A Google Merchant Center feed is only as good as the data inside it. Products with incomplete or inaccurate data get disapproved, which means they do not appear in Shopping results or free listings. This guide covers the required and recommended attributes for most product categories.
These attributes must be present for every product in your feed or the product will be disapproved:
Some attributes are required only for certain product types or categories. GTIN (barcode), MPN (manufacturer part number), and color/size/material are required for variants and for categories where Google needs them to correctly identify and match products.
The price in your feed must match the price on the landing page. Mismatches are one of the most common reasons for product disapproval. If your prices change frequently, use the Content API to push price updates in real time rather than relying on a daily feed fetch. Including a sale_price attribute when products are on promotion is recommended but not required.
Images must show only the product being sold, on a white or neutral background for most categories. Watermarks, promotional text, and borders are not allowed. For apparel, on-model images are preferred. The image_link must be a direct URL to the image file, not a page that contains the image.
Products with missing required attributes are automatically disapproved. They will not appear in Shopping results or free listings until the missing data is added and the feed is reprocessed.
Google fetches your feed on the schedule you set in Merchant Center, typically daily or weekly. After fetch, processing takes a few hours. Price and availability updates take effect faster if you use the Content API for real-time updates.