Published 2026-06-09 · 5 min read · By Satsuki Okazaki

Etsy POD seller fees explained: every fee, every percentage (2026)

Etsy publishes its fees clearly, but they're scattered across eight Help Center pages. This is the complete picture in one place — every line that comes off your $24 t-shirt before you see a dollar.

The four fees Etsy charges every POD seller

Fee	Amount	When charged
Listing fee	$0.20 per listing	When you publish or auto-renew (every 4 months)
Transaction fee	6.5% of the item price + shipping you charge	On every sale
Payment processing	3% + $0.25 (US); varies by country	On every sale
Offsite ads (mandatory above $10K/year)	12% of the sale	Only on sales attributed to Etsy's offsite ads

Plus optional: Etsy Ads (you set the budget, separate from offsite), Pattern subscription, Etsy Plus subscription. None of those are unavoidable like the four above.

Worked example: $24 Bella+Canvas tee, US buyer, no offsite ads

Retail price                    $24.00
- Vendor base (Printful 3001)   $12.95
- Vendor shipping (US)          $4.99
- Etsy listing fee              $0.20
- Etsy transaction fee (6.5%)   $1.56
- Etsy payment processing       $0.25 + 3% × $24 = $0.97
- Etsy offsite ads              $0.00 (toggle off)
                                ─────
Net profit                      $3.33  (13.9% margin)

That's the calculation in one form. Now the gotchas.

The four traps every newcomer falls into

1. Forgetting the transaction fee applies to shipping you charge

If you charge $5 shipping on a $24 item, Etsy's 6.5% transaction fee is calculated on $29, not $24 — that's an extra $0.33 you didn't budget for.

2. Triggering offsite ads at the worst time

Once your trailing 12-month sales hit $10K, offsite ads become mandatory at 12% on every sale Etsy attributes to its ad network. On a $24 item with already razor-thin margins, that's usually enough to push you into a loss. Either reprice everything or close the listings that drive offsite traffic.

3. Foreign exchange you didn't notice

When a UK buyer pays £19 for your $24 listing, Etsy converts at a rate that's typically 2-4% worse than mid-market — silently eating margin. PODProfit's multi-currency view shows this explicitly.

4. Listing renewal fees

Etsy charges $0.20 every 4 months per listing whether or not it sold. With 200 listings, that's $40 every 4 months ($120/year) before you sell anything. Cull dead listings.

How to calculate it for your specific listing

Open the calculator, set marketplace = "Etsy", and the four fees above are itemized in the breakdown. Toggle the "Include Etsy offsite ads (12%)" checkbox to see the worst-case scenario before you list.