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If you're thinking about selling on Etsy, then you’re likely left with an important question: How much does it cost?
While there are plenty of things to take into consideration, one thing you must evaluate with any online marketplace is the true cost of selling through that channel. In this blog, we’ll cover the various fees associated with selling on Etsy, plus tips for adding Etsy to your multichannel sales strategy.
With humble beginnings in a Brooklyn apartment, Etsy is now one of the leading eCommerce marketplaces on the web, offering sellers the potential to reach higher revenues and new audiences.
Set up your eCommerce website with Wix and start selling today.
What is Etsy?
Etsy is a global eCommerce marketplace with a primary focus on handmade, vintage and artisanal items. It’s a hotspot for people looking to snag—or sell—one-of-a-kind goods you wouldn’t find in most big-box stores.
Established in Brooklyn, New York in 2005, Etsy has become one of the top eCommerce marketplaces, distinguishing itself from larger players like Amazon and eBay through its specialized product offerings. According to Statista, the platform had over 95 million active buyers in 2023 and 7.5 million active sellers, with revenue topping $2.6 billion.
Selling on Etsy is one avenue you can take toward diversifying your eCommerce income. Multichannel selling is an effective way to reach new audiences beyond those only visiting your website.
Mandatory Etsy seller fees for 2024
You may have seen Etsy claim that “All it takes is 20 cents to get started.” While that’s not totally off, there are several other required fees to take into account.
Type of fee | Amount |
|---|---|
Listing fee | $0.20 per item |
Transaction fee | 6.5% |
Payment processing fee | 3%+$0.25 per transaction |
Offsite ads (high volume sellers) | 12% |
Currency conversion | 2.5% |
Regulatory fees | Cost varies |
Listing fees: $0.20 per item
This is where the “20 cents” comes from. For every item you publish on Etsy.com, you must pay a flat fee of $0.20 (USD). You’ll be charged this fee whether or not your product actually sells, and your account will be charged as soon as you hit “publish” on a listing.
Keep in mind that there are other quirks regarding Etsy listing fees:
Auto-renewal: If your item hasn’t sold after four months, Etsy will automatically renew your listing (read: charge you another $0.20). You can opt out of auto-renewal from your account, which means you’ll have to manually repost a listing once it has expired.
Multi-quantity listings: If a customer buys multiple units of the same product, then you’ll be charged $0.20 per unit (unless your units are sold as a single pack). For instance, say that you list a T-shirt for sale and a customer decides to buy 10 of them in different colors. You will be charged a grand total of $2 in listing fees, or $0.20 per additional unit after the first T-shirt sold, which you already paid a listing fee for.
Multipacks and pre-bundled items: When multiple products are prepackaged together and sold as a single product, you will only be charged one listing fee per pack.
Private listing: On Etsy, you have the option to list certain items for sale just for a particular buyer to see. These types of listings will be subject to the same $0.20 listing fee.
Transaction fee: 6.5%
A transaction fee is what you pay whenever you make a sale on Etsy. It’s currently 6.5% of the total sales price and includes the cost of shipping, gift wrapping and product personalization. (However, on your Etsy bill, your transaction fee will appear as two different line items: transaction fees deducted from your product price and transaction fees deducted from your shipping cost.)
For sellers in the U.S. and Canada, this fee is based on the pre-tax total.
Payment processing fee: 3% + $0.25 per transaction
The processing fee covers the costs of handling credit card or bank transactions when using Etsy Payments. Sellers in 52 eligible countries (including the U.S. and Canada) have access to this tool, which accepts PayPal, Google Pay, Apple Pay, credit cards and debit cards.
Etsy Payments charges a flat rate ($0.25 USD) and a percentage of the final sales price (3%), including tax and shipping, for sellers in the U.S. Outside of the U.S., processing fees vary by country.
Offsite Ads (for high-volume sellers): 12%
Offsite Ads are ads that Etsy places on behalf of its merchants to drive more business to its marketplace. Offsite Ads appear on search and social media destinations (think selling on Instagram), as well as other select media sites.
