Etsy vs Shopify: Which Is Better for a Small Online Seller?

In the Etsy vs Shopify decision, start on Etsy if you sell handmade, vintage or custom goods and have no audience yet, because Etsy brings buyers and charges nothing until you list. Choose Shopify if you already have a way to bring in customers, or if your products aren't allowed on Etsy. On platform fees alone, Shopify Basic gets cheaper at around 13 orders a month on a $46 order. But Shopify sends you no shoppers, so most sellers should keep the marketplace until they can win orders for less than about $3 each.

That last figure is the one the "Shopify is cheaper" argument leaves out, so the rest of this guide shows where it comes from.

The real difference between the two

Etsy is a marketplace. Buyers go there to shop, search for "personalized dog collar" and find your listing beside your competitors. You rent a stall in a busy market.

Shopify is software for running your own shop. You get a website, a checkout and an order system, and nobody knows you exist until you tell them. You own the building, and the street outside is empty.

What each one costs as of November 2026

Etsy fees

These are US seller fees as of November 2026, from Etsy's help pages on selling fees and payment processing:

• Listing fee: $0.20 per listing, and listings expire after four months unless renewed
• Transaction fee: 6.5% of the order total, including shipping and gift wrap you charge for
• Payment processing: 3% + $0.25 per order, on the item price, shipping and any sales tax
• Offsite Ads: 15% or 12% of an order total when a sale comes from an Etsy ad on another site, capped at $100 an order

Etsy also says a one-time, non-refundable fee may apply when you open a shop, and that it varies by location, so check the figure you see at sign-up. Sellers outside the US may pay a different processing rate and a regulatory operating fee on top.

Shopify fees

These US figures match our Shopify vs WooCommerce guide, with card rates from Shopify's October 2026 fee guide:

Shopify's pricing page changes by country, so the number you see may be lower than these. Use the price shown for your own store address. It was also offering 3 days free, then $1 a month for your first three months, which makes it cheap to try.

Etsy vs Shopify: the fees on one order

Here's an example order: a $40 item plus $6 shipping, so $46 in total. I've left out sales tax to keep the sums readable. On a taxed Etsy order, the 3% processing fee also applies to the tax.

Etsy's processing fee is 3% of $46, which is $1.38, plus $0.25. Shopify's card fee is 2.9% of $46, which is $1.33, plus $0.30. The two are nearly identical, so the real gap is the listing fee and the 6.5%. Etsy costs $3.19 more per order.

Order size changes the break-even point. This table divides Shopify's $39 by the extra Etsy fees:

The more you charge per order, the sooner a flat subscription beats a percentage. A $120 custom piece reaches break-even at five orders a month. A $25 order needs 22.

The monthly bill at five sales levels

Here's the same $46 order at different volumes, with Shopify's $39 included. The Offsite Ads row is an example that assumes one order in five comes through an Etsy ad.

Offsite Ads stops being optional

The Offsite Ads rule catches a lot of sellers out. If your shop has never reached $10,000 in sales in any 365-day period, you can opt out. Once you pass that level, you must stay enrolled for the life of the shop, at the lower 12% rate.

On a $46 order, $10,000 is 218 orders, or about 19 a month for a year. That's why the table uses 12% from 25 orders a month upward, and why the 10-order shop can opt out. Each attributed $46 order costs an extra $5.52. You can't choose which sales get charged, so build it into your pricing.

The number that actually decides it

Shopify's lower fees only count if the orders still arrive, and Shopify brings you none of them. Divide the monthly saving by your orders and you get the most you can spend on marketing per order before Shopify stops being cheaper:

So on this order, the limit never reaches $3.19. If winning a customer costs you $10 in ads, Etsy is far cheaper, even at 200 orders a month. Shopify makes sense when your customers come cheaply: repeat buyers, an email list, search traffic, a social following or wholesale contacts.

Offsite Ads charges raise that limit, and paid Shopify apps and a domain name lower it, so add those to your own version. It still comes down to one question: do you have a cheap source of buyers? Our profit margin guide shows how to run this for a real product.

What you're allowed to sell

For many sellers, this settles the question before any arithmetic. Under Etsy's Creativity Standards, items must be made, designed, handpicked or sourced by the seller. In practice:

• Fits Etsy: things you make, your own designs, vintage items at least 20 years old, and craft supplies
• Doesn't fit Etsy: reselling mass-made modern goods without changing them

If your plan is general dropshipping or reselling wholesale goods, Etsy isn't a real option, and you need your own store. Read dropshipping vs holding inventory before you commit to that model.

Which seller should pick which

Choose Etsy if you make, design or curate your products, you have no audience, and you want to learn whether strangers will buy. This covers most handmade sellers in their first year. Spending $0.20 a listing is the cheapest way to validate a product idea with real buyers.

Choose Shopify if your products don't meet Etsy's rules, your orders are large, you're building a brand, or you already have an audience. It also suits sellers who want repeat business, because the customer list and email relationship are yours. Plan your first traffic sources before you pay for the plan.

Stay on Etsy longer than you think if nearly all your sales come from Etsy search and you have no email list. Switching a working sales channel off to save fees is usually a mistake.

If you're asking "Etsy or Shopify for my new online store?" and you make your own products, my answer is Etsy first. If you resell other people's products, it's Shopify. In the Shopify vs Etsy choice, the deciding factor isn't which has the better dashboard, it's who brings the buyers.

Selling on Shopify and Etsy at the same time

Running both is where many successful small shops end up, and it's the best answer once Etsy sales are steady. Etsy finds new customers. Your own store collects repeat orders at lower fees.

Here's the example at 100 orders a month, with 70 on Etsy and 30 on Shopify:

That's $47.58 less than $482 on Etsy alone, before Offsite Ads. The saving is modest, because the real gains are less risk and customers you own. If Etsy changes its search or suspends a listing, your business doesn't stop.

Two things go wrong for sellers who run both:

• Overselling. A one-off item can sell on both platforms at once. You need inventory sync unless your stock is made to order. Shopify's Etsy integration guide points to its Marketplace Connect app, but Shopify community posts report it no longer accepts new Etsy connections, so confirm this before relying on it. Third-party apps are listed in the Shopify App Store, including CedCommerce from $9 a month, which is where the example figure comes from. Test with a few listings first.
• Pricing mismatch. Etsy costs you more per order, so some sellers charge more there. Check that your margin works on each channel separately.

A simple way to start is to add Shopify when Etsy is reaching roughly 50 orders a month and you have repeat buyers. Put a card in each package that points to your own site, keeping within Etsy's rules, and start collecting emails on your site from day one.

How to decide in 10 minutes

Stop at the first yes:

1. Do your products fail Etsy's rules? Choose Shopify.
2. Do you already have an audience or a cheap source of customers? Choose Shopify.
3. Are your orders usually over about $100, with a clear way to reach buyers? Choose Shopify.
4. None of the above? Choose Etsy, and add Shopify when you have repeat customers.

Your next step

Take your real order value and redo the $46 table with your own numbers, then estimate what one customer would cost you outside Etsy. If that's under the limit, a full startup budget is the next job. If it isn't, list 10 products on Etsy this week. Our guide on how to start an online store covers the remaining steps.