Glossary
barcode product SKU
A barcode product SKU is a stock item identified by its barcode, used as the primary key of a product database. In Open Food Facts the barcode is the primary key, giving about 4.7 million keyed records with created and last-modified timestamps.
What is barcode product SKU?
In Open Food Facts the barcode product SKU is not a field among many - it is the primary key of the whole database. Each product SKU is identified by its barcode, which yields about 4.7 million uniquely keyed records (the source profile counts 4,697,746 products indexed). Every record carries created and last-modified timestamps, so you can tell when an item entered the catalog and when it was last touched. That design supports two workflows at once: scan-time lookups of a single SKU, and bulk joins where a retailer's barcode-columned sales data attaches to nutrition attributes such as Nutri-Score or the per-100g nutrient profile. For beverage and spirits work in particular, the keyed rows give distillers and soft-drinks analysts a common spine to hang attributes on.
Why does barcode product SKU matter when choosing a dataset?
When a product dataset lacks a barcode key, matching it to anything commercial means fuzzy text matching on names and pack sizes, and every mismatch silently corrupts an analysis. With the barcode as key, a scan event, a receipt line and a nutrition record all point at one row. The buyer's residual risks are coverage and freshness: a crowd-built catalog may simply lack your SKUs, and stale rows can mislead. Open Food Facts mitigates the second problem by exposing created and last-modified timestamps on each of its 4,697,746 indexed products, letting you filter out records untouched since before your range of interest.
How do you evaluate barcode product SKU in a data source?
- Check that the barcode really is the key: Open Food Facts documents granularity as per barcode product SKU, one keyed row per item.
- Check record count and timestamps: 4,697,746 products are indexed, each with created and last-modified timestamps you can use for staleness filtering.
- Check what attributes ride on the key: Nutri-Score and the per-100g nutrient profile attach to the same keyed rows, which is what makes the join worthwhile.
- Check delivery format: nightly full exports let you take the keyed table wholesale instead of calling per item.
Related terms
Adjacent entries in the same product-data cluster:
Frequently asked questions
What does 'barcode product SKU' mean in Open Food Facts?
It means the barcode identifies each stock item and acts as the database's primary key. About 4.7 million products are keyed this way (4,697,746 indexed), each with created and last-modified timestamps.
Can I join my sales data to barcode product SKUs?
Yes - if your transactions carry barcodes they join directly to Open Food Facts' keyed rows, which also hold Nutri-Score and per-100g nutrient values. Nightly full exports provide the table in bulk.
How current is a barcode product SKU record?
Each record exposes created and last-modified timestamps, so you can exclude SKUs untouched since a cutoff date. Bulk refreshes arrive through nightly full exports of the full keyed table.
Datasets containing this field
Datasets containing barcode product SKU
6 datasets carry barcode product sku in the catalog. Open one, count the fields, judge for yourself.
American Beverage Association - Industry Data & Insights
British Soft Drinks Association (BSDA)
FAOSTAT Food and Agriculture Data
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