Most sellers know Etsy takes "about 10%." The real number, on a typical print-on-demand order with Offsite Ads attributed, is closer to 30% of the sale price before you've paid for the product itself.
Here's every fee, what triggers it, and the arithmetic on real orders.
The fees, one at a time
Listing fee — $0.20 per listing
Charged when you publish a listing, and again every four months when it auto-renews. Also charged per item when a multi-quantity listing sells: sell 3 of one listing and you pay $0.20 × 3 in renewal fees.
Charged in USD regardless of your shop currency.
Transaction fee — 6.5%
Applied to the full order total, which includes:
- Item price
- Shipping you charge
- Gift wrap
- Personalisation charges
The shipping inclusion catches people out. Charging $6 shipping means paying $0.39 in transaction fees on the shipping alone.
Payment processing fee — varies by country
Etsy Payments takes a percentage plus a flat fee, set by the seller's country:
| Country | Rate |
|---|---|
| United States | 3% + $0.25 |
| United Kingdom | 4% + £0.20 |
| Germany | 4% + €0.30 |
| Canada | 3% + C$0.25 |
| Australia | 3% + A$0.25 |
Applied to the order total including shipping and tax in most jurisdictions.
Offsite Ads fee — 12% or 15%
This is the one that reshapes your margin. Etsy advertises your listings on Google, Meta, Pinterest and elsewhere. If a buyer clicks one of those ads and purchases within 30 days, you pay:
- 15% of the order total if your shop made under $10,000 in the last 12 months
- 12% if you made over $10,000 — but participation becomes mandatory and cannot be turned off
Under $10,000, you can opt out. Above it, you can't. There's a fee cap of $100 per order.
Not every order triggers this — typically 5–20% of orders, depending on niche. But when it does, on a $25 item, that's $3.75 gone.
Regulatory operating fee — 0.25% to 1.1%
Charged in specific countries (UK, France, Italy, Spain, Turkey and others) to cover digital services taxes. Applied to the order total. Small, but it's real and it's easy to forget when you're pricing.
Currency conversion — 2.5%
If your shop currency differs from your bank's currency, Etsy takes 2.5% on conversion. A UK seller listing in USD pays this on every order.
Avoid it by listing in your own currency where the market allows.
Etsy Ads (onsite) — your chosen daily budget
Different from Offsite Ads. This is the internal search advertising you control, billed per click. Covered in the Etsy Ads guide.
Etsy Plus — $10/month (optional)
Credits for listings and ads, plus some shop customisation. Rarely worth it below significant volume; do the arithmetic on what you'd actually use.
Worked example 1: POD t-shirt, no Offsite Ads
- Sale price: $24.00
- Shipping charged: $0.00 (free shipping)
- Printify base cost: $9.50
- POD shipping: $4.75
| Line | Amount |
|---|---|
| Revenue | $24.00 |
| Listing fee | −$0.20 |
| Transaction fee (6.5%) | −$1.56 |
| Payment processing (3% + $0.25) | −$0.97 |
| Product cost | −$9.50 |
| POD shipping | −$4.75 |
| Net profit | $7.02 |
Margin: 29%. Healthy.
Worked example 2: same shirt, Offsite Ads attributed
| Line | Amount |
|---|---|
| Revenue | $24.00 |
| Listing fee | −$0.20 |
| Transaction fee (6.5%) | −$1.56 |
| Payment processing | −$0.97 |
| Offsite Ads (15%) | −$3.60 |
| Product cost | −$9.50 |
| POD shipping | −$4.75 |
| Net profit | $3.42 |
Margin: 14%. Same sale, half the profit.
Worked example 3: digital download
- Sale price: $6.00
- Product cost: $0.00
| Line | Amount |
|---|---|
| Revenue | $6.00 |
| Listing fee | −$0.20 |
| Transaction fee (6.5%) | −$0.39 |
| Payment processing | −$0.43 |
| Net profit | $4.98 |
Margin: 83% — and 71% even with Offsite Ads attributed. This is why digital products are the highest-margin thing on Etsy, and why digital downloads deserve a place in most shops.
What this means for pricing
Three practical conclusions:
1. Price assuming Offsite Ads. Not on every order, but blend it in. If 15% of your orders trigger a 15% fee, add roughly 2.3% to your cost base. Better: price so a fully-attributed order still clears your minimum acceptable margin.
2. Free shipping isn't free, but it's usually correct. Etsy's search favours listings with free shipping to US buyers, and buyers filter for it. Build the shipping cost into the item price — you'll pay 6.5% + 3% on it either way, so the fee difference is negligible and the ranking benefit isn't.
3. Low-price items are structurally bad. The $0.20 listing fee and the flat payment-processing component are fixed. On a $6 item they consume 10.5% before percentages apply. On a $30 item, 1.9%. Bundle small items into packs.
Full pricing methodology in how to price Etsy listings and print-on-demand profit margins.
The fee that isn't a fee
The largest cost in most POD shops isn't Etsy's cut — it's the time spent on production work that doesn't scale. Manually rendering mockups, writing listings one at a time, re-exporting images when a supplier changes dimensions.
Etsy's 30% is fixed and non-negotiable. Your own hourly cost isn't. Automating the repetitive parts — bulk mockup rendering, templated listing copy, batched uploads — is the only line in the whole calculation you fully control.
Fee arithmetic you should run once, properly:
- Take your three bestselling listings
- Calculate net profit both with and without Offsite Ads attributed
- If the with-ads figure is under 15% margin, raise the price or cut the product cost
- Check whether you're paying 2.5% currency conversion unnecessarily
- Bundle anything under $10 into a multi-item pack
- Re-run the numbers every time your supplier changes prices — they don't email you