Hi @timmiieehh,
The difference you’re seeing between manual creation and import relates to how WooCommerce and the importer handle attribute slugs. When you create or edit an attribute manually in the dashboard, WooCommerce may automatically shorten or adjust the slug to fit the 28-character limit without alerting you. However, during import, the importer strictly enforces the slug length limit and will warn if the slugs exceed that maximum.
Here are a few solutions you can try:
Option 1: Pre-create shorter attribute slugs
- Go to Products → Attributes in your WordPress admin
- Edit your existing attributes and manually set shorter slugs (like “wall-thick-after” and “wall-thick-before”)
- Then use these shorter slugs in your CSV import
Option 2: Modify your CSV
- In your import CSV, use the shorter attribute slugs in your column headers
- For global attributes, use format:
meta:attribute_pa_[short-slug]
- For local attributes, use format:
meta:attribute_[Short-Name]
Option 3: Consider abbreviations
- Rename your attributes to shorter versions like “Wall Thick. After” and “Wall Thick. Before”
The manual creation works because WordPress can handle the display name separately from the slug, but the import process has stricter limitations.
I hope that helps. Let us know if you need anything else.
