How to Execute Mass Actions in Magento and Adobe Commerce

To execute mass actions in Magento, open Catalog, then Products, in the Admin, filter the grid, select the products with the checkboxes and choose an option from the Actions menu. You can delete products, change their status, update attributes, and assign, unassign or transfer inventory sources for many products at once.

Every minute counts, so every click that can be avoided, and every change that can be applied to many products at once, is worth it. For an eCommerce or operations director, mass actions are not a convenience feature. They decide how quickly the store can respond to the business. A promotion that needs new prices on hundreds of items, a supplier that stops shipping a product line, a warehouse that closes or a season that ends all require catalog changes at scale. When those changes are made product by product, they take hours, they introduce errors and the store shows customers products it cannot deliver. When they are made with well-governed mass actions, the catalog stays aligned with inventory and strategy, the team spends its time on higher-value work and customers trust what they see.

What are mass actions in Magento and Adobe Commerce?

Mass actions are operations that apply the same change to several selected records in the Admin at the same time. In the product grid of Magento Open Source and Adobe Commerce (Adobe explains that Magento is now Adobe Commerce), the Actions menu at the top of the grid lists the operations available for the products selected through the checkboxes in the first column.

The main product mass actions are these.

• Delete. Permanently removes the selected products.
• Change status. Enables or disables the selected products.
• Update attributes. Changes attribute, advanced inventory or website data for all selected products.
• Assign inventory source. Adds one or more inventory sources to the selected products.
• Unassign inventory source. Removes a source from the selected products.
• Transfer inventory to source. Moves the inventory of the selected products from one source to another.

The inventory source actions belong to Inventory Management, the multi-source inventory capability, and are relevant for merchants who stock products in more than one location. Extensions can add further actions to the menu. If you run separate B2B and B2C operations, our article on Magento B2B and Magento B2C and the key differences between the two platforms explains how the catalog needs of each differ.

Why do mass actions matter for the business?

In a large store, the catalog changes every day. Products go in and out of stock, prices change with promotions and costs, content is updated and assortments shift between websites and store views. The speed and accuracy of those changes affect revenue in three ways.

• Customer experience. Showing products that are not available frustrates customers and generates service contacts. Disabling them quickly, and re-enabling them when stock returns, keeps the storefront honest.
• Commercial agility. Promotions, seasonal assortments and price changes reach the market on time when they can be applied to many products in one operation.
• Operational efficiency. Each manual edit is a chance for error. Applying one controlled change to a filtered set of products reduces clicks, time and mistakes.

Mass actions in the Admin are one of several tools for catalog changes at scale. For very large or recurring updates, import and export, or an integration with the ERP or a product information management system, is often the better option. Our guide on how to export and import products in Adobe Commerce explains that method.

The following table helps decide which method fits each type of change.

How to execute mass actions in Magento step by step

The general procedure is the same for every action.

1. In the Admin sidebar, go to Catalog and then Products.
2. Use the search, the filters and the sorting options to show only the products you want to change.
3. Select products with the checkboxes in the first column, or use the select all option in the header of that column.
4. Open the Actions menu and choose the action.
5. Complete the options of the action and confirm.

The following sections describe each action and when to use it.

Delete products

This action removes products that the store no longer needs. Deletion is permanent and the products cannot be recovered, so in most cases it is safer to disable a product first and delete it only when you are sure it has no orders, reports or links that depend on it. Deleted products also lose their pages, which can affect search rankings and links shared by customers, so coordinate with marketing before removing products that attract traffic.

Change status to enabled or disabled

Use this action when a list of products must leave the storefront temporarily, for example seasonal items, products without stock or products under review, and enable them again when they return. Disabling instead of deleting keeps product data, history and URLs intact. Combined with a saved filter, such as products of a given category or attribute set, it lets the team switch an entire seasonal collection on or off in a single operation, at the moment the commercial calendar requires it.

Update attributes

Update Attributes applies changes to one or more attributes of all the selected products. According to Adobe's documentation on bulk updates for product attributes, after selecting the products you choose Update Attributes in the Actions menu, change the attribute, advanced inventory or website data as needed, and save. In practice, the changes fall into three groups.

• Attributes. Product attributes such as name, price, special price, descriptions and other fields.
• Advanced inventory. Settings such as quantity rules, stock status, limits and backorders.
• Websites. Adding or removing the products from the websites configured in the store.

In the video, the short description of the selected products is changed to a promotional text and a special price is assigned. These changes are known as bulk actions. They are added to a work queue and processed asynchronously according to the store's cron configuration, so they do not harm site performance. In the author's experience they run every minute by default, although this can be changed. In Adobe Commerce, the Bulk Actions log, under System, then Action Logs, then Bulk Actions, records the details of asynchronous mass operations that run in the background, so administrators can confirm that an operation finished. To analyze the effect of these changes on sales, see our guide to advanced Magento reporting.

How to manage inventory sources with mass actions

Inventory sources are the physical locations where products are stocked and shipped from, such as warehouses, physical stores, distribution centers, pickup locations or drop shippers. With multiple sources, a merchant can sell one aggregated inventory while managing stock in several places.

