How to Export WooCommerce Product Reviews to CSV

Product reviews are easy to overlook during routine catalog work. They are neither product descriptions nor orders, yet they carry years of customer feedback, ratings, moderation decisions, and product associations. When a store is rebuilt or audited, “we still have the products” is not the same as “we still have the reviews attached to the right products.”

A CSV gives you a reviewable working copy. Shirely exports one row per WooCommerce product review so you can inspect the association, content, rating, status, and verification flag before deciding what comes next.

What the review export contains

The CSV uses these columns:

review_id, product_id, product_sku, reviewer, reviewer_email, rating, verified, status, date, content

Together they answer the main questions behind a review:

• Which product does it belong to?
• Who submitted it, and what email is recorded?
• What star rating did it receive?
• Was it marked as a verified-purchase review?
• Is it approved, pending, spam, or otherwise moderated?
• When was it submitted?
• What did the reviewer write?

The file contains customer text and an email field. Treat it as sensitive content. Limit who can download or receive it, and follow your own privacy and retention rules.

Preserve both product references

The export includes product_id and product_sku, but they do not mean the same thing.

product_id is local to the WordPress installation. It is useful when reviewing or restoring data on the same store, but it is not a portable identity across unrelated sites. product_sku is the more useful cross-store catalog key when SKUs are stable and unique.

Before a migration, check how many review rows lack a SKU and whether every SKU resolves to the intended destination product. Do not assume matching numeric IDs prove that the products are the same.

This is also why products should be prepared before reviews. A review cannot be associated correctly if its destination product does not exist or cannot be identified.

Export for a specific job, not just “as a backup”

There are several legitimate uses for the same file:

Migration preparation

Export the reviews, prepare the destination catalog, and test a small review import against products with known SKUs. Check that dates, ratings, status, and text survive and that each review lands on the right product.

Moderation review

A spreadsheet can make it easier to examine pending or problematic content in context. Keep the status column intact so an analysis copy does not blur approved and unapproved reviews.

Content analysis

Review text can reveal repeated product questions or documentation gaps. Work from a protected copy, minimize personal fields when they are not needed, and remember that sentiment tools do not replace human judgment.

Operational archive

A dated CSV can be one component of a store backup or migration package. It is not a complete WordPress backup and should not replace database, media, and configuration backups.

A practical export and verification workflow

1. Confirm that the products in scope have stable SKUs where possible.
2. Run the review export on demand.
3. Store the original CSV unchanged in a controlled location.
4. Open a working copy and verify the row count and headers.
5. Check a sample containing approved, pending, and differently rated reviews.
6. Compare those rows with the corresponding product pages and WordPress review records.
7. For a migration, test the import on staging before moving the full set.

This is a deliberate store-data workflow. Product-review export is not one of the catalog Automation export-slot types in Shirely 1.3, so you start it when you are ready to inspect and secure the result.

What to inspect in the CSV

Choose a sample that is likely to expose problems, not simply the first five rows:

• a review linked through a stable product SKU;
• a product with several reviews;
• a review containing punctuation or non-English characters;
• a pending or spam-marked record;
• a verified-purchase review and a non-verified review;
• a longer piece of review text;
• a row for a product that has been renamed or migrated.

Make sure the rating and verified values are aligned with the right row, the status is preserved, dates are recognizable, and text has not been split into extra columns by punctuation.

For any row without a usable destination product key, stop and resolve the association before importing it elsewhere. Guessing is how credible reviews end up on the wrong product.

Reviews are not the whole migration

Review CSVs should be kept separate from products, customers, orders, and payment data. That makes the scope easier to understand and reduces accidental sharing of unrelated information.

In a catalog move, a sensible sequence is:

1. Establish the destination products and stable SKUs.
2. Verify product variations and categories.
3. Import a small review sample.
4. Check product association, rating, status, date, and content.
5. Continue only after the sample is correct.

Do not use review content as a substitute for a complete legal or operational migration plan. Your store may have separate obligations for personal data, consent, retention, or moderation.

Frequently asked questions

Does the CSV contain one row per product or per review?

One row per review. Several reviews for the same product therefore appear as several rows.

Is the verified-purchase flag included?

Yes. The verified column records the review's verification value alongside its rating and status.

Can I identify products by SKU?

Yes. The export includes both product_id and product_sku. For a cross-store workflow, a stable, unique SKU is generally safer than assuming local WordPress IDs match.

Does the export publish or approve pending reviews?

No. It records the current moderation status in the CSV; exporting a review does not change that status.

Is the CSV a complete site backup?

No. It is a working copy of review data. Keep proper database, files, and configuration backups as well.

If the file is intended for another store, review the companion process for importing WooCommerce reviews from CSV and prepare the product catalog first. The documentation explains the broader Shirely workflow.