Magento 2 Color Swatches Guide: Definition, Configuration & Import

Today, we are going to talk about Magento swatches  – an important element of many configurable product pages. The lack of decent product content is what prevents ecommerce businesses from booming. However, you can always enrich your offer with the help of built-in tools, such as Magento 2 color swatches. 

Below, we are going to describe what Magento color swatches are. After that, you will learn how to create color swatches in Magento 2. And, of course, there is a section dedicated to the import process. You will learn what attributes are used for Magento 2 swatches. Next, we explain how to compose a CSV with product information that incorporates color swatches. After that, you will master the Magento 2 color swatch import. 

What Are Magento Swatches?

In Magento 2, swatches are selectable options for a configurable product represented as buttons. Usually, there are two types of swatches in Magento 2:

• Visual swatches;
• Text swatches.

What are the color and size swatches then? Well, they are just examples of visual and text swatches correspondingly. Below, you can see how color (visual) and size (text) swatches are represented in a category:

By clicking on different swatches, customers can switch between the corresponding product images that illustrate child products with the selected parameters. It is an intuitive process that leaves your clients with no questions open:

Magento 2 provides the ability to use both text and visual swatches on product pages, product listings, and layered navigation. In this tutorial, we, however, focus on Magento color swatches and other visual swatches. 

Visual swatches in Magento 2 are images and color icons that provide information about product variations. Similar to text swatches, they are unique attributes available for configurable products that enable specific customer interactions with such products.

Magento configurable product swatches offer a great way to provide flexible offers in your store. User-friendly and intuitive product variations help appeal to all types of customers and increase sales significantly. That’s why visual swatches with their very illustrative purpose are so important. They enhance configurable product variations with images of color, pattern, material, etc.  

How to Set Up Magento 2 Color Swatches

Now, that you are familiar with Magento swatches, let’s see how to create color swatches in Magento 2.

Step 1: Add New Attribute

New Magento visual (color) swatches can be added to the database under Stores > Attributes > Product as follows:

1. Click the Add New Attribute button.
   
2.  Give a swatch attribute title and select ‘Visual Swatch’ from the attribute type dropdown.
   
3. Set Values required to No.
4. Set Updated Product Preview Image to Yes if you want your product image to update corresponding to the chosen color swatch.
5. Set Product Image for Swatch if Possible to No.
   
6. Leave Advanced Attribute Properties at default.
   

Now, you can proceed to the next step of the Magento 2 color swatch creation – the selection of swatch colors.

Step 2: Manage Swatch – Add Colors

Here, we have Magento 2 color swatches available in multiple colors:

Push the Add Swatch button to add a new color to the selection. You have two options:

• Choose a new color from the palette;
• Upload an image.

Color Selection for Magento 2 Color Swatches

You can select a new color option for your visual swatches in Magento 2 as follows:

1. Click on the arrow in your swatch;
2. Choose the “Choose a color” option.
   
3. Enter a hexadecimal code or use the color picker and hit the button in the bottom right corner.
4.  Set a name for this swatch in the Admin column.
   

Image Upload for Magento Swatches 

Alternatively, you can create visual swatches based on images that represent the necessary pattern, color, or texture for your configurable products. Follow these steps to upload images for Magento 2 color swatches:

1. Choose “Upload a file“ instead of “Choose a color.”
   
2. Provide a file you want to use as a visual swatch.
3. Review your Magento 2 color swatch:
   

Step 3: Add Magento 2 Swatches to Products

Now, we’d like to draw your attention to the last step of the Magento 2 configurable swatches configuration. Below, you will learn how to add swatches to a configurable product in Magento 2:

1. Navigate to Catalog -> Products and select a configurable product to add Magento swatches to.
2. Scroll down to the Configurations section and click the Edit Configurations button.
   
3. Select attributes associated with Magento 2 swatches and click Next.
   
4. Next, choose swatches to display on a storefront as a part of this configurable product.
   
5. Now, you can link a unique product image per each color swatch:
   – Choose Apply unique images by attribute to each SKU in Images;
   – Now, select your attribute that represents color swatches in Magento 2;
   – Upload a unique product imager per each color.
   
6. View the results in the Summary section.
   

Now, let’s find our configurable product in the catalog to test how well the Magento swatches are synchronized with the image display:

As you can see, everything works according to the configurations: when you switch between color swatches, the corresponding product images replace one another. Since we didn’t bind unique images to size swatches, switching between them doesn’t impact the image section. But you can change that following the instructions above.

