Magento catalog price rules is one of the greatest built-in marketing tools the platform provides. They allow you to implement discounts and run sale campaigns more easily without any third-party implementations, same as cart price rules.
So, in this article, you will learn everything you need to know about Magento 2 catalog price rules, how to configure them and what differentiates them from the cart price rules.
Post Contents [hide]
Without any further ado, let's dive in and define what stands by catalog rules.
What is Magento Catalog Price Rule?
Magento catalog price rule is a set of conditions based on customer group, product attributes, and other conditions you use to assign discounts to products in the catalog.
If the product falls under conditions of the catalog prices rule, the discount is applied to it and displayed directly in the catalog.
Due to that, catalog price rules don't use coupon codes and customers see discounts while browsing through your store. This encourages them to purchase more.
So, how do you set them up?
How to Create Magento 2 Catalog Price Rules?
Creating catalog price rules in Magento 2 is really simple and doesn't require any special knowledge. Magento developers made these options very straightforward and intuitive.
To set up Magento catalog price rules you have to complete certain steps. But first, go to Marketing > Promotions > Catalog Price Rule and press the Add New Rule button.
1. Fill out rule information
- Enter Rule Name, Description and Activate it.
- Choose the Websites catalog price rule will be applied on.
- Define the Customer Groups you want to create this rule for.
- Set the Date From and To and define the time frame during which the Magento catalog price rule will be enabled on your store.
- Set rules Priority.
Note: if one product falls under conditions of more than one Magento catalog price rule, the system applies the rule with the higher priority.
2. Create rule cnditions
In this section, you define under what circumstances to apply the rule. They are based on product attributes such as category, SKU, material and any other attributes you have on your store.
In other words, you define what products to apply the Magento catalog price rule for in the Conditions section. If you want to apply it for all products in your catalog, leave this section empty.
Note: if you don't see product attribute in conditions dropdown, add product attribute to sales rules conditions.
This way you can add multiple conditions in one rule based on several product attributes.
3. Define catalog price rule actions
The Actions section in the Magento catalog price rules configuration defines how the discount is applied to the products you set in Conditions a moment before.
- Choose how to Apply a discount. You can choose one of several options.
- Enter the Discount Amount which will be calculated in either percentage or currency depending on the method you choose above.
To make these methods more comprehensive we'll provide some examples. Discounts are calculated based on the amount you enter, so let's assume we want it to be 20.
Apply as a percentage of original — discount is calculated by subtracting a certain percent of a product price.
e.g. the price of this bag is $34. Then $27.20 is the price of the bag with the subtracted 20% discount.
Apply as fixed amount — discount is calculated based on subtracting fixed amount from the price of the product.
e.g. the original price is $74. Then $54 is the price of the bag with the subtracted fixed $20 discount.
Adjust final price to this percentage — final price is the percentage of the price you enter in the Discount Amount field.
e.g. the original price of the product is $38. Then $7.60 is 20% of the original adjusted price.
Adjust final price to discount value — final price is the fixed amount you set in the Discount Amount field.
e.g. the original price of the product is $45. Then $20 is the $20 you set a fixed price for this product.
- If you don't want other rules to be applied after the rule switch Discard subsequent rules to Yes.
Once you Save the catalog price rule, don't forget to Apply it and check on the storefront.
The above solution is now clear, but there is one more option to consider. You can also create Magento catalog price rules programmatically. So, it's up to you what solution to choose for your specific case.
Catalog Price Rule vs Cart Price Rule
Both catalog and cart price rules are a great way to manage discounts in your store. Though their purpose is mentioned in their title, some people still find it confusing to differentiate between them.
As we've already mentioned, Catalog Price Rules are applied in catalog, on product pages, before a product is added to the cart. Correspondingly, customers can see discounted prices while browsing through the catalog.
Note: the discounts are calculated once the product falls under conditions of the rule, no coupon code is used.
Catalog price rules are based only on product attributes and are applied to the product price. However, the price is displayed already with a discount in the shopping cart and checkout while the discount amount is not mentioned.
Cart Price Rules, on the other hand, are applied in the shopping cart based on shopping cart attributes like quantity or price in the cart and products attributes. Customers can't see the discount before adding products to the shopping cart.
Unlike catalog price rules, cart rules have or don't have a coupon. They allow you to create specific or auto-generated coupons customers can apply on checkout. But if you don't specify a coupon the rules will be applied automatically.
It makes discount amounts visible in the shopping cart and checkout.
Besides, it is also important to note that cart price rules allow you to apply a discount to the shipping amount which catalog rules don't provide.
Now you should be able to find the difference between catalog and cart price rules without effort. It doesn't matter which one you choose for your sales campaign. Both are proved to perform really well.
How to Use Catalog Price Rules in Magento 2?
Since we've already covered it multiple times, there is no need to repeat what catalog price rules are used for. They allow you to manage discounts in your store. Customers can see what is on sale while looking through the categories.
However, discounted products are scattered around your store and sometimes customers might not see the products that really need are on sale.
It would be more convenient to have them all in one place, don't you agree?
So, it is a good practice to create a sale category and gather all discounted products there.
If you want to save time on adding and deleting products from the sale category, you can create a dynamic category for this.
Check out how to create dynamic sale category in Magento 2 based on catalog price rules or other conditions and optimized your catalog management.
