FOR PEOPLE SELLING THE SAME ITEM IN MORE THAN ONE PLACE

One item. Every channel. See where the money actually lands.

Enter what an item cost you and what you would sell it for, once. This compares what eBay, Etsy, Amazon, Mercari, your own store and a direct sale each leave you after their fees — plus Reverb, switched off until you turn it on because it only applies to musical instruments and audio gear — including the per-listing fees and monthly plans that flat “X% fee” comparisons skip — then applies each channel’s return rate so a high-return marketplace cannot win on a completed sale and lose you money in the real mix. When you sell more units on one channel than another, it also ranks expected monthly cash, not just the single sale. It divides what you keep by how many days you expect that channel to take, so a slower no-fee sale does not automatically beat a faster marketplace. Then it asks the question fees alone cannot answer: how often does it actually sell there, and what is one listing worth per month of shelf once you count that. Everything runs in this page; nothing is uploaded.

Already cross-listing everywhere? This tool vs. Vendoo — different jobs, and most resellers want both.

Running inventory across ten-plus marketplaces already? This tool vs. List Perfectly — same split: List Perfectly runs the catalog, this decides where a new item belongs first.

Posting through a browser extension instead? This tool vs. Crosslist — same split: Crosslist posts the listing everywhere, this decides where it belongs first.

Been opening each marketplace’s own fee calculator instead? Here is what that comparison misses — and why you should still check theirs before you price the listing.

Your item

If it does not sell

These apply to every channel. Anything a particular channel does differently — a higher price on Etsy, no postage on a local sale — goes in that channel’s own panel below the table.

Where to sell it

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Rank by
Same item on every channel, ranked by expected keep after returns unless you turn that overlay off.
Channel Price Fees You keep After returns Return drag Margin Return on cash Gives up Monthly keep Days to sell You keep / day Break-even price Orders to cover plan Price to match best Price for target profit

Break-even price is how low you can list before the sale costs you money — your floor when you discount, and it differs by channel because the fee shapes do. It is shown in red where your current price is already under it. Return on cash is profit against what you actually laid out to source, pack and ship; fees come out of the sale rather than your pocket, so they are not counted as invested. It reads “—” when nothing was invested. Monthly keep is that per-sale profit times the sales you expect on this channel. Leave the per-channel field blank to use the shared monthly-orders figure; fill it in when one channel actually sells more than another. A monthly plan is spread over that same number, so a $39 store plan on 20 sales is $1.95 a sale, not $0.39. You keep / day is what that sale leaves you divided by the days you expect it to take. A no-fee local sale can still lose if the item sits for weeks while a marketplace sells next week. Days are your estimate — the shipped numbers are illustrative starting points, not a marketplace’s sell-through. After returns is the expected keep once some share of orders come back — return postage, units you cannot list again, and fees the channel does not refund. Return drag is the gap between a completed sale and that expected keep. Orders to cover plan is the minimum whole-order volume needed to recover a channel’s monthly subscription from this item’s profit before that plan. “—” means the item’s unit economics cannot recover the plan at any volume; “0” means the channel has no monthly plan.

Transparent arithmetic from the rates you entered — not any marketplace’s current published schedule. Rates vary by category, country, plan and account. Check yours against a recent statement.

Sourcing: the most you can pay for it

Standing at a thrift-store shelf or estate sale? Enter the price you expect to sell for (above) and the profit you want per item. This works backwards through every channel’s fees and your returns overlay and shows the highest purchase price that still gets you there. It ignores what you entered for “what you paid”.

ChannelMost you can pay

And how often does it actually sell there?

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The same channels ranked on what one listing is worth per 30 days of shelf, not on what one sale is worth.
Channel Sells within horizon Days to sell If it sells If it does not One listing is worth Days on the shelf Per 30 days Gives up Sell-through to match

One listing is worth weights what you keep if it sells against what it costs you if it does not — renewal listing fees for as long as it sits, and your cash tied up in the item meanwhile. Postage, packaging and fulfilment are not double counted here; they are already in the sale figures above and only happen on a sale. Per 30 days divides that by the shelf the listing actually occupies, which is what lets a cheaper, faster channel beat a richer, slower one on the same inventory dollar. Sell-through to match is how often this channel would have to sell to earn the leader’s rate — read it as a test of your own estimate, not a target. A worked example of the flip →

Sell-through and time to sale are the two numbers here you should replace first. They vary more by category than by channel — a graded card and a dining table do not share a sell-through — and the shipped defaults are illustrative, not measured. Your own sold-listing history is the better source.

Each channel’s rates and costs

Opened defaults are illustrative US rates, not a live fee schedule. Replace them with the rates on your own statements — that is what makes the comparison yours rather than a generic estimate.

