Set Up ShipStation's Internal Inventory

ShipStation's internal inventory management allows you to set your product inventory levels in ShipStation and track those stock counts as you ship out your orders.

ShipStation inventory includes multiple features and settings to customize your shipping workflow, such as: inventory locations on packing slips, First In/First Out allocation, Inventory Sync between certain order sources, and reorder thresholds.

Once you've decided ShipStation's internal inventory is right for your needs, you can set it up in ShipStation with these few basic steps:

  1. Create an Inventory Warehouse.

    This process includes adding an inventory warehouse to ShipStation and the optional steps of creating a warehouse layout and specifying inventory locations.

  2. Link your Inventory Warehouse as an Inventory Source to the appropriate Ship From Location.

  3. Establish On Hand Quantities for your stock.

  4. Review your Inventory settings.

  5. Enable Inventory Tracking.

Follow the instructions in each section below to successfully set up your inventory in ShipStation. Once you’ve completed these steps, you can set your reorder thresholds, allocation strategy, and enable Inventory Sync.

How To Set Up an Inventory Warehouse

Review the sections below and learn how to:

  1. Create an Inventory Warehouse

  2. Create a warehouse layout (optional)

  3. Specify Inventory Location (optional)

For ShipStation to track your stock levels, you need to create at least one Inventory Warehouse and link it as an Inventory source to one of your Ship From Locations. Think of this as the physical location where you store your inventory.

You can also configure your Inventory Warehouse to mirror your actual warehouse layout (for example, if your warehouse is separated into aisles, rows, and bins). By adding Locations, you can have ShipStation show specifically where each item is located (for example, Toy A is located in B-24-7).

Add an Inventory Warehouse

Create a Warehouse Layout

Tip

This step is not required before you start using inventory, but is helpful if your products are located in clearly defined locations within your warehouse.

Specify Inventory Locations

Create Layout During Inventory CSV Import

If you import your new stock levels via CSV, you can also create the layout and specify locations in bulk via CSV using the alternate method outlined in the Set Your Initial Stock Levels article.

Link Inventory Warehouse to Ship From Location

Every shipment in ShipStation must have a Ship From Location. By linking an Inventory Warehouse to a Ship From Location, ShipStation can allocate and deduct inventory within the warehouse.

A Ship From Location can only be linked to one Inventory Source at a time, so as long as an order has the right Ship From Location selected, you’re all set!

You can, however, use the same Inventory Warehouse as the Inventory Source for multiple Ship From Locations. This is useful if you have the same SKU in multiple locations. Using multiple Ship From Locations in this way will allow inventory to deduct from the correct place.

Set Inventory Source

Enable Inventory Tracking

Before ShipStation will start deducting inventory from your products, you must enable the inventory tracking option. You can do this step before or after you set your initial stock levels.

Note

If you enable this setting before completing the basic setup process, you'll likely get an error about not having any stock.