Migrate from v2 inventory service to supplemental feeds

  • The Merchant API is the new version of the Content API for Shopping and is now in beta.

  • Supplemental feeds in Content API v2.1 offer similar functionality to the legacy inventory service for partial product updates, but with a lower request quota.

  • You can update any online product data field using supplemental feeds, except for local inventory fields.

  • Separate supplemental feeds can be created for different product data updates (e.g., price, availability) to streamline debugging.

  • Contact Google Merchant Center support if you require a higher request quota for supplemental feeds, providing necessary information for evaluation.

The supplemental feeds feature introduced in Content API version 2.1 provides similar functionality to the legacy (v2) inventory service. Both services let you to make partial updates of online (non-local) products without replacing all product data. When migrating to supplemental feeds, keep the following points in mind:

  • With supplemental feeds, calling Products.insert with the feedId as a query parameter is equivalent to using Inventory.set with the legacy inventory service to perform partial updates on a product.
  • You can update any product data field with supplemental feeds, except local inventory-specific fields.
    • To add and update store-level product data with Content API v2.1, use the local inventory service instead of supplemental feeds.
  • You can create separate supplemental feeds for separate product data updates. For example, you can create a supplemental feed for price updates and a separate supplemental feed for availability updates. This helps with debugging product data issues by making it easier to track down the feed responsible for updating that attribute.

Request quotas

In addition, one major difference between supplemental feeds and the legacy inventory service is that supplemental feeds have a lower request quota. Unlike the inventory service, requests made via supplemental feeds count towards the same quota as the Products resource. If you need a higher request quota, please contact us and include the following information:

  • Your Merchant Center ID
  • The methods you are hitting your quota on
  • An estimate of how many extra calls per day you need for those methods
  • A business justification for why you need these extra method calls