Keep in mind that Magento 2 supports text swatches as well. The text swatches generation is similar to that of visual swatches. You can transfer them following the steps of the visual swatch import we describe below.

Magento 2 Color Swatch Import

Now, let’s talk about the Magento 2 swatch import. The Improved Import and Export extension lets you import swatches to Magento 2 in a couple of ways. Firstly, it is possible to stick to a color code. Secondly, you can specify an image URL which is the most efficient way to retrieve product images from the manufacturer’s side without storing the images at your hardware.

Magento 2 visual swatches can be imported following two different logic patterns:

• As a single color attribute;
• Within additional attributes of a configurable product.

Both types allow implementing a color swatch via a particular color code or an image URL. 

Single Color Attribute CSV

In Magento 2, swatch import within the color attribute can be run upon defining these base attributes: sku, attribute_set_code, and color in the import data table. You can find their detailed descriptions in the table below:

A CSV for the Magento 2 swatches import as a part of a color attribute looks as follows:

It contains multiple additional columns. For further information, follow this Sample Google Sheets spreadsheet.

CSV with The additional_attributes Column

Let’s explore another way to import color swatches to Magento 2 – the additional_attributes column. Simply add it to the product import table.

The swatch values will have the same syntax as the color attribute’s values during the single swatch attribute import. The base attributes for such import are sku, attribute_set_code, and additional_attributes; they must be specified for a successful swatch data implementation.

As you can see, it is also possible to place more information in the additional_attributes column than in the color column. For instance, there is also the size swatch specified along with the color. See the Sample Google Sheets CSV for more information. Each column has a detailed description there.

How to Import Magento 2 Color Swatches

With a Magento 2 color swatch CSV, you can proceed to the import procedure associated with the Improved Import and Export extension. Follow these steps to import color swatches to Magento 2:

1. Go to System > Improved Import / Export > Import Jobs and press the “Add New Job” button to create a new job.
   
2. In the first section, specify the job name and set the job schedule if you want to import Magento swatches automatically.
   
3. Proceed to the Import Settings section. Select the entity you want to import to your Magento 2 store – Products.
   
4.  Then, specify the behavior of the import job: Add/Update, Replace, or Delete. Select the behavior carefully and proceed. If you want to add more swatches to the existing products, specify the Add/Update as the import behavior. In case you want to replace existing swatches or, stick to the Replace behavior.
   
5. Now, it’s time to choose a file format and source of your file with Magento 2 color swatches. Note that it can be either the standard CSV format or something more specific, such as XML, JSON, ODS, or XLSX.
   When it comes to file sources, the Improved Import & Export provides the ability to import swatches to Magento 2 from Google Sheets, Google Drive, over FTP/SFTP, or even via API.
   
6. Once you’ve selected the file from the specified source, hit the ‘Validate file’ button. If your file is correct, you can click the ‘Save & Run’ button followed by ‘Run’ to start the import job.
7. Once the import is finished you will get a log with information about how the import went.
   

Magento 2 swatch import is extremely useful when you need to save time on creating and applying swatches to products manually. During this process, you can both generate new swatches or assign the existing ones to SKUs of configurable products. There’s no need to add a parent configurable to an import table, as the functionality matches swatches to specified SKUs.

All in all, you can significantly simplify the database update routine with Improved Import and Export while still reaching out to customers with strong visual content and interactive offers. Try out the extension and see how much you can benefit from a single data management solution.

 Get Improved Import and Export

Magento 2 Color Swatches FAQ

Below, we provide answers to questions that Magento 2 users often ask when it comes to the color swatch import.

Final Words

Magento 2 color swatches are an integral part of Magento 2 in general and configurable products in particular. They dramatically improve the visual representation of complex items, providing customers with a better shopping experience. As a store administrator, you can easily create Magento swatches and assign them to products, connecting each swatch to a particular product image.

On the other hand, the Improved Import & Export extension introduces a more straightforward procedure associated with the Magento 2 color swatch import. In this case, you provide all the necessary information, including image URLs and color codes, and assign it to products. Follow this link to discover more improvements our extension adds to Magento’s standard data management routine:

Improved Import and Export Extension