How to limit the cart quantity to 1 in WooCommerce

Searching for a way to limit cart quantity to 1 in WooCommerce? In this detailed tutorial, I’ll show you step-by-step how to restrict customers from purchasing more than one product per order from your ecommerce store. The best part? The entire process is super beginner-friendly and takes less than ten minutes from start to finish.

Do you want to set restrictions to limit the cart quantity to 1 in WooCommerce?

Setting a 1-item limit is a straightforward way to control stock levels and prevent over-purchasing. It also helps to ensure fairness when you’re running promotional campaigns for new product launches and flash sales so you can give everyone an equal chance to buy.

In this in-depth tutorial, I’ll walk you through the steps to set the product purchase limit to 1 in WooCommerce to block customers from increasing the quantity beyond a single unit in the cart. This feature isn’t built into WooCommerce by default, so we’ll need to use the powerful Min/Max Quantity for WooCommerce plugin to set it up.

Ready? To start, let’s examine what it means to restrict shoppers from purchasing more than one product at a time from your online store.

What it means to limit cart quantity to 1 in WooCommerce

Limiting the cart quantity to 1 in WooCommerce means that shoppers can only add a single unit of a product to their cart for each order. This restriction applies per product and ensures that no matter how many times a customer tries to add more product units to their cart, it will only allow one instance of it.

Any type of WooCommerce store can set control inventory restrictions to 1 per customer. However, this feature is particularly handy for stores that sell:

• Exclusive products. Think: antiques, limited-edition products, designer items, custom artworks, autographed book copies, collectibles, etc.
• Time-sensitive items. Think: Concert tickets, event passes, live-streamed webinars, etc.
• Special promotions for products offered at a steep discount. Think: Flash sales, new product launches, subscription trials, Black Friday sales, etc.

If you set restrictions to limit the cart quantity to 1 in WooCommerce, it will automatically replace the previous product in situations where a customer adds the same item again. For instance, if a customer tries to add two of the same event tickets to their cart, only one will remain.

Why limit cart quantity to 1 in WooCommerce?

On the surface, setting restrictions to limit the cart quantity to 1 in WooCommerce can seem like an overly strict restraint. However, many store owners find that it allows for more granular control over product sales, inventory management, and customer experience.

Let’s explore common scenarios where setting a 1-item limit is valuable:

• Stores that sell exclusive products. When you sell unique, limited-edition, or one-of-a-kind items — think: antiques, workshops with restricted seats, unique digital products, etc., — restricting purchases to a single unit ensures fairness and can help drive up the product’s value. For example, if you sell photographs online and are offering a rare print run, you might want to ensure each customer receives only one copy to maintain the artwork’s collectible status.
• Promotional campaigns to create hype. If you’re offering a high-value item at a significantly reduced price, for example, during product launches, flash sales, or special discount promotions, restricting the cart to 1 prevents abuse. Without this limit, some customers might buy in bulk to resell at higher prices which undermines the goal of your promotions. For example, an online electronics store can choose to offer 50% off for the first 500 orders on a newly launched electronic gadget and set a cart limit of 1 to ensure the promotion benefits more people.
• High-demand products with scarce inventory. For products that are in high demand and short supply, limiting purchases to 1 per order helps prevent stockouts caused by a handful of customers who purchase in bulk and leave others empty-handed. This is slightly different from stores that limit the cart quantity during promotional campaigns, as the limits are continuous year-round.
• Subscription or membership-based products. Stores that offer exclusive memberships or products for which customers must subscribe, often choose to allow only one purchase per customer. Some subscriptions, such as digital products like online courses, consulting sessions, or exclusive webinars don’t make sense in multiples, and enforcing a limit of 1 per order helps ensure only one subscription is activated per account to avoid confusing customers.
• Stores that sell unique or complex products. Some products are designed to be individual purchases and thus require strict purchase controls. Think: Custom-made items, personalized services, unique gift bundles, products with significant production lead times, etc. Allowing customers to add multiple quantities of such products can cause issues with inventory management and order fulfillment workflows, especially if each item requires custom input or manual setup. A good example of this is jewelry stores that offer customized jewelry where customers enter engraving details.

The best plugin to limit cart quantity to 1 in WooCommerce

Min/Max Quantity for WooCommerce by The Dotstore is a simple-to-use plugin for setting precise controls over product purchase limits in your WooCommerce store. It is flexible and straightforward and makes it super easy to enforce a 1-item limit for customers’ carts.

With Min/Max Quantity for WooCommerce, you can set specific limits for both simple and variable product types. For variable products, you can restrict quantities for individual variations or the parent product. For example, it lets you limit a specific size or color of a T-shirt to 1 per order while allowing other variations in unrestricted quantities.

A quick note: Min/Max Quantity for WooCommerce is a full-featured product quantity management plugin that enables you to finetune the number of units of a product customers purchase from your store. This means in addition to enabling you to set a 1-product per order limit, you can set minimum, maximum, step quantity increments, change the default quantity, and much more.