What this does, and what it does not

Three things flat fee comparisons get wrong

A per-listing fee is charged whether or not the item sells, so it hurts most on cheap items. A monthly plan is only a real per-order cost once you spread it over the orders you actually expect — at ten orders a month a $39 plan is $3.90 an order, at two hundred it is 20¢. The fee percentage is not the decision: what matters is the price each channel needs to leave you the same money, which is the last column above. And the highest profit per sale is not the decision either if one channel sells in a week and another sits for a month — you keep / day is that comparison. eBay vs Etsy fees on the same item works one example through in full, and Reverb vs eBay for selling gear works an $800 guitar through the case where the two answers disagree — the cheaper channel pays more per sale and less per month of shelf. Poshmark vs Mercari vs eBay fees works a $60 jacket through the same split for clothing: the biggest fee leaves the most per sale and the least per month of shelf.

Margin is not the same question as turnover

A fee comparison ranks a sale. A seller with stock ranks a listing. Those come apart the moment two channels do not sell the same item equally often: at the shipped defaults Etsy keeps more per completed sale than eBay and is worth roughly a third as much per month of shelf, because a 35% sell-through leaves most listings still sitting — paying renewal fees and tying up the cash — when eBay has already cleared two in three. The second table ranks that way, and where the two rankings disagree works one example through in full.

What it deliberately leaves out

Fees are not the only difference between channels. A marketplace fee buys you demand you would otherwise have to create. Put your own expected sales in each channel’s panel to see when volume flips the ranking. Days-to-sell is your estimate of that demand, not a measured sell-through rate, and the page still has no way to know how many buyers each channel puts in front of you — sell-through and time to sale are numbers you supply, not measurements. Returns are an input the same way: each channel has a rate, return postage, a still-sellable share, and a fee-refund share you can replace with your own report. Returns can flip the ranking works one Amazon-vs-eBay example through in full. Read the fee, volume, cash-per-day, return and shelf-time gaps as inputs to the decision, not the decision. It does not recommend a price, a channel, or a business model, and it is not tax, financial or business advice.

Common questions

Is it cheaper to sell on eBay or Etsy?

It depends on the item, because the two fee shapes are different rather than one simply being lower. eBay charges a percentage of the order total that normally includes payment processing, plus a small fixed fee. Etsy charges a per-listing fee whether or not the item sells, a transaction percentage, and a separate payment-processing percentage and fixed fee. On a low-priced item the per-listing and fixed fees matter most; on a high-priced item the percentages dominate. Enter your own numbers above — this page does no more than the arithmetic on the rates you give it.

How do I compare marketplace fees fairly?

Put the same item through every channel with the same cost of goods, then make three adjustments most comparisons skip. Spread any monthly subscription over the orders you actually expect that month. Count per-listing fees, which are charged whether or not the item sells. And compare the price each channel needs to reach the same profit, not just the fee percentage, because a channel with higher fees can still win if you can list higher there.

Does selling on my own store beat a marketplace?

On fees alone an own store usually wins, because there is no marketplace commission — only card processing and the monthly plan spread over your orders. What it does not include is the buyers. Put the number of sales you actually expect on each channel in that channel's panel: a store that keeps more per sale can still lose the month to a marketplace that sells more units. The honest comparison is the fee gap against the volume each channel can carry.

Should I sell on the cheapest channel or the fastest one?

A channel that keeps more per sale can still lose if the item sits longer. Divide what you keep by how many days you expect that channel to take to sell, and compare cash per day — not just cash per sale. The days are your estimate, not a marketplace statistic. Replace the illustrative starting points with how long your last similar listings actually took.

Do marketplace returns change which channel is cheapest?

They can. A completed sale on Amazon can look better than eBay once you list a few dollars higher, then lose once you count Amazon's higher return rate, return postage, and units that cannot be sold again. This page ranks channels on expected keep after the return rate you enter — turn that overlay off to see the sold-sale ranking only. Rates are inputs, not a published marketplace schedule.

Should I sell where I make the most per sale or where it sells fastest?

Those are two different questions and they often have different answers. What you keep per sale only matters if the item sells; a channel that pays more but clears one listing in three inside your horizon can be worth less per month of shelf than a cheaper channel that clears two in three quickly. This page ranks both ways side by side: what you keep if it sells, and what one listing is worth per 30 days of shelf once you count sell-through, time to sale, listing fees charged again on renewal, and the cash tied up while it waits. Where the two rankings disagree you are choosing between margin and turnover, and the tool says so rather than picking for you.

How do I work out what a listing is worth per month?

Take what you keep if it sells, subtract any listing fee charged again while it waits and the cost of the cash tied up in the item, and weight that by how often listings like it actually sell inside the period you would leave it up. The listings that do not sell still cost renewal fees and carry. Divide the result by the average days the listing occupies — shorter when it sells quickly — and multiply by thirty. That per-month figure, not the fee percentage, is what compares a fast channel against a rich one on the same inventory dollar.