Etsy takes more than the 6.5% everybody quotes. Not because anything is hidden — every number here is on Etsy’s own fee page — but because the fees stack, and two of them are charged on money you never keep. Here is every one of them, worked through on a single $38 order, twice.
Where these numbers come from
Everything below is Etsy’s published rate as of September 2026, taken from Etsy’s own fees page and payments policy, not from another blog. Fees change, so check the source before you make a decision on them — I’ve linked it at the bottom.
One thing I’m not doing is pretending I have Etsy payouts to show you. I don’t sell on Etsy and I can’t — Etsy Payments doesn’t operate in my country, so Etsy won’t let me open a shop at all. What I do run is a silver jewelry store of my own, where I pay the same kinds of fees to different companies and watch them eat the same margin.
The five fees, plainly
| Fee | Rate | Charged on |
|---|---|---|
| Listing fee | $0.20 | Every listing, every 4 months, and again each time one sells |
| Transaction fee | 6.5% | Item price plus shipping and gift wrap |
| Payment processing (US) | 3% + $0.25 | The full amount the buyer pays |
| Offsite Ads | 15%, or 12% once you pass $10,000 in sales | Only orders attributed to an offsite ad. Capped at $100 per order |
| Etsy Ads | Your daily budget | Optional, on-site, you set the cap |
The one that surprises people is the third column of row two. The 6.5% transaction fee applies to shipping as well as to the item. Etsy charges you a percentage of the postage your buyer paid for.
Worked through: a $38 necklace with free shipping
Free shipping means the postage is baked into the $38, so the buyer pays $38 and that is the number every fee is calculated on.
| Buyer pays | $38.00 |
| Listing fee | − $0.20 |
| Transaction fee, 6.5% | − $2.47 |
| Payment processing, 3% + $0.25 | − $1.39 |
| Etsy’s total cut | − $4.06 (10.7%) |
| Shipping label | − $5.60 |
| Mailer, box, insert, tape | − $1.10 |
| Left before materials and your time | $27.24 |
So Etsy’s share is about 10.7%, and the real hole in a $38 order is the $6.70 of shipping and packaging you absorbed by calling it free. That is the same arithmetic I ran on my own shop in the free shipping post, in a different currency, and it lands in the same place.
The same order, charging $6 shipping
Now the buyer pays $38 for the necklace and $6 for postage — $44 total. Watch what Etsy does with that extra $6.
| Buyer pays | $44.00 |
| Listing fee | − $0.20 |
| Transaction fee, 6.5% of $44 | − $2.86 |
| Payment processing, 3% + $0.25 | − $1.57 |
| Etsy’s total cut | − $4.63 (10.5%) |
| Shipping label | − $5.60 |
| Mailer, box, insert, tape | − $1.10 |
| Left before materials and your time | $32.67 |
You charged $6 for shipping and kept $5.43 of it. Etsy took 57 cents of the postage — 6.5% transaction fee plus 3% processing on money that goes straight to the carrier.
That is not a reason to avoid charging shipping. Charging it still leaves you $5.43 better off per order than absorbing it. It is a reason to stop thinking of the shipping line as neutral: on Etsy, postage is taxed at roughly 9.5% before it reaches the carrier.
The fee that can double everything: Offsite Ads
Etsy advertises your listings on Google, Facebook, Instagram and Pinterest. If a buyer arrives through one of those ads and orders within 30 days, Etsy charges 15% of the order — 12% once your shop has passed $10,000 in sales.
On our $38 free-shipping order, that is another $5.70:
| Ordinary order | Offsite Ads order | |
|---|---|---|
| Etsy’s total cut | $4.06 | $9.76 |
| As a share of the order | 10.7% | 25.7% |
| Left after shipping and packaging | $27.24 | $21.54 |
Two things worth knowing before you panic about it:
- If your shop makes under $10,000 a year, Offsite Ads is optional and you can switch it off. Above $10,000 it is mandatory, at the lower 12% rate.
- It only charges on orders it actually produced. A 15% fee on a sale you would not otherwise have made is a customer acquisition cost, and 15% is not a bad one. A 15% fee on a repeat buyer who would have found you anyway is pure loss — which is the real argument for getting people onto an email list.
The listing fee is not $0.20 once
This is the fee that quietly multiplies for anyone with a big catalogue. That $0.20:
- is charged when you first list the item
- is charged again every four months, automatically, whether or not it sold
- is charged again each time an item sells, to renew the listing
- is charged per quantity — sell three of the same item in one order and you renew three times
A shop with 200 listings that renew three times a year pays around $120 a year before a single sale. That is not a lot of money, but it is a fixed cost, and fixed costs are the thing beginners never put in their pricing.
What Etsy actually costs you, as one number
| Situation | Etsy’s share of the order |
|---|---|
| Ordinary order, US seller | ~10.7% |
| Ordinary order, UK seller (incl. regulatory fee) | ~11.5% |
| Order attributed to Offsite Ads, under $10k | ~25.7% |
| Order attributed to Offsite Ads, over $10k | ~22.7% |
Note the last line of that caption, because it matters more than anything else here: the flat fees hurt small orders disproportionately. On a $38 order the two flat fees are 1.2% of the total. On an $8 order they are 5.6%. If you sell cheap items, Etsy’s effective rate on you is much higher than the headline, and raising your average order value does more for your margin than any listing tweak.
Three things to do with this
- Put the real percentage into your pricing formula. Not 6.5%. Around 11% for an ordinary order, and decide deliberately whether you are pricing to survive a 25% Offsite Ads order too.
- Check whether Offsite Ads is on and whether you can turn it off. Under $10,000 in annual sales, it’s your choice — make it a choice rather than a default.
- Look at your average order value before you look at anything else. The flat fees mean two $19 orders always cost you more than one $38 order.
Sources: Etsy’s fees and payments policy, read 4 September 2026. Payment processing rates vary by the country your bank account is in — check yours rather than assuming the US rate.
Questions people ask about this
How much does Etsy take in total?
On the worked example in this post — an ordinary $38 order in the US — Etsy’s published fees come to about 10.7% of the order. That is the $0.20 listing fee, the 6.5% transaction fee and 3% + $0.25 payment processing.
If the same order arrives through Offsite Ads, add 15% of the order value on top (12% once a shop passes $10,000 in annual sales).
Is the transaction fee charged on shipping too?
Yes — this is the part that surprises people. Etsy’s 6.5% transaction fee applies to the item price plus the shipping and gift wrap you charge, not the item alone.
So the money you collect purely to hand to a courier is money you also pay a fee on.
Can I turn Offsite Ads off?
Only above a threshold. Shops under $10,000 in annual sales cannot opt out; the fee is 15% when an order is attributed to one of those ads. Above $10,000 the rate drops to 12% and opting out becomes possible.
The fee is capped at $100 per order, and it only applies when the ad actually gets the credit for the sale.
How much should I add to my price to cover Etsy fees?
Work backwards from what you want to keep rather than adding a flat percentage. If you need to keep $34 on an item, the price has to carry the listing fee, 6.5% of everything the buyer pays, and 3% + $0.25 of the total — and it should survive an Offsite Ads order without going negative.
These are Etsy’s published rates for 2026 and payment processing differs by country, so check yours before pricing against them.
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