Offsite Ads fee calculator — what one sale costs when Etsy attributes it to an offsite ad
Etsy Ads ROAS calculator — is your on-site ad campaign making money?
Etsy Offsite Ads are ads Etsy runs for your listings on Google, Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest and Bing. You pay only when a buyer clicks one and buys within 30 days: 15% of the order total for shops under $10,000 a year, 12% at $10,000 or more, capped at $100 per order.
How Etsy Offsite Ads work
Etsy buys ads for sellers' listings on other websites and apps — Google, Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, Bing, Etsy's publishing partners and the Google Display Network. You do not set a budget or choose which listings appear. Etsy pays for the clicks, and charges you a fee only when one of those clicks turns into an order.
The sequence for a single order:
- A shopper sees your listing in an ad on, say, Pinterest, and clicks it.
- Within 30 days, they buy something from your shop — the advertised item or any other.
- Etsy attributes the order to the offsite ad and charges the fee on the order total: item price, shipping and gift wrap, not sales tax.
- The fee is 15% if your shop made under $10,000 in the past 365 days, or 12% if it made $10,000 or more, and never more than $100 per order.
If the shopper's last click before buying was an on-site Etsy Ad, the order counts as an Etsy Ads sale instead, and no Offsite Ads fee applies.
Etsy reviews your sales against the $10,000 threshold monthly, using the past 365 days and converting other currencies to US dollars at the rates used for each sale. You can check your own total in Stats with a custom date range. Your monthly statement in Shop Manager → Finances lists each Offsite Ads fee with the order it came from, which is the quickest way to see which products the ads actually sell.
Insight: The 30-day window is the part sellers miss. A buyer who clicked an Instagram ad three weeks ago, forgot, then searched for your shop by name is still an Offsite Ads order. That is why some orders carry the fee even when you are sure they found you another way.
What Offsite Ads cost on a real sale
US digital downloads with no shipping, using Etsy Payments in the US (6.5% transaction fee, 3% + $0.25 processing, $0.20 listing fee):
| Order total | Standard Etsy fees | You keep (normal sale) | Offsite fee at 15% | You keep at 15% | Offsite fee at 12% | You keep at 12% |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| $5.00 | $0.93 | $4.08 | $0.75 | $3.33 | $0.60 | $3.48 |
| $10.00 | $1.40 | $8.60 | $1.50 | $7.10 | $1.20 | $7.40 |
| $20.00 | $2.35 | $17.65 | $3.00 | $14.65 | $2.40 | $15.25 |
| $50.00 | $5.20 | $44.80 | $7.50 | $37.30 | $6.00 | $38.80 |
| $700.00 | $66.95 | $633.05 | $100.00 (cap) | $533.05 | $84.00 | $549.05 |
The cap starts to matter only on large orders: above about $667 at 15%, or $833 at 12%. For most digital products, it never applies.
Should you opt out of Offsite Ads?
Only shops under $10,000 in the past 365 days have the choice. The question is not "is 15% expensive?" but "would I still make money on this sale, and would I have got it anyway?"
Keep Offsite Ads on if:
- You sell digital downloads — with no cost per order, even a 15% fee leaves most of the sale. On a $10 printable you keep $7.10 instead of $8.60.
- Your shop is new and gets little Etsy search traffic. Offsite clicks are buyers you could not reach otherwise, at no up-front cost.
- Your products are visual and giftable — wall art, planners, wedding stationery — the kind that does well on Pinterest and Google Shopping.
Consider opting out if:
- Your margin per order is thin. A $30 physical order with $24 of costs keeps $2.70 after standard fees; a 15% offsite fee of $4.50 turns it into a $1.80 loss.
- Most of your orders already come from repeat buyers or your own social channels, so the ad mostly charges you for buyers you had.
- You are close to $10,000 and want to test without ads first — crossing the threshold enrols you permanently.
Opting out also removes your listings from Etsy's paid offsite placements. Opted-in shops can appear in free Google Shopping listings through Etsy's checkout, which carry no Offsite Ads fee.
Etsy Ads (on-site): ROAS and break-even
Etsy Ads are different: you set a daily budget (minimum $1) and pay per click when your listing appears in Etsy search. The second calculator on this page works out whether that spend is paying for itself.
ROAS (return on ad spend) = revenue from ads ÷ ad spend. $175 of sales from $50 of ads is 3.5:1.
Break-even ROAS = 100 ÷ gross margin %, where gross margin is (sale price − cost of goods − Etsy fees) ÷ sale price. Anything above it is profit; below it, the ads cost more than they earn.
| Gross margin | Break-even ROAS | Typical product |
|---|---|---|
| 85% | 1.18:1 | Printables, planners, templates (no cost of goods) |
| 60% | 1.67:1 | Notion templates with design costs |
| 40% | 2.50:1 | KDP-style printed books after print cost |
| 25% | 4.00:1 | Print-on-demand shirts, mugs, hoodies |
This is why a digital seller can profit at a ROAS that would sink a print-on-demand shop. Run a campaign for about 30 days before judging it — a handful of clicks says little, and changing the budget every few days resets what you are measuring.
How to lower your ad costs without switching anything off
- Fix the listing first. Ads send people to the listing; a weak first photo or a vague title wastes every click. Run it through the Etsy listing optimization checklist.
- Raise prices on very cheap items. Fixed fees and ad fees hit $2–$3 listings hardest. Bundling three printables at $9.99 keeps far more per sale than one at $2.99. See the Etsy pricing strategy guide.
- Advertise only listings that already convert. In Etsy Ads, switch off listings with many clicks and no orders after 30 days.
- Check the real numbers monthly. Your Etsy statement lists Offsite Ads and Etsy Ads fees separately; compare them with the orders they brought.
For every fee on a sale, use the Etsy fee calculator, and to compare Etsy with Gumroad and KDP at the same price, the digital product pricing calculator. Whether paid ads are worth it at all is covered in are Etsy ads worth it.
Etsy Offsite Ads: Frequently Asked Questions
15% of the order total if your shop made under $10,000 in the past 365 days, and 12% if it made $10,000 or more. The fee never exceeds $100 for a single order, and it is charged only on orders Etsy attributes to an offsite ad click.
Only while your shop is under $10,000 in sales over the past 365 days. Go to Shop Manager → Settings → Offsite Ads and opt out. Once a shop reaches $10,000 it is enrolled for the life of the shop, at the lower 12% rate.
Usually not. A $10 printable sold through an offsite ad still nets $7.10 after all fees, against $8.60 for a normal sale, and many of those buyers would never have found your shop. Opting out makes sense when your cost per order leaves too little margin to absorb 15%.
The order total, which in Etsy's fee terms includes the item price, shipping and gift wrap but not sales tax. A $20 item with $5 shipping is charged on $25, so the 15% fee is $3.75.
Thirty days. If a buyer clicks your offsite ad and buys from your shop within 30 days, the order is attributed to the ad — even if they bought a different item. If their last click before buying was an Etsy Ad on Etsy, only the Etsy Ads cost applies.
Above your break-even ROAS, which is 100 ÷ your gross margin %. A digital download with an 85% margin breaks even at about 1.18:1; a print-on-demand shirt at a 25% margin needs 4:1. Judge a campaign after about 30 days, not after a few days.
Most often it is an Etsy Plus subscription, which costs $10 a month. Check the monthly statement in Shop Manager → Finances to see which fee it is; Offsite Ads and Etsy Ads appear there as separate lines.