Min/Max Quantity for WooCommerce’s standout features

Here’s why Min/Max Quantity for WooCommerce is the best-choice plugin for limiting the cart quantity to 1 in WooCommerce. With it, you can:

• Set per-product purchase limits. It enables you to configure purchase restrictions on individual items (both simple and variable products) to make sure that specific items can only be added to the cart once.
• Apply rules at the category or global level. You can easily set 1-item limits across entire product categories or your entire store with global rules. It enables you to set exclusions to prevent the rules from being applied to specific products. This saves time and ensures that limits are applied consistently.
• Control product quantity on the cart level. In addition to product-specific limits, the plugin allows you to set cart-level restrictions. For instance, you can configure the cart to allow only one total product, regardless of its type.
• Customize error messages. You can tailor the error messages to be displayed in situations where customers try to exceed the 1-item limit. This avoids confusing customers during checkout which can lead to abandoned carts. For instance, if a customer tries to add two items to their cart, you can add error messages to say, “You can only purchase one unit of this product per order.”
• Set dynamic role-based rules. It allows you to enforce 1-item limits for certain customer roles while leaving others unrestricted. This is great for wholesale, VIP, or B2B stores. For instance, if you run a hybrid wholesale and retail store, you can allow wholesale customers to purchase without limits while restricting retail customers to 1 item.
• Schedule purchase limits for specific times. You can schedule restrictions for certain time periods, for example, apply 1-item limits during flash sales or Black Friday promotions. Once the sale ends, the limits are automatically removed. A common example is for stores that want to run a 24-hour flash sale to promote a particular product and make sure customers can only purchase one unit per order during that time frame.

How to limit cart quantity to 1 in WooCommerce

In this section, I’ll walk you step-by-step through the process of setting limits to constrain the number of products customers can purchase per order to 1 using the powerful Min/Max Quantity for WooCommerce plugin.

Let’s get started.

Visual learner? Check out the video walkthrough of the steps to limit the cart quantity to 1 in WooCommerce. Otherwise, read on for in-depth written instructions.

How to limit cart quantity to 1 in WooCommerce (globally)

1. Add the free or premium version of the Min/Max Quantity for WooCommerce plugin to your website.
2. To configure global quantity limits, navigate to your WordPress dashboard, then go to Dotstore Plugins → Min/Max Quantity → Settings → General.
3. From here, you can specify the storewide minimum order quantity, i.e., for all products as 1 in your WooCommerce store.
   
4. Once you’ve set the desired quantity limits, click Save Changes at the bottom of the page to finalize the settings.

How to limit cart quantity to 1 in WooCommerce (per product and product category)

1. In your WordPress dashboard, go to Dotstore Plugins → Min/Max Quantity → Add New.
2. Enter a name for the quantity limit rule (this is for your reference).
   
3. Find the “Advanced Rules” section and expand the first collapsible tray.
4. Here, you can set the conditions that will control how the rule works.
   • To apply the quantity limit to specific products, select “Product” or “Variable Product” (as applicable) from the left dropdown, then choose the applicable product names from the right dropdown.
     
   • To apply the rule to product categories, select “Category” from the left dropdown and pick the relevant categories from the right dropdown.
5. You can also define additional conditions in this section, such as user roles, shipping zones, stock levels, and more.
   
6. Next, go to the “Actions” section to configure the maximum quantity limit setting to 1 and customize the quantity selector button if needed.
   
7. When everything is configured, click “Save Changes” at the bottom to apply your rule.

How to limit cart quantity to 1 in WooCommerce based on user role

1. Go to Dotstore Plugins → Min/Max Quantity in your WordPress dashboard and click “Add New”.
2. Enter a name for the quantity limit rule (note that this is for internal reference only).
   
3. In the “Advanced Rules” section, expand the first collapsible tray.
4. If you want to restrict quantities based on specific users, select “User” from the left dropdown. To set limits for specific user roles, choose “User Role” and specify the role.
5. Define the conditions that will control how the rule operates:
   • To set limits for certain products, choose “Product” from the left dropdown and select the relevant products in the right dropdown.
     
   • To apply limits to product categories, select “Category” from the left dropdown and pick the appropriate categories from the right dropdown.
6. You can also include additional rules, such as shipping methods, product attributes, stock levels, and more.
   
7. Finally, move to the “Actions” section to configure the maximum quantity limit setting to 1 and customize the quantity selector button if needed.
   
8. Press “Save changes” at the bottom of the screen once done.

How to create custom error messages for orders that exceed the cart quantity limit of 1 in WooCommerce

1. Navigate to Dotstore Plugins → Min/Max Quantity → Settings → Messages in your WordPress dashboard.
2. Customize the error messages to inform customers when their carts exceed the cart quantity limit of 1.
   
3. Press Save Changes to apply the updates.

How to display quantity rules on cart and product detail pages

1. Navigate to Dotstore Plugins → Min/Max Quantity → Settings → Display Rules in your site’s admin dashboard.
2. Choose where the quantity rules table should appear on product detail pages — either before or after the Add to Cart button.
   
3. Optionally, add a custom heading or text above the table for extra clarity.
4. Once finished, press Save Changes to apply the updates.

Check out the below example of how the rules appear on a product detail page in a demo WooCommerce store:

Here’s what it looks like on the cart page of the same demo store.

Ready to limit cart quantity to 1 in WooCommerce?

In this tutorial, I’ve shown you how to limit cart quantity to 1 using the powerful Min/Max Quantity for WooCommerce plugin.

With Min/Max Quantity for WooCommerce, when you set a product’s purchase limit to 1, it will block customers from increasing the quantity beyond a single unit in the cart. If a customer tries to add the same product again, only one will remain and they will see a notification explaining that they are prevented from buying more than one item per order.

As an added bonus, along with setting a 1-product per order limit, Min/Max Quantity for WooCommerce makes it possible for you to change the default product quantity, define minimum, maximum, step quantity increments, and much more. (Plus, the plugin is incredibly easy to use).

Get Min/Max Quantity for WooCommerce and set restrictions to limit cart quantity to 1 in ten minutes or less!