Digital Product File Size Limitation

I need to add an audiobook to my list of products but the file size max. is 300mb. This seems excrutiatingly small considering people sell audiobooks and music on this platform.

Does anyone know of a work-around that won't effect the file quality?

300Mb is almost 10 hours of audio. In fact, with good compression you could extend that to 12-15 hours. 

How large is the file size of the book you want to sell?

I'm having this issue aswell, 300mb it's too small i need about 2gb+

What's the workaround in this situation?

I'd love info on a workaround as well.  I'm trying to sell a high definition video that's 7.5 minutes long.  I can't get it under 1GB.

If your files are this large, and you want to do this securely, you will need to use an alternative commerce solution. Squarespace is limited to 300MB per digital product.

Other platforms have much higher limits. For example:

Shopify allows you to upload a file up to 5GB.

Ecwid allows you to add as many files per product as you need. Every file can be up to 25GB.

A workaround on Squarespace is to save the large files elsewhere and then supply a text file as the digital download, containing the url of the large file and the password to access it. However, bear in mind that this link can then easily be shared online, whereas digital download links expire.

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Awful solution on a great platform. 

"We do not provide bla bla bla"... is not a great UX answer in 2020.

Just to recap how bad the selling on Squarespace is:

- No video or audio previews, just images

- 300 mb limit. Great for images (not even all of them) bad for HD video, long audio books, collections

- No different option even for a simple things like images. Info for UX designers in Squarespace - photographer selling prints and digital versions, in a few variations and for a different purposes, such as tiffs for prints, mid jpegs for social media, hi-res jpegs for other purposes. And this is just a tip of the iceberg , but not even this is implemented. 

- no ability to sell different licences such as personal or commercial. 

- no search on inventory page option for a larger collections of digital goods, 

- no filters system for tags (only category) on inventory page

- no collection ability

And this is just a few things, I could name after 3 minutes spend on inventory page. 

Yes I know you are not a dedicated "sell" platform, but since you entered that realm, please analyse UX at least for the majority of factors and implement them before proclaiming selling option.

Thanks.

@Madebyvadim This forum is not monitored for product feature requests. Those of us commenting are Squarespace customers too and we are not in a position to improve the features provided by Squarespace.

To ensure your feedback reaches the appropriate team at Squarespace it is best to raise a ticket through Customer Care. 

On 10/22/2019 at 9:06 AM, RebeccaW said:

I need to add an audiobook to my list of products but the file size max. is 300mb. This seems excrutiatingly small considering people sell audiobooks and music on this platform.

Does anyone know of a work-around that won't effect the file quality?

Could you upload to dropbox, generate a link and then use that link for download? Tip: Every dropbox link ends in a "0" and if you change that "0" to a "1" it initiates automatic download of that product anytime someone clicks the link.

I'm currently selling digital products (some up to 20GB) on Shopify, but it's still got it's woes for shop owners. I came here to see what the main issues would be if I switch over to SS. I'm curious if there's anyway to get that customer the dropbox link in an automated email after they purchase.

On 1/11/2020 at 7:16 PM, Mhossey said:

I'm curious if there's anyway to get that customer the dropbox link in an automated email after they purchase.

@Mhossey Yes this is possible, but you risk someone sharing that link with others, whereas digital download links expire. Perhaps you missed my comment above:

On 12/17/2019 at 3:51 PM, paul2009 said:

A workaround is to save the large files elsewhere and then supply a text file as the digital download, containing the url of the large file and the password to access it. 

On 12/30/2019 at 5:36 AM, Madebyvadim said:

Quote

- No video or audio previews, just images

You can easily embed third-party players (YouTube, Wistia, Vimeo, and HTML5 audio players).

Quote

- 300 mb limit. Great for images (not even all of them) bad for HD video, long audio books, collections 

If you have larger files, just provide a link to download them! Make a password-protected PDF and put the link inside, or just send the link via email. 

Quote

- No different option even for a simple things like images. Info for UX designers in Squarespace - photographer selling prints and digital versions, in a few variations and for a different purposes, such as tiffs for prints, mid jpegs for social media, hi-res jpegs for other purposes. And this is just a tip of the iceberg , but not even this is implemented. 

If you have larger files, just provide a link to download them! Make a password-protected PDF and put the link inside, or just send the link via email. 

Quote

- no ability to sell different licences such as personal or commercial. 

Make a password-protected PDF and put the license inside, or just send the license via email. 

You sound creative, @Madebyvadim so BE CREATIVE.

On 12/17/2019 at 10:40 AM, TonyDonovan said:

I'd love info on a workaround as well.  I'm trying to sell a high definition video that's 7.5 minutes long.  I can't get it under 1GB.

Try using Gumroad.com to sell your video content. They're setup to protect your digital content by tracking the IP of whomever is trying to access the download. You can even allow paid RENTAL of digital content on Gumroad. And yes— it integrates nicely within any Squarespace page/post. 

I just posted a quick example on my site: https://squareflair.com/gumroad 

Download the "paid" content to test. 

Other apps that can integrate with Squarespace that allow larger filesizes are SendOwl, Podia and Ecwid. 

SendOwl.com allows you to upload via FTP for sizes larger than 1G (trying to find the size LIMIT though)

Ecwid.com now allows files as large as 25GB! 

Podia.com has a max of 1G per file. 

Shopwired is unique— they allow you to use any third-party host and add the link to their admin system. So when purchasing, they provide the secure direct download to the externally-hosted file. https://help.shopwired.co.uk/manual/digital-downloads/selling-files-with-a-large-file-size