All sellers are automatically enrolled in Offsite Ads—and if your Etsy shop has earned more than $10,000 in the last 365 days (as calculated on the first day of the month), you are required to stay enrolled. You will be charged 12% of the total sales price whenever someone purchases your product from an Offsite Ad. This advertising fee will never exceed $100 USD. You will also remain enrolled for the lifetime of your shop, even if you fall below the $10,000 threshold on a later date.
The fine print: If a customer clicks on an Offsite Ad that features one of your listings, then buys something from your shop within 30 days of that click, this will be attributed to an Offside Ad. For example, say that an Offsite Ad features a $25 lamp you sell. If someone clicks on the ad and decides to buy a $500 table you offer, you’ll be charged the 12% fee even though the ad was for your lamp. Now, let’s say that within that same 30-day period, the customer purchases your $25 lamp—that too will incur the 12% fee. In addition to this, you will still be responsible for paying shipping transaction fees or other applicable fees.
Currency conversion fee: 2.5%
If your company attracts international business and uses Etsy Payments, you will be charged a 2.5% currency conversion fee on your total sales price (including the cost of shipping, gift wrapping and personalization). Put another way, this fee will be applied whenever the currency on your shop’s listing is different from the currency of your Payments account.
Regulatory operating fees: cost varies
Merchants located in select countries outside the U.S. are subject to regulatory operating fees in addition to the standard Etsy fees. The regulatory operating fee is a fixed percentage of your total sales price (including the cost of shipping, gift wrapping and personalization). This fee ranges from 0.32% to 1.1%.
Optional Etsy fees for 2024
On top of these base costs, Etsy offers optional services that carry their own costs.
Etsy Ads: cost varies
Etsy offers onsite ads to boost the visibility of your items. Fees for these ads are “pay per click” (PPC), meaning that you incur charges any time a person clicks on your Etsy Ad, whether or not they proceed to buy your product.
The cost per click is determined based on an auction system. You can set a daily budget, which essentially tells Etsy how much you’re willing to pay for a single click on your ad. When you’re first starting out, you’ll be allowed a maximum daily budget of $25. Etsy will recalculate this limit on a weekly basis for Etsy Payments users, and on a monthly basis for users who aren’t enrolled in Etsy Payments.
Offsite Ads (for lower volume sellers): 15%
If your Etsy shop has generated less than $10,000 in sales over the last 365 days (as calculated on the first day of the month), you can opt out of the Offsite Ads program. Sellers below this threshold are charged a higher fee (15%) for Offsite Ads than those who exceed the threshold (12%).
Shipping labels: cost varies
If you choose to leverage Etsy Shipping, you can save up to 30% on shipping costs from USPS, FedEx and Canada Post. You can also print labels directly from your Etsy account. Doing so automatically marks items as shipped and adds a tracking number to the order—both of which can help boost your seller ranking and earn you Etsy’s Star Seller badge.
In-person selling fee: $0.20
If you have a physical store and use Square as your POS system, you can sync your Etsy listings with your store inventory. The benefit of this is that if someone purchases your product in stores, your listed quantity on your Etsy page will be updated automatically.
There’s no extra charge beyond the usual listing fees when your Etsy listings are synced with Square. However, if you sell an item via Square that’s not synced with your Etsy listings, you’ll be charged a separate $0.20 fee that shows up as a “Square manual” fee on your Etsy bill.
Square charges additional processing fees for each transaction, which varies by the type of sale.
Etsy Plus: $10 per month
Etsy Plus is an optional subscription service that offers perks, such as:
15 listing credits each subscription cycle
$5 in Etsy Ad credits each subscription cycle
Etsy Shop customization
Ability to accept restock requests from your shop
Discounts on web domains, custom shipping boxes, business cards and more
An example of an Etsy bill
To put all this into perspective, let’s pretend you sell snazzy dog collars. They cost you $10 to make and you sell them on Etsy for $20. Your customer pays $5 in shipping and $1 in tax, bringing their total price to $26.
