Field reference

Required fields

These are the fields a channel needs to ingest a product at all. A feed missing required fields will have items rejected or silently dropped. The seven fields at the top of the matrix are required by every channel — they form the universal core.

Field	Meta	Google	Snap	Pin	TikTok	Axon	Reddit
id	R	R	R	R	R	R	R
title	R	R	R	R	R	R	R
description	R	R	R	R	R	R	R
link	R	R	R	R	R	R	R
image_link	R	R	R	R	R	R	R
price	R	R	R	R	R	R	R
availability	R	R	R	R	R	R	R
condition	R	R	R	—	R	—	—
brand	R	C	R	C	R	—	—
gtin / mpn	—	C	—	C	—	—	—
item_group_id	C	C	C	C	C	C	C
currency	R	R	R	R	R	R	R

The universal core

Every channel requires the same seven fields at minimum: id, title, description, link, image_link, price (with currency), and availability. A feed that cleanly satisfies these seven can pass base ingestion on all seven platforms. This is why the Google Shopping spec has become the de facto standard — Pinterest, TikTok, Snap, and Reddit all mirror it, and Axon's feed is a slim variant of the same shape.

Conditional fields explained

• condition — required by Meta, Google, Snap, and TikTok. Optional for Pinterest, Axon, Reddit. Values: new, refurbished, used.
• brand — required by Meta and TikTok. Conditional for Google and Pinterest (required for most products that have a real brand; exempt for handmade or generic goods).
• gtin / mpn — conditional for Google and Pinterest. Required for products with a manufacturer barcode; exempt for custom, handmade, vintage, or one-off goods. When present, Google strongly prefers a valid GTIN over an MPN.
• item_group_id — conditional everywhere. Required the moment a product has variants (size, color, etc). Without it, channels treat each variant as a separate unrelated product.

Optional & recommended fields

Required fields only get a product ingested. Optional fields are what drive performance — better matching, richer ad rendering, sale annotations, and campaign segmentation. The matrix below marks each field as highly recommended or merely supported, per channel.

Field	Meta	Google	Snap	Pin	TikTok	Axon	Reddit
Categorization & taxonomy
google_product_category	H	H	H	H	H	—	H
product_type	H	H	S	S	S	—	S
Variants & merchandising
item_group_id	H	H	H	H	H	H	H
color	H	H	S	S	S	S	S
size / size_system	H	H	S	S	S	S	S
gender	H	H	S	S	S	—	S
age_group	H	H	S	S	S	—	S
material / pattern	S	S	S	S	S	—	S
Pricing & promotion
sale_price	H	H	H	H	H	H	H
sale_price_effective_date	H	H	S	H	H	H	S
cost_of_goods_sold	—	H	—	—	—	—	—
Media & creative
additional_image_link	H	H	H	H	H	S	H
lifestyle_image_link	S	H	—	—	—	—	—
video_link	S	S	S	S	H	—	—
Identifiers
gtin	S	H	S	H	S	—	S
mpn	S	H	S	S	S	—	S
Campaign segmentation
custom_label_0–4	H	H	S	H	H	—	S
product_highlight	—	H	—	—	—	—	—
short_title	—	H	—	—	—	—	—
Shipping & inventory
shipping	S	H	S	S	S	—	S
inventory / quantity	S	S	S	S	H	—	S

High-leverage everywhere

• item_group_id — the single most important optional field. Tells every platform that variants belong to one product. Without it: no variant pickers, broken retargeting, and ad rotation that cannibalizes itself. Treat as required the moment a catalog has variants.
• additional_image_link — universally high-impact. Drives richer ad rendering — lifestyle shots, alternate angles, scale shots. On TikTok this is also where vertical 9:16 imagery goes.
• sale_price + sale_price_effective_date — the pair that unlocks the “was $X, now $Y” treatment on Google, Meta, Pinterest, and TikTok. A sale_price without effective dates is often ignored or causes disapprovals.
• custom_label_0–4 — the campaign-segmentation backbone. Originated by Google, adopted by Meta, Pinterest, and TikTok. Standard plays: margin tier, seasonality, bestseller status, price band, promo flag. Never shown to users — purely for campaign structure.
• color, size, gender, age_group — required-when-applicable on Google and Meta for apparel and regulated categories; recommended elsewhere. Apparel feeds without these cannot match category-level audiences.

Channel-specific high-leverage fields