Etsy fees explained for artists

Etsy’s fees are not hidden, but they are layered — and the layers add up faster than most artists expect. If you price a print at what feels fair and forget the stack, your margin can evaporate by the time Etsy takes its cut. Here is every fee, what triggers it, and a worked example so you can price with your eyes open.

The three fees you always pay

Every sale on Etsy carries the same three mandatory charges, regardless of what you sell.

• Listing fee — $0.20 each time you list an item. The listing renews (and charges again) when the item sells or after four months.
• Transaction fee — 6.5% of the total order, including the item price, shipping, gift wrapping, and any personalisation charge.
• Payment processing — in the US, about 3% + $0.25 per order. UK sellers pay around 4% + £0.20, and many EU countries pay roughly 4% + €0.30.

Note the trap in the transaction fee: it applies to shipping too. Charging the buyer for postage doesn’t escape the 6.5% — Etsy takes its cut of that line as well.

Offsite Ads — the fee that surprises people

Etsy advertises your listings on Google, Facebook, Instagram, and Pinterest. If a shopper clicks one of those ads and buys from your shop within 30 days, you pay an Offsite Ads fee on that order — on top of everything above.

• If your shop has always made under $10,000 in any rolling 365-day period, the fee is 15% and participation is optional — you can opt out.
• Once you cross $10,000 in a rolling 365-day window, the fee drops to 12% but participation becomes mandatory — you cannot opt out.

That asymmetry catches sellers off guard: growing your shop locks you into the program at the very moment your order volume rises.

Optional costs: Etsy Plus

Etsy Plus is a $10-per-month subscription that bundles 15 listing credits (worth $3 in listing fees) plus credits toward Etsy Ads, advanced shop customisation, and restock requests. For a small shop, the listing credits rarely justify the cost on their own — it pays off only if you actively use the marketing extras.

A worked example

Say you sell a framed art print for $40 with $6 shipping — a $46 order, US seller.

• Transaction fee: 6.5% of $46 = $2.99
• Payment processing: 3% of $46 + $0.25 = $1.63
• Listing fee: $0.20
• Subtotal of standard fees: $4.82 — about 10.5% of the order.

Now suppose that sale came through Offsite Ads at the 15% rate: add 15% of $46 = $6.90. Total fees jump to $11.72 — over 25% of the order, before you’ve paid for the print itself or the frame. On a POD product with a $20 base cost, that order is barely breaking even.

Compose, never generate. When Realform places your existing artwork onto made-to-order products, the art is yours and the copyright, credit, and income stay with you. Nothing is generated, copied, or imitated — the work is composed onto the product and made after purchase, so you remain free to license it or sell direct.

What the fees mean for your pricing

Build the fees in before you set a price, not after. A safe rule for art sellers: assume roughly 10–12% will vanish to standard Etsy fees on every order, and stress-test your margin at the 15% Offsite Ads rate too, because you don’t choose which sales it applies to.

• Price to survive the 15% ad scenario, not just the base 10–12%.
• Remember shipping is taxed by the 6.5% transaction fee — free shipping baked into the price is often cleaner.
• Track your rolling 365-day revenue so the mandatory 12% threshold doesn’t catch you unprepared.
• Compare net margin against your own store, where there is no per-sale transaction fee at all.

Etsy buys you discovery, and for many artists that traffic is worth the cut. But knowing the exact stack lets you decide deliberately — and it’s why running a fee-aware presence on your own store alongside the marketplace, with pricing handled automatically, is increasingly how artists protect their margin. Realform sits in that operational layer, keeping prices fee-aware across channels while the art stays yours.