Etsy vs. eBay: How To Choose an Ecommerce Marketplace

One of the easiest ways to get started selling online is to join a popular marketplace like Etsy or eBay. 

Etsy caters to buyers and sellers of handcrafted and vintage goods, while eBay is more of an all-purpose marketplace, with specializations in collectibles, like baseball cards. But there are some areas of overlap, such as vintage clothing and antiques.

If you’re deciding between the two ecommerce marketplaces, the guide below outlines their key differences. You’ll also hear from entrepreneurs about the roles these marketplaces have played in their businesses’ growth, and learn how you can pair an Etsy or eBay storefront with your own ecommerce website.

Etsy vs. eBay: Which online marketplace is best for you?

• Customer base
• Product focus
• Seller protections
• Product listings
• Platform fees
• Advertising tools
• Integrations

Etsy and eBay can both help you get started selling online. Here’s a breakdown of each platform: 

Customer base

With 136 million active buyers, eBay has a larger customer base than Etsy (87 million active buyers). eBay is also available in more countries (190) than Etsy (62).

A smaller customer base isn’t necessarily a bad thing. Etsy has a more narrow product focus, and attracts customers looking for niche items. For example, Genna Tatu, who sells crochet plushies under the brand CrochetByGenna, chose Etsy because she knew there was an existing audience for her handmade product.

Product focus

Etsy focuses on handmade, vintage, or curated products, while eBay lets you sell almost any item that adheres to local regulations.

According to Etsy’s seller policy, you can only sell items you’ve made, designed, handpicked, or directly sourced. You have to provide accurate details about how items were made, use your own photos (not stock images), and disclose any use of production partners or artificial intelligence (AI). 

Etsy prohibits dropshipping and reselling with limited exceptions for items that meet Etsy’s creativity standards (for example, print-on-demand products with your original designs).

On eBay, you can sell nearly anything, including homemade goods, new products, and used items. Popular categories include electronics, fashion, auto parts and accessories, health and beauty, home and garden, and toys and hobbies. 

eBay has restrictions for some categories. For example, cosmetics and perfume need to be sold in the original packaging. eBay allows reselling items purchased from a wholesaler, but you can’t dropship with eBay because you need to have every item in your possession before listing it on the platform.

Seller protections

Both eBay and Etsy provide sellers with certain protections. 

eBay’s seller protection policy focuses on removing negative reviews left by abusive buyers. eBay also provides some protection against fraudulent returns: If you accept a return request and the returned item arrives used or damaged, you can deduct up to 50% of the refund amount to cover the lost value of the item.

Etsy has a purchase protection program for sellers whereby Etsy will issue up to $250 to buyers (at no charge to the seller) in case of a dispute.

Product listings

When you sell on a marketplace like Etsy or eBay, the way you list your products is limited by the marketplace’s functionality. 

On eBay, which started as an auction site, sellers have the option of listing their products for auction or for a fixed “buy it now” price, while Etsy only supports fixed-price listings. Both platforms allow sellers to add product variants, and Etsy has functionality for custom orders.

However, the custom order process can be a bit clunky on Etsy. Custom furnituremaker Oakywood got their start on Etsy, but eventually migrated to Shopify due in part to the limitations of Etsy’s product listings. 

For each custom order, the customer needed to describe the product they wanted in detail, and there was no way for them to visualize the product before purchasing.

Platform fees

Both Etsy and eBay charge fees for listings, transactions, and payment processing. Here’s the breakdown:

According to Genna of CrochetByGenna, many small business owners start on a marketplace like Etsy because it’s low-risk, then shift to their own ecommerce store once they establish their brand and audience, to avoid paying fees. “Etsy fees are not worth it if you have your own organic traffic,” Genna says.

Eugene Ravitsky had a similar experience with eBay: Before launching his household machinery business FactoryPure, he resold cell phones on eBay. He eventually moved to his own ecommerce store for better profit margins.

Advertising tools

Both Etsy and eBay have built-in tools for advertising your products. Here’s how they work on each platform.

Etsy has both onsite and offsite Etsy ads to help sellers reach more customers. With onsite Etsy ads, you pay per click when your listings appear in Etsy’s search results. Genna invested in onsite ads early on, which she credits with helping make initial sales.

For offsite advertising—in which all sellers are automatically enrolled (though merchants with less than $10,000 in sales in the past year can opt out)—Etsy promotes your items on Google and social media. Etsy charges 15% of any sale made within 30 days of a user clicking an ad. 

eBay ads work differently from Etsy’s; sellers choose an eBay ad rate (percentage of the item’s price) and pay the rate if the item sells within 30 days of someone clicking the ad. 

Integrations

If you plan on growing your business beyond eBay or Etsy, you may want to look into available integrations that can help with tasks like marketing. eBay maintains a list of trusted partners, while Etsy has an Apps page.

Ecommerce integrations are useful if you want to sell on both a marketplace and your own store, like Genna of CrochetByGenna.

If you want to sell on Shopify, you can use the Shopify-developed Marketplace Connect app to manage your eBay sales directly from your Shopify Admin. You can also connect your store to Etsy using a third-party inventory sync app.