# Handle

> A handle is the readable part of a Shopify URL, generated from the title and used to identify a product, collection or page.

- Source: https://storestandards.com/glossary/handle/
- Also called: URL handle
- Updated: 2026-08-14
- Author: Ana Sousa, Design lead, Store Standards

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In `/products/navy-wool-overcoat`, the handle is `navy-wool-overcoat`.

## Where it comes from

Shopify builds it from the title the first time you save: lower case, spaces
to hyphens, punctuation dropped. The same happens for a collection, a page and
a [product option](https://storestandards.com/glossary/product-option/) value. After that it stops
following the title.

Rename a product from "Navy Overcoat" to "Navy Wool Overcoat" and the handle
stays as it was. That is deliberate, and it is the right default.

## Changing one costs you

The handle is the URL. Change it and the old address is gone, along with any
ranking it had built and any link pointing at it.

Shopify creates a redirect for you when you edit a handle in the admin, and
that redirect is the only thing standing between you and a dead link. Do not
delete it. An import that rewrites handles in bulk makes no redirects at all.

## Where it goes wrong

Handles get a size or colour in them, from a title like "Navy Overcoat
Medium". The product then reads as one [variant](https://storestandards.com/glossary/variant/) in its
own URL, and the other sizes have nowhere sensible to live.

The other one is duplicate products competing on near-identical handles.
Shopify appends a number, so you end up with `navy-wool-overcoat-1` on a
[sales channel](https://storestandards.com/glossary/sales-channel/) somewhere, splitting the traffic
between two pages that should have been one.

## Related terms

- [Product option](https://storestandards.com/glossary/product-option/): A product option is one axis a customer chooses along, such as size or colour. Shopify allows three, and their combinations make the variants.
- [Variant](https://storestandards.com/glossary/variant/): A variant is one buyable version of a Shopify product, such as the blue medium. Stock, price and barcode all live on the variant.
- [Sales channel](https://storestandards.com/glossary/sales-channel/): A sales channel is somewhere your Shopify products are on sale, such as your website, a marketplace, or a till in a shop.