What Is a GTIN (Global Trade Item Number)?

A GTIN's digits indicate the GS1 Member Organization it was licensed from, the company that applied it to the item (often the manufacturer), the item number, and a check digit that verifies the number's structure. Only a GS1 Member Organization can issue GTINs and guarantee they are unique, and they are searchable in Verified by GS1, a public database many marketplaces use to verify product identity.

A GTIN has two jobs. Encoded in a barcode, it is scanned at the point of sale and in distribution for accurate data capture. In ecommerce, it helps make sure the item listed is the one picked, packed and shipped. It is also the key trading partners use to retrieve product information, including in EDI purchase orders, invoices and advance ship notices.

GTINs come in four lengths, all intended for global use:

• GTIN-12. 12 digits, used predominantly in North America and scanned at the point of sale. It is synonymous with UPC and is the only GTIN that can be encoded in a UPC-A barcode.
• GTIN-13. 13 digits, used mostly outside North America at the point of sale. It is synonymous with EAN and is the only GTIN that can be encoded in an EAN-13 barcode.
• GTIN-8. 8 digits, used mostly outside North America for small items scanned at the point of sale.
• GTIN-14. 14 digits, never starting with zero. It identifies trade item groupings, such as a case of a product, and is not intended for point of sale use.

GS1 US defines packaging levels so the correct GTIN is tied to how a product is packed, sold, shipped and scanned across the supply chain. The each, generally the consumer unit sold at checkout or online, is assigned a GTIN-12 (U.P.C.). A case holds eaches that all share the same GTIN, and a case with more than one GTIN inside is a mixed case. When a shipping case is created in a GS1 US account, the account can assign it a GTIN-14 automatically, using the same item reference as the product inside. Once the case is set to In Use, its product and quantity cannot change: if either changes, GS1 US says to create a new case and assign a new GTIN.

A manufacturer sells a brass hose fitting as an each and in a case of 24.

• The each carries a GTIN-12 in a UPC-A barcode and is scanned at a store's point of sale.
• The case carries its own GTIN-14 for shipping and receiving.

A distributor's EDI 850 orders 10 units of the case GTIN. The manufacturer ships 10 cases, which is 10 x 24 = 240 eaches, and the store that later sells a single fitting scans the each's GTIN-12, not the case's.

A GTIN is entered as one of a product's or variant's barcodes. You can add up to 20 barcodes to one product or variant, and each can have a type that records its standard. The GTIN type accepts 8, 12, 13 or 14 digits, and the value has to match that standard's length and allowed characters. Some sales channels might require a GTIN before a product can be published. If you don't have a product's GTIN, Shopify suggests requesting it from the manufacturer. If you manufacture the product, you get GTINs from GS1.

In the GraphQL Admin API, the ProductVariant object exposes a barcodes connection, and the older single barcode field is marked deprecated. Variants can be searched and filtered by barcode.

Uncap's Shopify EDI integration guide names the problem: enterprise buyers reference products by their own item numbers, UPCs or GTINs, while your Shopify catalog uses your internal SKUs. If the mapping between those identifier systems is not clean and maintained, every 850 that arrives with an unfamiliar identifier creates a manual intervention.

• UPC (Universal Product Code)
• SKU (stock keeping unit)
• Case pack
• GS1-128 label
• EDI 850
• PIM (product information management)

• GS1: Global Trade Item Number (GTIN)
• GS1 US: What is a GTIN?
• Shopify Help Center: Product details page