Supplier guide · Photo storage
New stores get free hosted photo storage out of the box — no setup at all. This guide is for when you want more: your own free Firebase bucket means unlimited space and full ownership of your images. Five short steps, about ten minutes.
Firebase is Google's app platform — its Storage product hosts your photos. Open the Firebase console (sign in with any Google account) and click Add project. Name it after your store, e.g. my-store-photos. You can switch Google Analytics off when asked — it isn't needed.
On the project's home page click the </> (Web) icon — or go to Project settings → Your apps → Add app → Web. Give it any nickname, skip Firebase Hosting, and click Register app. Firebase then shows a code block starting with const firebaseConfig = { — copy the whole block. That's what you'll paste in step 5. (You can always find it again under Project settings → Your apps.)
In the left sidebar open Build → Storage and click Get started, keeping the suggested location. Heads-up: on new projects Google may ask you to switch to the Blaze (pay-as-you-go) plan first — the generous free allowance still applies, you only ever pay if you outgrow it, and a store's product photos won't.
Still in Storage, open the Rules tab, replace everything with the rules below, and click Publish. They allow product-photo uploads (images under 5 MB) into one marketplace folder — the rest of your bucket stays locked.
rules_version = '2';
service firebase.storage {
match /b/{bucket}/o {
match /marketplace_products/{path=**} {
allow read;
allow write: if request.resource.size < 5 * 1024 * 1024
&& request.resource.contentType.matches('image/.*|text/plain');
}
}
}Paste the config block from step 2 — the fields fill themselves — then test the connection.