Insert Multiple Catalog Items at Once, With Part Numbers Generated Automatically

Some of the most valuable product improvements are not new capabilities. They are the removal of repetition. Adding items to a Catalog one row at a time, clicking the same command again and again, waiting for each Part Number to be assigned, is exactly the kind of repetition that adds up when you are building or updating a large Catalog.

With the August 2026 update, Catalogs support inserting multiple items in a single operation.

It Works the Way Your Spreadsheet Instincts Expect

The feature mimics the conventional spreadsheet insert-rows operation in Excel and other tools. Select several rows, right-click the target location, and choose Insert {number} items above or Insert {number} items below. The menu number reflects how many rows are selected, so if you highlight five rows, the menu offers to insert five items, making it faster to add multiple catalog items without repeating the same action.

This matters more than it sounds. Engineers coming from Excel do not want to relearn basic data entry. When the fastest path in OpenBOM matches the muscle memory they already have, adoption stops being a training problem.

Part Numbers Are Generated in the Same Operation

Here is the part that goes beyond spreadsheet mimicry. If a Part Number generator is configured, OpenBOM generates Part Numbers for the inserted items during the same operation. Five new rows arrive with five valid, rule-compliant Part Numbers already assigned. No manual numbering, no copy-paste of identifiers, no window where an item exists without an identity.

And if you change your mind, Undo removes the inserted group in one action, not five separate undos.

Why We Did It

Part Number discipline is one of the topics I write about most, because identity is where clean product data starts and where messy product data begins. Every manual step between “I need new items” and “these items have valid Part Numbers” is an opportunity for a typo, a duplicate, or an unnumbered placeholder that lives in the Catalog for months.

Multi-row insert with automatic Part Number generation closes that gap. The bulk operation saves clicks, which is welcome. But the real value is that speed and discipline stop competing with each other. The fastest way to add items to a Catalog is now also the way that guarantees every item is born with a correct, generated identity. When the easy path and the right path are the same path, data quality takes care of itself.

How It Works

1. Open a Catalog.
2. Select the number of rows you want to insert.
3. Right-click the row where the new items should be added.
4. Choose Insert {number} items above or Insert {number} items below.
5. OpenBOM adds the selected number of new items. If a Part Number generator is configured, Part Numbers are generated for the inserted items in the same operation.
6. Use Undo to remove the inserted group if needed.

Conclusion

Multi-row insertion makes building and updating larger Catalogs faster, especially when adding multiple new parts at once, and automatic Part Number generation ensures every new item starts life with a valid identity. Less clicking, cleaner data, and a workflow that feels like the spreadsheet you know, running on the structured data model spreadsheets never had.

REGISTER FOR FREE and check how OpenBOM can help: https://bom.openbom.com/sign-up

Best, Oleg