The media library
The media library holds every file in your store. The admin describes it as “Every image, video and file in your store — browse them, organise them, and reuse them anywhere.”
That last word is the important one. A file uploaded while editing a product is not trapped in that product; it is in the library, and it can be used again in a blog post, a page, or a category banner without uploading a second copy.
How you find things
Section titled “How you find things”Three tools, and they are meant to be combined rather than chosen between:
| Tool | What it narrows by |
|---|---|
| Search | The file name. |
| Type | Image, Video, Audio, Document, Other. |
| Tags | Whatever meaning you have given the file yourself. |
Search and type are free — they work on facts the file already carries. Tags are the only one that depends on you, and they are the only one that can express something the file does not already know: which campaign it belongs to, which season, which photographer.
The habit worth forming early
Section titled “The habit worth forming early”A media library is pleasant at fifty files and unusable at five thousand, and the difference is almost entirely whether anything was tagged on the way in.
File names arrive from cameras and phones (IMG_4821.jpg) and nobody renames them later. If a
set of photos belongs to something — a campaign, a supplier, a shoot — tag it while you are
uploading it. It costs seconds then and it is the difference between finding it and re-shooting
it later.
Deleting is not free
Section titled “Deleting is not free”A file in the library may be in use in several places at once — that is the point of a shared library. Removing one is not a local act.
Before deleting, the safer question is not “do I still need this?” but “where is this still being shown?”
What this page does not say
Section titled “What this page does not say”- It does not give click-paths. This screen has no verified screenshot in this help centre, and we do not print steps we have not checked against the admin as it is today.
- It does not state upload size limits or accepted file types. Both are enforced by the screen and both can change; the screen is the authority rather than this page.
- It does not say whether deleting a file in use is prevented or merely allowed. That has not been checked against the current screen, so the cautious advice above is offered as caution rather than as a description of behaviour.