Notification

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Certification [certification] attribute

Use the certification [certification] attribute to describe certifications required by local regulations, such as energy efficiency ratings and CO2 class, associated with a product. To show your product with a supported certification, provide a supported combination of authority [certification_authority], name [certification_name], and code [certification_code].

In this article


When to use

Optional Optional for products that require certain information to be shown in your Shopping ads or free listings, for example due to local regulations.

Merchants in Germany are legally required to display the CO2 emission class for new vehicles. For Merchants in France, this is optional. Markets not mentioned here explicitly don’t require emissions class to be displayed.
Certain product groups advertised on Shopping ads and free listings in the EU, EFTA, or UK must be displayed with energy efficiency labels.

You may be required to show the EU energy efficiency class on your Shopping ads and free listings. Use the certification [certification] attribute and its certification code [certification_code] sub-attribute for energy labels for product groups that must be displayed with energy efficiency labels. Google will use EPREL code to look up the appropriate energy efficiency label and show it on Shopping ads and free listings. For example:

An icon depicting energy efficiency class rating.

Note: If you can’t provide EPREL code yet, and have energy efficiency information only in a form of the rating itself, you can temporarily use all 3 energy efficiency class [energy_efficiency_class] attributes until the end of the transition period in April 2025. During the transition period, Google will render the appropriate energy efficiency label based on information provided in energy efficiency class [energy_efficiency_class] attributes. However, this method may not be fully accurate or compliant, so prioritize switching to certification [certification] attribute as soon as you can.

Sub-Attributes

This attribute uses the following sub-attributes:

  • Authority [certification_authority] (Required): The authority or certification body responsible for issuing the certification. At this time, we support the following values:
    • "EC" or “European_Commission” for energy labels in the EU
    • ADEME” for the French CO2 emissions class for vehicles
    • BMWK” for the German CO2 emissions classes for vehicles
  • Name [certification_name] (Required): The name of the certification. At this time, we support the following values:
    • "EPREL", which represents energy efficiency certifications in the EU European Registry for Energy Labeling (EPREL) database.
    • Vehicle_CO2_Class” for the overall CO2 class of a vehicle
    • Vehicle_CO2_Class_Discharged_Battery” for the CO2 class of a vehicle with a discharged battery
  • Code [certification_code] (Sometimes Required): The code of the certification. For example, for the EPREL certificate with the link https://eprel.ec.europa.eu/screen/product/dishwashers2019/123456 the code is 123456. The code is required for European Energy Labels. Not required for Vehicle ads.
  • Value [certification_value] (Sometimes Required): The value of the certification. This field is ignored for certifications that require a certification code, like EPREL, but can be provided for specific certifications where a code isn't applicable. Specifically, the value of the appropriate CO2 Emission Class is required when listing vehicles in some countries. For details, refer to the Vehicle ads overview.

Format

Follow these formatting guidelines to make sure Google understands the data you're submitting.

Learn when and how to submit your product data in English

Type Unicode characters (Recommended: ASCII only)
Repeated field Yes
File format Example entry
Text feeds

Format the attribute header by including the sub-attributes you’re submitting. Include certification [certification], and then, in parentheses, add the names of the sub-attributes that you want to submit separated by a colon ( : ). Don't use quotation marks.

The authority [certification_authority] and name [certification_name] sub attributes are always required.

For example, to submit 3 sub-attributes authority [certification_authority], name [certification_name], and code [certification_code], submit the attribute header:

certification(certification_authority:certification_name:certification_code)

Example header and values:

For EPREL: certification(certification_authority:certification_name:certification_code)

EC:EPREL:123456

For Vehicles: certification(certification_authority:certification_name:certification_value)

ADEME:Vehicle_CO2_Class:C

If you don't include the sub-attributes in the attribute header, we’ll assume that your values include 3 sub-attributes in this order:

  1. Authority [certification_authority]
  2. Name [certification_name]
  3. Code [certification_code]
If only some of your products have all sub-attributes values as required by the attribute header, you still need to use colons ( : ) as separator placeholders for the empty / non-specified sub-attribute values.
XML feeds

<g:certification>
  <g:certification_authority>EC</g:certification_authority>
  <g:certification_name>EPREL</g:certification_name>
  <g:certification_code>123456</g:certification_code>
</g:certification>

<g:certification>
  <g:certification_authority>ADEME</g:certification_authority>
  <g:certification_name>
    Vehicle_CO2_Class
  </g:certification_name>
  <g:certification_value>C</g:certification_value>
</g:certification>

To format your data for Content API, you can read the Content API for Shopping resource.

Note: To ensure that this product data attribute gets recognized by our system correctly, remember to submit your data source file in a format that we support.

How to encode

The following example illustrates how to specify certification information using structured data. The example specifies an EPREL energy efficiency label for an LED.

{
  "@context": "https://schema.org/",
  "@type": "Product",
  "sku": "1234-5678",
  "image": "https://example.com/led.jpg",
  "name": "LED",
  "description": "Dimmable LED",
  "gtin14": "12345678901231",
  "mpn": "WH1234",
  "brand": {
    "@type": "Brand",
    "name": "ExampleLightingBrand"
  },
  "hasCertification": {
    "@type": "Certification",
    "issuedBy": {
      "@type": "Organization",
      "name": "European_Commission"
    },
    "name": "EPREL",
    "certificationIdentification": "123456"
  },

  "offers": {
    "@type": "Offer",
    "url": "https://example.com/led",
    "itemCondition": "https://schema.org/NewCondition",
    "availability": "https://schema.org/InStock",
    "price": 2.30,
    "priceCurrency": "EUR"
  }
}

Minimum requirements

These are the requirements you need to meet to show your product with a supported certification. If you don’t follow these requirements, you will find a warning in the “Diagnostics” tab. No products will be disapproved due to not meeting the minimum requirements:

  • Provide a supported combination of Authority, Name and Code.

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