Marketplace fees are structurally different per platform, which is why comparing headline percentages misleads. The comparison that matters is the all-in cost of selling YOUR product at YOUR price on each channel, and the fee categories below are how to build that number honestly. (Exact rates change and vary by category and region; always confirm against each marketplace’s current published schedule before pricing.)
The five fee categories that stack
1. Sale commission. Amazon calls it a referral fee, eBay a final-value fee, Etsy a transaction fee, all are a percentage of the sale (often including shipping), varying by category. This is usually the biggest line.
2. Payment processing. Sometimes bundled into the commission (Amazon, eBay’s managed payments), sometimes itemized separately (Etsy’s payment processing on top of its transaction fee). Bundled versus itemized changes how comparable two “percentages” are.
3. Listing and subscription costs. Etsy charges per listing; Amazon’s professional plan is a monthly subscription; eBay offers store tiers that trade monthly cost for lower final-value fees and more free listings. Low-volume sellers and high-volume sellers can rationally choose different structures on the same marketplace.
4. Advertising pressure. Not a mandatory fee, but on crowded marketplaces organic visibility for new sellers is limited enough that ads function as a de-facto cost of doing business. Model a realistic ad percentage per channel rather than pretending zero.
5. Fulfillment expectations. FBA fees if you use Amazon’s logistics (the FBA versus FBM math), shipping subsidies where buyers expect free delivery, returns costs where the marketplace’s policy is more generous than yours would be.
Building your real comparison
For each SKU you plan to cross-list, one row per marketplace:
All-in cost = commission % + processing + (listing or subscription amortized per sale) + realistic ad % + fulfillment delta
Three things emerge every time sellers run this honestly:
- Category rules dominate. The same marketplace can be your cheapest channel for one category and the most expensive for another.
- Your own store wins on fees and loses on acquisition. No commission, but every visitor is bought or earned, the portfolio logic balances both.
- One price cannot be right everywhere. A price with healthy margin on your store can be underwater after a marketplace’s stack. The operational conclusion is per-channel pricing: a base price plus a channel markup that absorbs each platform’s stack. Unifystock applies exactly that as a rule, set the markup once per channel, and every listing prices itself correctly from one base.
Fee hygiene: the audits worth running
- Reconcile from payout reports, not order totals: the itemized deductions are where fee surprises surface, eBay’s payout mechanics here.
- Recheck after category changes: recategorizing a product can silently change its commission rate.
- Watch the annual fee updates: marketplaces adjust schedules regularly; a one-point commission change across a catalog is real money, and your channel markups should move with it.
- Count refunds properly: some fees return on refund, some do not; high-return categories should price the difference in.
Common questions
Which marketplace has the lowest fees overall?
For most sellers, their own store, then it depends entirely on category and structure fit. A seller doing high volume in one eBay category with a store subscription can beat a casual Amazon seller’s rate, and vice versa. Run the row math on your SKUs.
Should I raise my marketplace prices to cover fees?
Usually yes, buyers on each marketplace compare against that marketplace’s price level, not your store’s. Per-channel markups are standard practice, not a trick; keep them rule-driven for consistency.
Do fees justify skipping marketplaces entirely?
Fees buy customer access. The question is whether the marginal sale at marketplace margin beats no sale, for most catalogs, yes for at least one or two major channels, chosen deliberately.
How do fee changes affect synced pricing?
If your prices flow from one base with channel rules, a fee change is a one-line markup edit applied everywhere at once, which is the whole point of doing it by rule.
Price each channel on its own economics
One base price synced everywhere in real time from $49/month with unlimited orders, and per-channel markup rules on the plans above. See pricing.