What Etsy actually charges, and what is left of a $20 sale

A $20 sale does not put $20 in your account, and it does not put $18 either. Etsy takes its cut in four or five separate places, and because they arrive at different moments — some at listing, some at sale, some at payout — most sellers never see them added up. Here they are, added up.

The rates below are the ones Etsy publishes for a US shop paid in dollars. They change, and they differ by country and by payment currency, so treat the arithmetic as the shape of the thing and check your own numbers in your shop's payment account.

Every fee, in the order it happens

1. 1Listing fee: $0.20 when you list, and another $0.20 every time that listing renews after a sale or after four months. A listing that sells ten times costs $2 in listing fees alone.
2. 2Transaction fee: 6.5% of the order total — and the order total includes what the buyer paid for shipping and gift wrap, not just the item.
3. 3Payment processing: a percentage plus a flat amount, set by country. In the US it is 3% plus $0.25 at the time of writing.
4. 4Offsite Ads: 12% or 15% of the order when the sale came from an ad Etsy bought. Under a certain annual revenue you can switch it off; above it, it is mandatory.
5. 5Currency conversion, if your bank account is in a different currency from your shop: 2.5% on the way out.
6. 6Regulatory operating fee, in some countries: a small percentage on top, charged because of local digital-services taxes.

A $20 order, worked through

Item $20, no shipping, US shop, Offsite Ads not involved. Listing $0.20. Transaction 6.5% = $1.30. Processing 3% + $0.25 = $0.85. Total fees $2.35, so $17.65 lands. That is about 12%.

Now the same order through Offsite Ads at 15%: another $3.00, and $14.65 lands — 27% gone. This is the number that surprises people, and it is why two shops with the same revenue can have very different months.

The three sellers forget

• The transaction fee applies to shipping. Charging $6 postage that costs you $6 still costs you 6.5% of the $6.
• The renewal listing fee. Auto-renew is on by default, so every sale quietly costs $0.20 more than the fee schedule suggests at first reading.
• Refunds. Etsy returns the transaction fee but the processing fee and the listing fee stay spent. A refunded order is not a neutral event.

What to do with the number

Work out your own average fee percentage from three months of real payouts — total deposited, divided by total sold — rather than from the published rates. Then price from that number. Most digital shops land between 12% and 20% once Offsite Ads are averaged in, and a shop that prices as though fees are 6.5% is working for about a fifth less than it thinks.

Then keep it per order rather than per month: a spreadsheet with the item, the fees and what actually landed tells you which products carry their fees and which ones only look like they sell.