Knowledgebase
How to add downloadable products in Magento
One of the product types that can be added in Magento is the downloadable product type. You can use this to sell audio and video files, pictures and various other files that can be downloaded directly from your site. To do this, in the admin panel go to Catalog>Manage Products, on the page that opens click on the Add Product button, and on the following page select Downloadable Product from the Product Type drop-down menu. Most of the settings are configured in the same way as when adding simple products. Here we'll outline the differences.
To configure the options specific to the downloadable product, on the product settings page click on the Downloadable Information tab on the left. A couple of panels with settings will appear on the right. From the settings in the Links panel you can upload the downloadable items that will make up the downloadable product. If you want to, you can upload many items within a single product (e.g. songs in a music album). In the field for Title you can type a title to be displayed above the links for the items on the product details page on the frontend. The option Lines can be purchased separately is enabled by default which means that if you upload more than one item within the product, each of the items can be purchased separately. Disabling this option will require the customers to buy all items (if more than one). To add a downloadable item click on the Add New Row button that's in the table in the Links panel.
A few options will appear in the table. In the field for Title type the name of the item. In the field for Price you can specify the price of the item; you can configure this option only if the setting Lines can be purchased separately is enabled. If you offer each item separately with its own price, you should set the base price from the Prices tab on the left to 0. If items can't be bought separately, you can only set the base total price. From the Max. Downloads option in the table you can set a limit to the number of times the purchased item can be downloaded. By default, it's set to 0 which means there's no limit.
If you want guests to be able to buy and download the item, set the Shareable option to Yes. You also have to allow guests to check out with downloadable products. You can do that from System menu>Configuration>Catalog button in the Catalog section on the left>Downloadable Product Options panel on the right>Disable Guest Checkout if Cart Contains Downloadable Items option set to No. From the last two columns in the table you can upload a sample (optional) and the actual file. Just mark the radio button File and use the button with the three dots to locate the file on your local computer. Then click on the Upload Files button.
Another thing that differentiates a downloadable product from the simple product type is that you don't have to manage its stock. So on the page with the product settings click on the Inventory tab on the left, then on the right unmark the checkbox Use Config Settings that's under the Manage Stock drop-down menu and set the drop-down menu to No. When you're done with the settings don't forget to click on the Save or on the Save and Continue Edit button.
For some more details and screenshots you can read the tutorial on how to create and manage downloadable products in Magento.