Fashion, Food & Drinks and Home & Garden categories since October 2019.

We'll continue to notify sellers in affected categories when new requirements are introduced.

View Categories With Required Item Specifics*

*This file was last updated on 18 August 2020. If you are not seeing this version of the file, please clear your browser's download history and download the file again, or try a different browser.

Required vs. Recommended Item Specifics

“Required” item specifics are considered essential information for buyers shopping for these products. You won't be able to create or revise listings without entering these details
“Recommended” item specifics are based on frequently searched terms. Including these will help buyers to find your listings more easily and understand exactly what you're selling

Why Item Specifics Matter

Adding item specifics to your listings is crucial to your visibility and competitive ranking in search results, both on and off eBay. By adding required and recommended item specifics, you’ll benefit from:

Increased Search Visibility: Your listing will only appear in buyers’ filtered search results if you’ve added the matching item specific information to your listing.

Improved Search Ranking: Item specifics move your listings higher in search results, both on eBay and the other search engines we work with, like Google Shopping.

Connecting with the Right Buyers: When you provide item specifics, we can better connect you with buyers searching for your products.

Inclusion in New Buyer Experiences: By listing with Item specifics, your listings are included in new buyer experiences on the platform, so we can showcase similar items together, cross-sell, and suggest relevant inventory to buyers.

Adding Item Specifics When Creating Listings

eBay’s listing forms show you which fields are the most important to fill in and how complete your listing is. Simply enter a keyword-rich title when creating your listing and we’ll pre-populate many of the item specifics fields for you.

The lightning bolt meter lets you know how many more searches you will match with each additional item-specific you add.

Tools to Edit Item Specifics in Bulk

There are a number of tools available to help you with the requirements for item specifics.

Use Optiseller to find item specifics

Optiseller's Aspect finder tool has driven success for over 20,000 eBay Sellers.

We’re delighted to announce that we’ve now renewed our partnership with Optiseller to cover all your listings in all categories (not just mandated categories) on the platform with the Aspect Finder+ tool from July 1, until at least the end of Dec 31st, 2020.

Use free of charge and courtesy of eBay* to:

Automatically review your listings
Identify missing and required Item specifics
Find recommended values
Easily update your listings (either directly on eBay or through another listing tool)

*Sellers using a third-party provider should first check with their listing provider to see how to best utilise the Optiseller tool via the tool itself or the downloadable file option.

Use Optiseller now

Item Specifics Download/Upload Feature

This tool is available on the Seller Hub Active Listings page and will allow you to download an Excel file containing all of your active listings that are missing required, soon-to-be required, or recommended item specifics.

To get started, click here to go to the Active listings page, click on Download - Missing required or recommended item specifics.
Open the file once ready, choose from the available values in drop-down menus or adding your own values.
Once you’ve completed your updates, save the Excel file in CSV format.
Note: Excel will give a warning that you can only save the worksheet you are on. Make sure you are viewing the sheet you are trying to save.
On the Active listings page, click on Upload - Item specifics file.
Select the CSV file you previously saved to your computer and then it will begin the upload process.

Go to Active Listings

Update Item Specifics in Seller Hub

There are a number of other tools available in Seller Hub to update your Item Specifics

On your Active Listings tab in Seller Hub, you’ll see a quick filter that shows how many of your active listings are missing required item specifics.

After you’ve clicked on the task or on the quick filter, you’ll see an Add item specifics link next to each listing in the Actions column.

A pop-up window will appear, which will allow you to add all required and recommended item specifics.

Bulk Edit

You are able to update item specifics using a bulk flow in Seller Hub Active Listings. You can select the listings you’d like to update and go through them quickly to choose your item specifics.

Find Missing Item Specifics

When you list or revise an item, eBay provides tools to find missing Item Specifics.

“Required Soon” Feature. When you list or revise an item, within the listing flow you will see Required soon above item specifics that have an upcoming enforcement date. Seller Hub will give you information about upcoming item specifics requirements and the dates that will become mandatory for your current listings.

"Required Soon' Quick Filter. The Required soon quick filter on the active listings page lets you quickly identify listings needing action to ensure item specifics have been added prior to the required date.

Item specifics rankings. This feature gives you guidance on what the most important item specifics your buyers are searching for using buyer demand data (the number of searches over the past 30 days). Within each item specific section, you will see the most important item specifics at the top. Providing these item specifics will help to increase your item’s visibility especially when buyer’s use the left-hand navigation filters.