How Much Does It Cost to Sell on Amazon US? Fees & Expenses Explained

Setting up an Amazon store is a great way to gain exposure for your products. Amazon has a 37.6% share of US retail ecommerce sales, making it a top choice for online sellers to reach a large number of customers in one place.¹

Before you get started, however, you should understand Amazon’s seller fees and other expenses so you can ensure your business remains profitable. How much does it cost to sell on Amazon? This guide breaks down the fees involved and provides tips to help you keep costs down.

As a participant in Amazon's Payment Service Provider Program, Wise Business can help you manage your store with ease.

How Much Does It Cost to Sell on Amazon? Understanding Amazon Selling Fees

There are a number of Amazon fees you should be aware of, including account fees, referral fees and fulfilment charges.

Individual vs. Professional Seller Accounts

Amazon offers individual and professional seller accounts:²

Individual: No monthly subscription fee. Sellers pay $0.99 per item sold. Ideal for casual users selling fewer than 40 items each month or businesses exploring selling on Amazon.

Professional: Flat subscription fee of $39.99 per month regardless of sales volume. Designed for businesses aiming to scale up sales. Users can revert to an individual plan at any time.

Plan	Monthly Fee	Per-Item Fee	Access to Advanced Tools
Individual	$0	$0.99 per sale	No
Professional	$39.99	$0	Yes

Sellers with professional accounts receive access to bulk listing tools, sales analytics reports, advertising options, and eligibility for top placements in search results.

Both types of account are subject to additional selling fees.

Referral Fees

Amazon charges a commission, known as a referral fee, for each item sold through its marketplace. This is typically 8-15% of the total sales price for the product, or a minimum fee of $0.30, although it varies by category. In some categories, fees are tiered based on the total sales price.³ For instance, in the Beauty, Health, and Personal Care category, the referral fee is 8% for products with a total sales price of $10 or less and 15% for items with a total sales price above $10. The total price includes the price for the item, shipping cost and gift-wrapping charges.

Product Category	Referral Fee Percentage	Minimum Fee
Amazon Device Accessories	45%	$0.30
Appliances (Compact)	15% up to $300; 8% over $300	$0.30
Appliances (Full-size)	8%	$0.30
Automotive & Powersports	12%	$0.30
Baby Products	8% ≤ $10; 15% > $10	$0.30
Beauty, Health & Personal Care	8% ≤ $10; 15% > $10	$0.30
Clothing & Accessories	5% ≤ $15; 10% $15.01–$20; 17% > $20	$0.30
Consumer Electronics	8%	$0.30
Electronics Accessories	15% ≤ $100; 8% > $100	$0.30
Furniture	15% ≤ $200; 10% > $200	$0.30
Grocery & Gourmet	8% ≤ $15; 15% > $15	--
Home & Kitchen	15%	$0.30
Jewelry	20% ≤ $250; 5% > $250	$0.30
Lawn & Garden	15%	$0.30
Media (Books, DVDs, etc.)	15%	--
Office Products	15%	$0.30
Pet Supplies	15% (22% for veterinary diets)	$0.30
Sports & Outdoors	15%	$0.30
Toys & Games	15%	$0.30

You should take these fees into account when pricing your items, especially in categories where competition is high.

Check Amazon’spricing page for the most up-to-date fees, as they can change based on promotions, category changes or selling policies.

What Percentage Does Amazon Take From Sales?

How much does it actually cost to sell on Amazon? Amazon takes around 15-20% on average from each sale including referral fees, spending on advertising and other costs. This can increase further for Fulfillment by Amazon (FBA) listings. More than 60% of US-based sellers handle shipping and fulfillment for some or all of their orders themselves, according to Amazon.

Additional Costs for Amazon Sellers

What are some of the additional costs that Amazon charges on top of referral fees?

Amazon Fulfillment Fees

When you sell products on Amazon, you can choose to ship them yourself, or have Amazon stock and fulfil orders on your behalf.