Assign inventory source

This action adds one or more sources to the selected products. As Adobe's documentation on bulk source assignment explains, the sources are added to the products with an inventory quantity of zero, so the next step is to set the quantity per source so that it counts toward the salable quantity. In the video, two products are assigned to a warehouse source called Bodega, which adds the source with a quantity of zero, and the inventory quantity of one product is then increased to raise its salable quantity.

Unassign inventory source

This action removes a source from the selected products, which means the product is no longer stocked at that location. The same Adobe documentation warns that unassigning clears all inventory data for that source and recommends completing pending orders and shipments first. If you need to keep the stock, use a transfer instead.

Transfer inventory to a source

This action moves the inventory of the selected products from an origin source to a destination source, for example when a warehouse closes. Adobe's guide to transferring inventory to a source notes that all product inventory for the source is moved, partial quantities cannot be transferred, products without the origin source are skipped, and an option lets you unassign the origin source after the transfer.

All of these functions can also be performed on each product individually. Mass actions were created to solve a real problem, since administrators doing these tasks product by product were losing a great deal of time. With mass actions, inventory updates that used to take hours can be done in minutes, with far fewer clicks, fewer mistakes and higher productivity. A clean, up-to-date catalog also projects a professional online store.

What this means for the C-level

Catalog operations rarely reach the leadership agenda, yet they shape revenue and cost every week.

• Convert. A catalog that reflects real availability and current prices converts better and avoids cancellations. Set a standard for how quickly out-of-stock products are disabled and promotions go live.
• Serve. Fewer unavailable products on the storefront mean fewer complaints, cancellations and service contacts.
• Efficiency. Measure how long catalog changes take today and how many errors they cause. Mass actions, import routines and ERP integration can remove much of that effort.

Governance matters as much as speed. A mass action can change hundreds of products in seconds, which makes permissions, approvals and audit trails essential. Our article on user management in Magento explains how to control who can do what in the Admin.

How to measure catalog operations

Leaders can track a few simple indicators to know whether the catalog operation supports the business. Useful ones include the time from a business decision to its publication in the store, the number of products visible without stock, the share of orders cancelled for lack of inventory, catalog errors reported by customers or the service team, and hours per week the team spends on manual updates. Reviewing them monthly shows where automation or better processes would pay back fastest.

Checklist for safe mass actions in Magento

1. Define who is allowed to run each type of mass action, and restrict deletion to a few roles.
2. Filter and review the selection before applying any change, and confirm the number of selected products.
3. Prefer disabling over deleting, and keep a record of what was changed and why.
4. Test large attribute or price changes in a staging environment first.
5. Check the Bulk Actions log, where available, to confirm background operations completed.
6. Process pending orders before unassigning or transferring inventory sources.
7. Decide which changes belong in the Admin and which should come from the ERP or an import routine.

How ICX helps

ICX Consulting helps companies run eCommerce as a business process, not only as a website. Our Adobe Commerce practice configures catalog, inventory and permissions, automates recurring updates through integrations with ERP and inventory systems, and trains teams to operate the store with control. For B2B companies, our B2B digital commerce consulting aligns the catalog with pricing, customer accounts and sales channels.

To document who does what in your catalog operation before you automate it, we invite you to use ICX's Define Activities and Processes Toolkit.

Frequently asked questions

Can I undo a mass action in Magento?

Not automatically. Deletion is permanent, and attribute or status changes must be reversed with another mass action or an import. That is why it is good practice to export the affected products before a large change, test it in staging and restrict destructive actions such as deletion to a few trusted roles.

How do mass actions fit with a PIM or ERP that feeds the catalog?

When a product information management system or ERP is the master for certain fields, changes made in the Admin to those fields may be overwritten at the next sync. Agree which system owns each attribute, use mass actions only for data the store owns, such as visibility or merchandising fields, and make master data changes at the source.

Are mass actions available in Magento Open Source?

Yes. The product grid Actions menu, including delete, status changes and attribute updates, is part of the standard Admin, and the inventory source actions come with Inventory Management. Some features, such as the Bulk Actions log, are documented by Adobe as exclusive to Adobe Commerce, so check the edition you run.

Can mass actions be used for other records besides products?

Yes. Grids in the Admin for orders, customers, reviews and other records also offer actions for selected rows, such as updating status, assigning groups or printing documents. The available options vary by grid, edition and installed extensions, and the same governance principles apply, with clear permissions and a review of the selection before confirming.

Why does the store still show old values right after a mass update?

Some large operations run asynchronously in the background, and the storefront may depend on indexing and cache refreshes before changes appear. If values do not update as expected, check the status of background operations, indexers and cache with your technical team before repeating the action, to avoid applying the change twice.

A catalog that changes as fast as the business is a competitive advantage that customers notice every time they buy. If you want your eCommerce operation to run with that speed and control, get expert advice from ICX on how to organize your catalog, inventory and integrations.