In July 2026, Shopify replaced smart and manual collections with a new model built on collection sources. A single collection can now combine automated rules, hand-picked products or variants, other collections, and app-provided product groups.
Matrixify does not support the new model. Its documentation and release notes cover only the old Smart Collections and Custom Collections sheets, with no support for collection sources.
Altera supports the new collections model in full, through a unified Collections data type that imports and exports every kind of source.
What are collection sources?#
A collection source is a building block that adds products or variants to a Shopify collection. Every collection is made of one or more sources, and the collection contains the combined result. There are four kinds:
- Products sources hold inclusion rules, hand-picked products, or both at once, plus exclusions. “Everything under $100, except preorder items, plus these five products” is now one source.
- Variants sources work at the variant level, so a collection can contain only the red variants or only the sizes on sale.
- Collection sources pull in the contents of other collections. This gives Shopify native subcollections: a “Sale” collection built from “Summer sale” and “Clearance” that updates when they do.
- App sources are product groups published and kept up to date by an app, like a bestseller tracker’s “Trending this week”.
Under the old model, a collection was either smart (rule-based) or manual (hand-picked), permanently, and the two could never mix. The new model removes that split entirely. Our guide to Shopify collection sources covers the full model in detail.
What Matrixify does and doesn’t do#
Matrixify can:
- Export and import collections through its legacy Smart Collections and Custom Collections sheets
- Keep working with collections that still fit the old model. Shopify carried every pre-existing collection over as a collection with a single source, so existing files behave as before.
Matrixify cannot:
- Export or import collections that combine rules with hand-picked products
- Handle exclusions (“tagged summer, except these items”)
- Handle subcollections built from other collections
- Handle variant-level collections
- Handle app-provided sources
- See new-model collections at all. Shopify hides these collections from apps that have not updated to the 2026-07 API version, so they are missing from exports entirely rather than partially.
Why this matters#
The dangerous part is not the missing features. It is that the gap is silent.
When an app has not been updated for the new collections model, Shopify does not show it an error. The app simply never sees any collection that uses the new capabilities: multiple sources, mixed rules and hand-picks, exclusions, subcollections, variant-level collections, or app sources. An export from such an app looks like a complete collections file while skipping those collections without a trace.
If you use collection exports as backups, the backup is incomplete. If you use them to migrate a store, the migration drops collections. If you use them to audit your merchandising rules, the audit is missing exactly the collections with the most structure. And nothing in the file tells you.
Until a tool announces support for the new collections model, treat its collection exports as incomplete.
How Altera handles the new collections#
Altera supported the new model from day one through a unified Collections data type. You can:
- Export every collection in the store, including how each one is built. Each source gets its own rows in the sheet, with columns for the source target, conditions, exclusions, and hand-picked products or variants.
- Import the full model: rules and hand-picks in the same collection, exclusions, subcollections, variant-level collections, and app sources.
- Edit one source without touching the rest, using the
Source Commandcolumn to update or delete a single part of a collection. - Restore backups exactly, because exports capture the complete definition of each collection, including manual sort order.
The format is the Matrixify-compatible layout you already know, with extra columns for sources. The collection fields reference documents every column, and there is a full write-up of how Altera handles Shopify’s new collections in the help center.
Frequently asked questions#
Does Matrixify support Shopify’s new collections? No. Matrixify’s documentation and release notes cover only the old Smart Collections and Custom Collections sheets. Collections that use the new capabilities are hidden from apps that have not updated to Shopify’s 2026-07 API version, so they do not appear in Matrixify exports.
Why is a collection missing from my Matrixify export? If the collection uses any new-model capability (multiple sources, rules combined with hand-picked products, exclusions, subcollections, variant-level selection, or an app source), Shopify hides it from apps that have not updated to the 2026-07 API version. The export completes without an error and the collection is simply absent.
Do my existing collection spreadsheets still work? Yes. Shopify carried every existing collection over as a single-source collection, so old Smart Collections and Custom Collections files keep working in both tools. Altera reads those same files, and its Collections data type adds the columns for sources when you need the new capabilities.
Can a spreadsheet import create subcollections or variant-level collections? With Altera, yes. A Collection source row references the child collections to pull in, and a Variants source row holds variant-level conditions or hand-picked variants. Matrixify has no way to express either.
Can I use Altera’s collections with Matrixify for everything else? Yes. Altera uses the same Matrixify-compatible spreadsheet format. You can use Matrixify for data types it supports and Altera for the new collections, market translations, metafield definitions, metaobject definitions, inventory transfers, linked product options, sales channel publishing, variant sales channel publishing, and other data types Matrixify doesn’t cover.
See our full Altera vs. Matrixify comparison for a breakdown of all the differences between the two tools, or check the FAQ for more common questions.
