Units & Variants

Units of Measure

Every product in StockFlow must have a Unit of Measure (UOM) — the thing that one “unit” represents. This affects how quantities are displayed, how inventory is counted, and how sales orders are entered.

Built-in units

StockFlow ships with 40 pre-configured units across these groups:

Creating a custom unit

1. Go to Settings → Units → + Add Unit
2. Enter:
   • Singular name — e.g. Roll
   • Plural name — e.g. Rolls
   • Abbreviation — e.g. rl
   • Allow decimals — check if quantities like 2.5 rolls are valid
3. Click Save

Changing a product’s unit

Open the product, change the Unit of Measure field, and save. Changing the unit does not convert existing stock quantities — it only changes the label. If you change from kg to g, update the quantities manually to reflect the new unit’s scale.

Product Variants

Variants let a single product entry represent multiple physical variations — such as a T-shirt available in 3 sizes and 4 colours.

When to use variants vs separate products

Setting up variant options

1. Open a product (or create a new one)

2. Click the Variants tab

3. Click + Add Option

4. Enter an option name and its possible values:

   Option 1: Size     → S, M, L, XL, XXL
   Option 2: Colour   → Red, Black, White, Navy

5. Click Generate Variants

StockFlow creates a variant for every combination: S / Red, S / Black, S / White, … XXL / Navy — 20 variants in this example.

Variant-level settings

Each variant has its own:

Managing variants after creation

After generating variants, you can:

• Edit any row in the variants table to adjust prices, SKUs, or barcodes
• Delete a variant — only possible if it has no stock movements or sales history
• Deactivate a variant — hides it from sales without deleting it
• Add new option values — e.g. add a new colour Green to an existing size/colour product; click Add value under the option and new combinations are generated

Stock per variant

Each variant has its own independent inventory. Adding stock to S / Red does not affect S / Black. You can view per-variant stock in the Inventory module by filtering to the parent product — it shows one row per variant/warehouse combination.

Variant limits

Unit conversion (advanced)

If you buy a product in one unit and sell it in another (e.g. buy in box of 12, sell by piece), configure a unit conversion:

1. Open the product
2. Click Unit Conversion
3. Set:
   • Purchase unit: box
   • Quantity per purchase unit: 12
   • Sales unit: piece
4. Click Save

When you receive a purchase order of 10 boxes, StockFlow adds 120 pieces to inventory. When you sell 1 piece, it deducts 1 piece. Reports show both the purchase unit and the sales unit.