Product data for the Kaufland marketplace: EAN, mandatory attributes, copy, images and checklist

The principle: one EAN, one product page

Kaufland separates product data (what the product is) from offer data (price, stock, delivery time). There is one set of product data per product, and every seller's offer hangs off it. Kaufland builds the visible description from several sources: product data services, sellers, manufacturers and its own product data team. According to the API documentation, some of your data may therefore not be used. For your content this means:

• The product already exists: you search the Seller Portal by EAN and only create your offer; your own copy and images are then not strictly needed. Do check the existing data and whether it infringes third-party rights.
• Changes apply to everyone: updated product data changes automatically for all sellers. If you delete your own product data, other sellers' offers may be hidden.
• No second listing: the same product under several EANs is prohibited (EAN spam), even with different images, copy or prices. Kaufland removes such offers without notice, up to closing the account. Exception: the same product shipped from several warehouses.

Mandatory attributes: six for everything, more per category

For all categories Kaufland requires EAN, category, title, description, manufacturer and image. If one is missing, the product data is invalid and not displayed. Products sit only in the lowest level of the category tree; if your CSV file names a higher category or none, Kaufland assigns one itself. On top come category-specific details, mostly from EU and German law, for example:

The Seller API returns exactly which attributes a category needs, including conditional attributes that only apply when other attributes have certain values. Many attributes such as colour accept only values from fixed lists; dimensions need a number and a unit, such as 2.5 m. Recommended attributes such as colour, material and size are optional, but Kaufland builds variants and filters from them automatically. Products missing them are left out of the variant group.

Title, description and short description

Kaufland automatically shortens longer titles in some places. A good example from the guidelines: “Sharp R-982STWE combination microwave with infrared grill”. Synonyms belong in the short description, not the title. Overall, data should follow Kaufland's “five Cs”: complete, correct, clear, consistent and concise.

Images, alt texts and video

• First image: the whole product cut out on a white background, no packaging as the main image.
• Size and count: at least 1024 px on the longer side, 2048 px for zoom; 5 to 10 images; at most 10 MB per file.
• Not allowed: text, logos, test seals, collages, frames, shadows, price or delivery details, and accessories not included in the delivery.
• Alt texts: since June 2025 Kaufland requires an image description for every product image. In the CSV file, image link and alt text sit in their own columns; an alt text without an image link causes an error.
• Video: MP4 with H.264, at most 180 seconds, 15 to 60 seconds recommended.

Sources disagree: the guidelines list PNG, JPG, WEBP, TIFF and GIF as image formats, the API documentation only JPG, PNG and GIF; the safe choice is JPG or PNG. For videos the guidelines say 100 MB, the API 200 MB; plan with 100 MB. There is also free rich content (text, images, videos, FAQ below the description), uploaded in the editor, as JSON or via the API, not by CSV.

Does Kaufland have a content score?

We found no publicly documented content score in the official sources. Instead, the Seller Portal offers reports: “EANs not found”, “Invalid items” (mandatory attributes missing), import errors and an improvement export that sets your attribute values against the relevant attributes of the category. According to Kaufland, gross disregard of the guidelines can restrict your sales activities.

Upload: Seller Portal, CSV file or API

• Seller Portal: search by EAN, create a new product if there is no match. Good for a few products.
• CSV file: category-specific template, semicolon as separator, UTF-8, EAN and locale (de-DE) in every row; several images in several columns with the same name. Can also be fetched automatically from a URL at a fixed time.
• Seller API: one request per product; a full send replaces your previous data, a partial update only the attributes sent. CSV files through the API: at most 30 per day and 1.5 GB per file.

Kaufland checks automatically and sometimes manually; for files this can take hours or days, according to the API documentation. A product only becomes visible once it has an offer.

Why product data is rejected or blocked

1. A mandatory attribute is missing, the file has format errors, or values are outside the allowed list.
2. Wrong category, so legally required details are missing.
3. Images with watermarks, URLs or promotional text; unclear image or text rights.
4. No proof of brand authorisation, trademark or authenticity concerns.
5. Product safety: a match with a public EU product safety alert (RAPEX), missing certificates, non-compliant health claims.
6. Missing GPSR contacts: Kaufland excludes such offers from sale.

According to the API documentation, a block on a product also hits the offers of other sellers with the same EAN.

GPSR: manufacturer and EU responsible person

Under Art. 19 points (a) to (d) of Regulation (EU) 2023/988 (GPSR, applicable since 13 December 2024), an online offer names the manufacturer with postal and electronic address, for manufacturers outside the EU the responsible person in the EU, information identifying the product including a picture, and warnings and safety information in the national language. This article is not legal advice.

On Kaufland you maintain these contacts since 15 May 2026 on a new page in the Seller Portal, ideally as a manufacturer rule covering all existing and future products of a manufacturer. Required are name, full postal address and an email address or website. Warnings, safety data sheet and CE certificate are product attributes. More in our guide GPSR details on marketplaces.

kaufland.de and the other Kaufland countries

One registration gives you nine Kaufland marketplaces: besides kaufland.de also Austria, Czechia, Slovakia, Poland, France, Italy, Spain and the Netherlands. You create product data only in each country's national language, so German for kaufland.de. Optionally Kaufland translates your data automatically; you then upload only offers in the target country. We found no separate title or image rules per country in the official sources.

Checklist before uploading

Where AI helps

AI mainly saves routine work: bringing titles to the right length, writing descriptions without prohibited content and checking before upload whether anything is missing. Whether EAN, category, fibre details or energy label are right is for you to check. With the ecomDNAI Marketplace Content Creator you get title and description in German plus square image sets to Kaufland's specifications, always from a real product photo and with a check before export. The Marketplace Optimizer measures an existing offer by title length, image count, description and EAN.