When you use Fulfillment by Amazon (FBA), Amazon stores picks, packs, and ships items to your customers directly from its** **fulfillment centers, and deals with returns. Amazon charges a fulfilment fee, which starts at $3.22 per item, as well as a monthly storage fee of $0.75 to $3.63 per cubic foot, depending on the season. With Fulfillment by Merchant (FBM), you manage the storage, shipping and handling. This option incurs fewer fees but more logistical responsibility.⁴

If you have a Professional seller account, you can set your own shipping rates to cover the cost. But an Individual account requires you to use Amazon’s set shipping rates for all products.

Using FBA allows you to reach Amazon’s estimated 163.5 million Prime users and rank in the Buy Box, increasing visibility for your products.

With each FBA sale, you’ll pay a based on the size and weight of the package. Amazon charges tiered fees in two broad categories: non-apparel and apparel.⁵

Amazon FBA Fulfillment Fees Summary

Category	Size Tier	Weight Range	Fulfillment Fee
Non-Apparel	Small Standard	Up to 2 oz	$3.06
		14 oz – 16 oz	$3.65
	Large Standard	Up to 4 oz	$3.68
		Up to 3 lb	$6.92
		Over 3 lb	+ $0.08 per 4 oz
Apparel	Small Standard	Up to 4 oz	$3.27
		Up to 16 oz	$3.98
	Large Standard	Up to 4 oz	$4.25
		Up to 3 lb	$6.92
		Over 3 lb	+ $0.16 per half-pound
All Categories	Large Bulky	0–50 lb	$9.61 + $0.38/lb over first lb
	Extra-Large (0–50 lb)	0–50 lb	$26.33 + $0.38/lb over first lb
	Extra-Large (50–70 lb)	50–70 lb	$40.12 + $0.75/lb over 51 lb
	Extra-Large (70–150 lb)	70–150 lb	$54.81 + $0.75/lb over 71 lb
	Extra-Large (150+ lb)	150+ lb	$194.95 + $0.19/lb over 151 lb

Storage Fees, Advertising Costs, and Hidden Charges

In addition to the per-sale fees, Amazon charges a monthly storage fee based on the space your inventory uses in its warehouses. The amount depends on the time of year, as fees are higher during the holiday season, when demand is higher.⁶

Storage fees are determined by your stock’s daily average volume in cubic feet, which is based on the unit size when packaged and ready to ship. Charges can be higher for items that are not packaged correctly.

Month	Standard size	Oversize
January – September	$0.78 per cubic foot	$0.56 per cubic foot
October – December	$2.40 per cubic foot	$1.40 per cubic foot

Additional storage costs apply to products that are classified as dangerous goods and for sellers who have a high volume of inventory stored compared with their recent weekly sales volume.

All these fulfillment charges can add up quickly, so understanding how the size and weight of your products will affect the cost of sales is key to estimating your true profit margins.

Since April 2022, Amazon has levied an additional 5% Fuel and Inflation Surcharge on top of these fulfillment fees.⁷

There are also other potential fees to be aware of:

Aged inventory surcharge: Starts at $0.50/cubic foot for items stored for over 181 days, scaling up every 29 days to $6.90/cubic foot (or $0.15 per unit, whichever is higher) for items stored for more than 365 days.⁸

Returns processing: Sellers must cover the cost if a customer returns an item that was sold with free return shipping. Fees range from $1.65 to $6.74 but can be higher for oversized items.⁹ There is a refund administration fee of $5 or 20% of the referral fee (whichever is less), capped at $5.¹⁰

FBA removal or disposal order: Fees to remove inventory from an Amazon fulfillment center either return it to you or destroy it range from $1.04 to $14.32 + $1.06/lb above 10 lb.¹¹

Unplanned services: Various fees apply if you send items to an Amazon fulfillment center that do not meet FBA’s Packaging and Prep or Shipping and Routing requirements. For instance, there is a charge of $0.20 per unit to re-label standard-sized items.¹²

MCF orders: Fees start at $6.99 per small standard item and $7.20 for large standard items for Amazon to fulfill non-Amazon orders, such as from your online store, through the Multi-Channel Fulfillment program.¹³

Advertising costs: There are various charges for sponsored product ads and paid ad placements on Amazon. Pay-per-click (PPC) ad charges vary depending on the keywords that the ads target and the daily budget you set.

