Free SKU Generator

A SKU (Stock Keeping Unit) is a unique alphanumeric code that a business creates to track individual products and variants in its inventory. A typical SKU is 8–12 characters and encodes details such as product type, size, colour, or scent. Unlike universal barcodes, SKUs are internal identifiers you control — the format and naming convention belong entirely to your business.

SKUs let you identify any specific product variant instantly, making it easier to manage stock levels, track sales performance, and prevent fulfilment errors. They're especially valuable when you sell variations of the same product — different sizes, scents, or colours — across multiple sales channels. Stocksmith tracks your SKUs across all connected sales channels so inventory counts update automatically with every sale.

There's no strict rule, but 8–12 characters is the sweet spot for readability and consistency. Longer SKUs capture more product detail but get harder to scan visually and type. Shorter ones usually mean you've dropped a variant dimension you'll wish you had later. The generator above lets you set the character length per segment so you can find the right balance.

Yes. You're free to edit your SKUs at any time, although it's best to settle on a consistent format early to avoid confusion. If you sell on multiple platforms, remember to update the SKUs everywhere — a code that's changed in one place and not another is worse than the original.

No — SKUs, barcodes, and UPCs are three distinct identifiers. A SKU is an internal code you create for your own inventory management, in any format you choose. A UPC or EAN is a globally standardised 12- or 13-digit code issued by GS1 for external retail and supply chains — you can check one with our UPC check digit calculator. A barcode is the visual, machine-readable representation of any underlying code; your SKU can be printed as a barcode once the codes are set.

Use letters A–Z and numbers 0–9. Dashes (-) or underscores (_) are safe separators. Avoid spaces and special characters such as #, &, /, or accented letters, and consider skipping easily confused letters like O and I.

Each marketplace sets its own field limit, and they change — check the current documentation for the platforms you sell on before committing to a long format. In practice the limits rarely bite: staying in the 8–12 character range keeps you comfortably inside every major platform's cap while remaining readable on a label. If you're planning a format longer than about 20 characters, verify it against each channel first.

Yes — each product variant should carry the same unique SKU on every marketplace you sell on. Duplicate or mismatched SKUs across channels cause wrong inventory counts, analytics errors, and duplicate-listing conflicts. Unique, consistent SKUs are the single source of truth that keeps stock levels accurate when you sell in multiple places.

Yes. Any alphanumeric SKU can be encoded into a barcode format such as Code-128 or a QR code using standard label-printing software — the underlying SKU text stays unchanged. That means you can print shelf labels, product tags, or shipping stickers that scan directly into your inventory system.

No. Retire the code instead. Reusing a SKU corrupts historical sales data and can trigger duplicate-SKU conflicts on marketplaces.

Both are technically safe, but dashes tend to print and scan more clearly on labels. Avoid other separators like spaces, slashes, or periods, which can cause import or URL-encoding issues.

Yes. Excel and Google Sheets strip leading zeros unless the cells are formatted as text or with a custom number format. Format columns before import, or start the code with a non-zero character to keep the zeros intact.

For products with multiple variants — scent, size, and colour, say — the most reliable format uses fixed segments: Category–Product–Variant1–Variant2. A lavender soy candle in a 12 oz jar becomes CND-SOY-LAV-12OZ. This pattern keeps every SKU consistent and human-readable while making sure each combination gets a unique code with no overlap.

Stocksmith assigns your SKUs to products and materials, then adjusts inventory counts as you sell, manufacture, or restock. When you connect a sales channel such as Shopify, incoming orders reduce the correct SKU's stock level automatically. That removes the manual reconciliation between spreadsheets and channels, which is where overselling usually starts.

Yes. Generate as many SKUs as you need, then click Export as CSV to download the whole list. The file includes the product name, all three attributes, and the generated SKU as separate columns, so you can map them straight into a bulk-upload template for Shopify, Etsy, or your inventory system. Nothing is stored on our end — the list lives in your browser until you export it.

Yes — completely free, with no sign-up, no email required, and no limit on how many SKUs you generate. Everything runs in your browser. We build it because the businesses we work with need it; if you later want to track stock, costs, and sales against those SKUs automatically, that's what Stocksmith does.