Metafield definition filter limitation

[Roo]

Hi all,

I’ve been migrating a large store from Magento to Shopify. The store has approximately 10k products and in Magento there are about 200ish attributes. These are primarily used for product filtering.

These have been migrated to Shopify as unstructured Metafields currently. I have then been adding them to product metafield definitions to allow them to then be set as being enabled for filtering with the Shopify Search & Discovery app. This was going great until I just ran into this message:

“Maximum definitions of 50 set for use as a filter. Turn it off for one or more to continue.”

Is there any workarounds? I have around another 145 or so attributes to add to definitions and set as filters but don’t seem to be able to move forward with that.

Any help would be really appreciated if anyone has overcome this or has other solutions to get round this or achieve what I need in a better way. Ideally I don’t want to use any other apps but would consider if it’s the only option.

Many Thanks,

Roo

[Sam_Tim]

Hi, @Roo
Shopify has a hard limit of 50 filters in the Search & Discovery app, which can be challenging when migrating a store with a large number of attributes. Since you have 200+ attributes, here’s a step-by-step approach to work around this limitation while maintaining effective filtering:

Step 1: Prioritize Essential Filters

• Identify the most important 50 attributes that customers actually use for filtering.
• Focus on high-impact filters like Size, Color, Material, and Brand while removing less essential ones.

Step 2: Consolidate Similar Attributes

• Instead of separate metafields for each value, use a single metafield with multiple values (comma-separated).
  • Example: Instead of individual metafields for “Cotton,” “Silk,” “Wool,” create:
    • Material: Cotton, Silk, Wool
  • Example: Instead of separate Color metafields, store values as:
    • Color: Red, Blue, Green
• This reduces the number of metafields required for filtering.

Step 3: Use Product Tags for Additional Filtering

• Shopify allows filtering by product tags, which can replace some metafields.
  • Example: Instead of a metafield for “Eco-Friendly,” use a tag like:
    • sustainable-recycled, organic-certified, vegan-leather
• This helps free up metafield slots for more critical filters.

Step 4: Utilize Shopify’s Built-in Fields

• Shopify natively supports filtering by Product Type and Vendor (Brand)—use these instead of metafields where possible.
  • Example: Use Vendor for brand filtering instead of a metafield.
  • Example: Use Product Type instead of a category metafield.

Step 5: Leverage Smart Collections for Filtering (Optional)

• If Shopify’s built-in filtering isn’t enough, use Smart Collections to group products dynamically.
  • Example: Instead of a metafield for “New Arrivals,” create a New Arrivals collection.
  • Example: Instead of filtering by “On Sale,” use an automatic Sale collection.

Step 6: Consider a Third-Party App (If Needed)

• If your store must exceed 50 filters, consider apps like:
  • Boost Product Filter & Search
  • Power Tools Filter Menu
• These allow unlimited filters and offer advanced filtering logic.

Final Recommendation

If you want to stay within Shopify’s native filtering:

• Use only the most essential 50 metafield filters in Search & Discovery.
• Merge similar attributes into fewer metafields with multi-value fields.
• Use tags, product types, vendors, and collections to reduce metafield dependency.

If necessary, use a third-party filtering app for additional flexibility.