Guide · By DQ · October 5, 2026
Many Etsy sellers eventually find a line in their Payment account they didn't plan for: the Offsite Ads fee. You never set a budget, never picked a listing, and never clicked "advertise", yet the fee still showed up. This guide covers how the program works, what it costs, who can opt out, and how to tell whether your prices can absorb it.
All fee facts below come from Etsy's own Help Center and are linked in the sources at the end. Etsy changes its rules from time to time, so check the current figures in Shop Manager before you make pricing decisions.
Offsite Ads is Etsy's program for advertising your listings outside Etsy: on search engines, social media and partner sites. According to Etsy, ads can appear on places like Google, Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, Bing, Etsy Publishing Partner sites and the Google Display Network.
Three things make it different from the Etsy Ads you manage yourself:
The fee is a percentage of the order total, and the rate depends on your shop's sales history:
| Your shop's history | Offsite Ads fee | Can you opt out? |
|---|---|---|
| Has always made less than $10,000 USD in any consecutive 365-day period | 15% of the attributed order | Yes |
| Has made $10,000 USD or more in any consecutive 365-day period | 12% of the attributed order | No. Participation is required for the lifetime of the shop |
Two more rules matter:
Etsy attributes an order to Offsite Ads when a buyer clicks an offsite ad and buys from your shop within 30 days. Some details sellers often miss:
You can see which orders were attributed in Shop Manager → Marketing → Offsite Ads, which also shows clicks, revenue and fees.
This is the part that's easiest to get wrong. The threshold isn't "your sales over the last 12 months" in a way that resets. Etsy's wording is "any consecutive 365-day period". Once your shop reaches $10,000 USD in any such window:
Etsy checks your sales each month. If you're getting close to $10,000, decide now how you'll price for a permanent 12% on some share of your orders.
If your shop has never made $10,000 USD or more in any consecutive 365-day period, you can opt out. These are Etsy's steps:
To re-enroll later, go back to the same page and choose Turn on Offsite Ads.
If you don't see an opt-out option, your shop has most likely crossed the $10,000 line at some point.
It depends entirely on your margin per order, so start there.
Here's a hypothetical US order: a $20 item with $4 shipping charged to the buyer, $7 in materials, a $4 shipping label and $0.50 of packaging.
| Organic sale | Same sale via Offsite Ads (15%) | |
|---|---|---|
| Order total | $24.00 | $24.00 |
| Transaction fee (6.5% of item + shipping) | −$1.56 | −$1.56 |
| Payment processing (US: 3% + $0.25) | −$0.97 | −$0.97 |
| Listing fee (renewal on sale) | −$0.20 | −$0.20 |
| Offsite Ads fee | — | −$3.60 |
| Your costs | −$11.50 | −$11.50 |
| You keep | $9.77 (≈41%) | $6.17 (≈26%) |
(Assumes no sales tax collected. Etsy says payment processing also applies to any applicable sales tax on the order.)
The Offsite Ads line takes more than a third of what this seller keeps. That can be fine. The question is whether those buyers would have found you anyway. Some practical guidance:
It's easy to price one listing at a time and forget that the same product has two very different margins depending on where the buyer came from. A simple approach:
You can do this in a spreadsheet. If you'd rather not, Canopio has a free one-order calculator: switch the same sale between organic, Etsy Ads and Offsite Ads (15% or 12%, with the $100 cap) to see what you keep. It runs in your browser. If you want the same check across your whole catalog, the optional Shop Audit ($9.90 one-time, no subscription) connects to Etsy and ranks your live listings worst margin first. Canopio is independent and not affiliated with Etsy.
No. Etsy says listings are selected based on what performs best on each channel.
No. There's no budget setting. You're charged only when an attributed sale happens, and the fee is capped at $100 per order.
No. Etsy charges only when a click leads to a purchase from your shop within 30 days.
No. Once your shop has made $10,000 USD or more in any consecutive 365-day period, participation is required for the lifetime of the shop, at the 12% rate.
Etsy says that if the buyer's final click before purchasing was an Etsy Ad, only the Etsy Ads fee applies.
In Shop Manager → Marketing → Offsite Ads. Fees also appear in your payment account.
Canopio is independent and not affiliated with Etsy, Inc. Examples are hypothetical and use US rates unless noted. Confirm current fees in your Shop Manager.