Manage Square Online Item Settings from Your Item Library
From your Square Item Library, you can adjust several item settings as they relate to your Square Online websites, including site item visibility, prep times for online ordering, SEO, social media links, and more. Take a look at each one below.
For information on other item settings beyond Square Online, check out creating and managing items online.
Sale Price
To add a sale price to an item displayed on your Square Online site:
From your Square Item Library, select an existing item or create a new one.
Under Variations, go to Price and click Options > Add online sale price.
Enter a sale price for each variation you want to update.
Select Save when finished.
Note: Sale prices only apply to your Square Online site and do not sync to other Square platforms.
Site Item Assignment
Site item assignment refers to which of your websites your item is assigned to. This, in combination with site item visibility, controls where items are available for purchase. For example, in order for an item to be purchasable on your site, it must be both assigned, and visible or hidden. To manage site item assignment:
From your Square Item Library, select an existing item or create a new one.
Under "Where it's sold," use the toggles to determine which websites the item should be assigned to.
Select Save when finished.
Note: If you're using channel integrations such as Google Business Profile or Meta for Business, you can also assign your item to those channels by clicking +Add channels.
Site Item Visibility
Item visibility refers to how and where an item will appear on your website.
To manage site item visibility:
- From your Square Item Library, select an existing item or create a new one.
- Under “Where it’s sold,” choose a site visibility setting from the Site visibility dropdown menu.
- Select Save when finished.
The item visibility settings will apply to items on every site they’ve been assigned to. For example, if you mark an item as Visible, it’ll be visible on each of your sites where the item is being sold.
The available item visibility settings include:
- Visible: Your item is visible online and available for purchase, and will show up in navigation and site search results.
- Hidden: Your item is available for purchase online but only to those who have a direct link to it (useful for exclusive items).
- Unavailable: Your item isn’t visible online and can’t be purchased, which is useful if you aren’t ready to sell the item.
You can also update visibility for multiple items at once using the bulk editing method.
Sell Items as Preorders
Note: Enable preordering for pickup and delivery by upgrading your Square Online subscription.
If you’re selling items for pickup and local delivery which are only available on certain dates (holiday specials, for example), your customers can preorder on Square Online and get the items when they become available.
To set up preordering for items set up for pickup and local delivery:
- From your Square Item Library, select the item you want to edit.
- Under Ordering, toggle on Sell as preorder. Note: Your item must have pickup or delivery enabled.
- Select Edit preorder settings to choose the date or date range when the item will be available for pickup or delivery. You can choose any date or time from 24 hours up to 365 days in advance.
- Optionally check Customize fulfillment hours to choose the specific fulfillment hours within the selected date range. For example, if you set the time range as 10am - 2pm, buyers can choose only these hours for pickup or delivery on the specified pickup or delivery dates. If you leave this option unchecked, your location’s standard pickup or delivery hours will apply.
- Enter a Preorder cutoff date. This is a date and time after which you’d like to stop taking orders for the item. The item won’t be available to order online after the specified date and time.
You can make changes to your item’s preorder status, edit dates or preorder availability, or turn off preordering at any time.
When you set up preordering, customers will see a badge on your item page showing that the item is available for preorder, as well as the corresponding fulfillment window. When they add the item to their cart and proceed to checkout, they will see and can edit the pickup date and time, as well as the location information.
If the customer’s order contains a standard item along with a preorder item, the pickup date will be adjusted to the preorder fulfillment date. They will see a notification about this change and can adjust their order, or order separately if they need to pick up the item immediately.
Preordering is for items that are not currently available for purchase, and need to be ordered in advance to be picked up or delivered at some point after the items become available. Preorders are often used to create preliminary excitement about an item pending release.
Scheduling is for items that are already available for purchase, but the customer wants to order and pay now, and schedule the pickup or delivery for a specific time in the future (as long as it’s within your pickup and delivery hours). Scheduling is often used by restaurants, and other food and beverage businesses.
The primary differences between these two ordering techniques are the item availability and the length of time the item can be ordered ahead of the fulfillment date.
Per-order Quantity Limits
You can limit the number of times a customer can add a single item to their cart per Square Online order. This can help prevent you from selling out of highly-demanded items too quickly and make stock easier to manage. For example, if you have a limit of four on a shirt that comes in different variations (think sizes or colors), then the total amount of those variations can’t exceed four in the cart.
To limit the number of times a customer can add a specific item to their cart for a single order:
From your Square Item Library, select an existing item or create a new one.
Under Ordering, toggle on Set quantity limits for online orders and enter a number in the text field.
Select Save when finished.
Note: To limit the total quantity of items allowed per online pickup and delivery order, you can set a large order limit by going to your Account & Settings page > Fulfillment > Pickup & Delivery > Advanced settings.
Fulfillment Methods
In order to sell any of your items online, be sure to indicate how you'll be fulfilling them when ordered from your website. To start:
From your Square Item Library, select an existing item or create a new one.
Under Fulfillment, Edit the online fulfillment methods.
Use the checkboxes to indicate the fulfillment methods used for that item and click Done.
Select Save when finished.
Item Prep Time
Prep time refers to how long it takes to prepare orders and items for pickup and local delivery. To set up prep times for individual items:
From your Square Item Library, select an existing item or create a new one.
Under Fulfillment, Edit the item prep time.
Toggle off Use location default to choose a custom prep time for your item and click Done.
Select Save when finished.
Note: To set up prep times for all pickup and local delivery orders, go to your Account & Settings page > Fulfillment > Pickup & Delivery.
Item Contains Alcohol
To start selling alcohol online with Square, you must first indicate which items in your Item Library contain alcohol. This could be a prepared cocktail from a bar that's set up for pickup, local delivery, or QR code ordering, or a non-perishable item like bottled wine set up for shipping. Learn more about selling alcohol with Square Online for details.
Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
You can customize how an item or category page from your Square Online site displays on search engines. This is known as Search Engine Optimization (SEO). Learn more about how to optimize your items and categories for Square Online SEO.
Social Media Links
You can customize how links to the item and category pages from your Square Online site appear when shared on social media, particularly if you want to use different information from your SEO. Learn more about Square Online social media links for more information.
Disclaimer: Nothing in this article constitutes legal advice. The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) prohibits misleading “former price comparisons.” If you advertise or promote item(s) at a discounted price, it’s your responsibility to ensure you’re meeting the FTC’s guidelines. We recommend you reach out to a legal expert if you have questions about the FTC’s guidelines.