You have sold less than $10,000 in the last 365 days, but you choose to pay for Offsite Ads for extra exposure.
Here’s what your bill shakes out to be at the end of the transaction.
Etsy takes a total of $6.61 from your sale, or 25% of the total amount that your customer paid at checkout.
The bottom line: Etsy should supplement—not replace—your online store
Etsy, no doubt, has its perks and can bring lots of business your way. But there’s also no denying that selling on Etsy comes with a cost (albeit, so does selling on Amazon, selling on eBay, selling on Facebook Marketplace, and selling on any other marketplace).
These costs present their own challenges:
Smaller margins: As the hypothetical example above shows, the costs can add up quickly, which means you may not be able to price your items competitively if you want to maintain a decent margin.
Rising fees: As on any marketplace, policies and fees can change at any time. Etsy has increased its transaction fees twice since 2018. The most recent change was in April of 2022, prompting a temporary strike among sellers.
Your brand is secondary: Customers come to Etsy for Etsy. Read: they trust Etsy, which is why Etsy is a great destination for both buyers and sellers. On the flip side, customers may not pay as much attention to the individual shop that they’re purchasing from, making it harder for you to establish brand recognition and earn repeat business.
Popularity means more competition: Etsy’s rapid growth has attracted more sellers than ever, which means your products may not stand out unless you invest in paid placements.
To avoid becoming over-reliant on Etsy and having to pay fees for every sale you make, leverage Etsy as a complement to your online store. You can start an online store with a no-hassle platform like Wix eCommerce, which includes built-in tools for inventory and price management, marketing, multichannel sales and more.
It’s never too early to start creating an ecosystem that belongs 100% to your brand, which is why it's so important to know how to create a website. You can control the messaging, visuals and the overall user experience, helping customers to remember your brand name and be loyal to you—not just Etsy.
3 tips for success in selling on Etsy
With that said, here are some tips for striking the right balance between Etsy and your online store:
01. Curate your Etsy selection
Just because you sell on Etsy doesn’t mean you have to make all of your products available at once. Consider offering a limited selection of top sellers or product lines that you believe would perform well on Etsy. Doing so can help you to better define Etsy’s role in your overall strategy, run controlled experiments and strategically optimize your Etsy listings. As a way of introducing Etsy shoppers to your brand, you can experiment with sets or sampler packs that showcase the breadth of your brand’s offering.
02. Invest in an amazing customer experience on your site
When it comes to your online store, you’ll want to make sure that it’s in tip-top shape so that when an Etsy buyer (or any buyer, for that matter) wanders to your site, they won’t be disappointed. Make sure your product pages, images and descriptions are up to snuff. Ensure that your products are easy to find. Incorporate videos, social proof and other creative content that draws your shoppers closer to your brand.
03. Optimize your listings
Whether on Etsy or your branded site—every listing you publish should be carefully crafted. Take the time to tailor your product description to your target buyer, which may differ from channel to channel. Offer a variety of high-quality product photos, and don’t skimp out on product attributes. One surprisingly easy mistake to make is misclassification when listing a product to multiple channels. Every marketplace has its own way of categorizing products; double-check that you’re using the best category and subcategory for Etsy, and that you provide all the details that customers expect when browsing items here.
All in all, Etsy’s unique and enthusiastic audience could be a great fit for your brand. But it goes without saying that you’ll want to monitor your costs closely and have a plan for building up your brand both on and off Etsy.
Read also: How to start a business, eCommerce vs marketplaces
Sell on Etsy FAQ
Is it worth it to sell on Etsy?
Whether or not it's worth it to sell on Etsy depends on your individual circumstances and goals. Etsy is a great platform for selling handmade, vintage and craft items, but it's not a get-rich-quick scheme. It takes time and effort to build a successful Etsy shop. However, if you're willing to put in the work, you can make a good living selling on Etsy.