WooCommerce Catalog Change Guard

Compare two WooCommerce Store API snapshots and review price changes, stock changes, new products and missing-product candidates before sending alerts or updating downstream systems.

An incomplete capture should not look like a product deletion. Catalog Change Guard flags incomplete, empty or suspicious snapshots and marks missing products as unconfirmed when removal interpretation is unsafe.

What you receive

Each completed run produces one JSON audit in the default dataset, an AUDIT.json backup and a readable REPORT.html in the run's key-value store.

The audit includes exact price deltas, stock changes, new products, removal candidates, duplicate SKU warnings, currency/price-scale changes and data-quality issues. Duplicate product IDs cause the run to reject the input.

Who this is for

Use this Actor if your collector, scraper or integration already supplies catalog snapshots and you want a validation step before alerts or commercial decisions. This Actor compares supplied data. It does not fetch websites, log into stores, schedule catalog collection or modify products.

Quick start

1. Open Input and use the synthetic example, or supply two snapshots from the same store and collection scope.
2. Keep the maximum run charge at $0.10 or higher and start the Actor.
3. Read the audit in Output. Open Storage to view REPORT.html or download AUDIT.json.
4. For the next audit, supply the previous capture and a newer capture in a new run.

Input example

{
  "previousSnapshot": {
    "sourceId": "my-store",
    "scope": "all-public-products",
    "capturedAt": "2026-09-03T12:00:00Z",
    "complete": true,
    "products": [{
      "id": 1, "type": "simple", "name": "Running tee", "sku": "TEE-1",
      "is_in_stock": true,
      "prices": {"price": "2500", "currency_code": "USD", "currency_minor_unit": 2}
    }]
  },
  "currentSnapshot": {
    "sourceId": "my-store",
    "scope": "all-public-products",
    "capturedAt": "2026-09-04T12:00:00Z",
    "complete": true,
    "products": [{
      "id": 1, "type": "simple", "name": "Running tee", "sku": "TEE-1",
      "is_in_stock": false,
      "prices": {"price": "2200", "currency_code": "USD", "currency_minor_unit": 2}
    }]
  }
}

This example reports a price change from $25.00 to $22.00 and a stock change. Supply prices as integer strings in minor units: "2500" with currency_minor_unit: 2 means 25.00.

Limits and supported format

• Up to 1,000 products per snapshot and 2 MB combined input.
• Both snapshots must have the same sourceId and scope, timezone-aware timestamps and an explicit complete boolean. The current timestamp must be newer.
• Products match by numeric product ID. Start a new baseline after store migrations or ID changes.
• Supported fields include id, type, name, sku, is_in_stock and prices. Raw WooCommerce REST v3 exports or arbitrary scraper output require mapping to this format.
• Optional priceAlertPercent ranges from 0 to 1,000; default 25.

Interpreting missing products

Missing products remain unconfirmed when collection is incomplete, the current capture is empty, the product count falls below 70% of the previous count, or serious data-quality issues make removal interpretation unsafe. Otherwise, missing products are removal candidates. They are never independently verified deletions.

Completeness is declared by your collector and cannot be independently verified here. Only supplied variants can be checked. Variable/grouped parent prices are excluded from individual-variant comparisons. Findings are observations for review, not instructions to delete or reprice products.

Pricing

$0.10 per completed audit, with platform usage included. One audit compares both snapshots and includes all detected changes up to the stated limits. There is no separate startup fee or per-product charge. Invalid input and budgets below one audit do not trigger the completed-audit event.

Results are stored before the audit event is charged. Recovery checks existing delivery and billing state. An uncertain charge is not automatically retried; this may leave an audit unbilled. Start a new run for a new comparison, rather than editing and resurrecting an old run.

Data and support

The comparison makes no AI/model calls and sends no catalog data to other external services. Input and results are stored by Apify under its platform access and retention rules. Download results you need to retain.

For help, open an issue on this Actor with the run ID, expected behavior and a small sanitized example. Do not post credentials or confidential catalog data in a public issue.