Premium account services: $1,600 per month + 0.3% of total monthly sales up to $5,000 for Amazon’s Strategic Account Services (SAS) Core program that connects you with an account manager.¹⁴

How to Minimize Amazon Selling Costs and Maximize Profit

There are ways to minimize how much you pay to Amazon if you closely monitor fees, optimize your listings and streamline operations.

Choose the Right Business Model

Selecting the right business model is one of the most important decisions you'll make as an Amazon seller. Each model comes with its own costs, risks, and operational requirements.

Wholesale

In the wholesale model, you purchase branded products in bulk directly from manufacturers or authorized distributors and resell them on Amazon.

Bulk purchasing helps you to keep costs down and scale quickly if you have consistent suppliers. Selling branded products also means faster time to market and less need for brand awareness marketing. However, this requires high upfront investment in inventory and approval to sell certain brand-name products on Amazon. In addition, you have little control over price and branding, and competition can be high from other resellers offering the same products.

This model is best for sellers who have the capital to invest in inventory and want a straightforward, scalable business with fewer branding responsibilities.

Private Label

Private label selling involves creating your own brand by sourcing generic or customizable products from manufacturers, often via platforms like Alibaba, and selling them under your own label.

Unique brands can help you generate higher profit margins. You have full control over the branding, packaging, and marketing of your products, and there is no direct competition. With your own brand, you can build customer loyalty and long-term brand equity.

However, this approach takes a longer time to get started as you need to research, develop, and launch products and invest in product development, branding, and marketing. You’ll also need to pay for advertising and search engine optimization (SEO) to drive visibility and sales. And after that investment, there is a risk of product flops without proper market research.

Private labelling is best suited to sellers who want to build a brand and have time, budget, and marketing skills to invest in product development.

Dropshipping

With dropshipping, you source products from a manufacturer and list them for sale on Amazon. The supplier fulfills the orders directly to the customer, so you never have to handle or store the inventory yourself.

This approach is flexible and scalable with minimal overhead. Startup costs are low as you do not need to buy inventory and it’s easy to test multiple products without committing to large orders.

However, profit margins are low because of the supplier fees and competition with other sellers on pricing. There can also be quality control issues, as you don’t see or handle the product, and shipping delays or poor customer experience can damage your seller rating. In addition, you should be aware that Amazon restricts dropshipping and there are strict policies you must follow to avoid having your account suspended.

Dropshipping is most appropriate for beginners with limited funds available who want to test products or learn Amazon systems before investing.

Choosing the right model depends on your budget, goals, and experience. Some sellers use a combination of models to diversify income and test new markets while maintaining sales.

Join Amazon Programs

If you are a brand owner, enroll in Amazon’s Brand Registry to earn a bonus on any sales made through non-Amazon marketing. You can earn up to 10% back on referral fees for purchases made within 14 days through Amazon-provided links in external marketing. Rates vary by category and sales volume.¹⁵

Monitor Inventory Levels

You can avoid extra storage fees by tracking and managing inventory accurately. If you use an ecommerce platform like Wix eCommerce for your online store, you can use its inventory management tools to track sales and avoid overstocking.

Use Amazon Tools for Fee Optimization

Amazon provides a range of free and paid for tools and reports to help sellers manage and reduce costs, improve pricing strategies, and maximize profitability.

Estimate Profits With the Amazon Revenue Calculator

The Amazon Revenue Calculator helps you estimate potential profits for a product. You input the item price, shipping cost, fulfillment method and estimated storage time, and it will calculate the referral fees, fulfillment fees and net profit. You can use this to test different pricing and fulfillment scenarios to find the most cost-effective option.

Use the Amazon Fee Preview Report

The Fee Preview Report in Amazon Seller Central indicates the referral fees, FBA fulfillment fees and upcoming fee changes for your listed products. This helps you adjust pricing or packaging before fees affect your profit margins.

Inventory Performance Dashboard (IPD)

The inventory dashboard helps FBA sellers manage inventory storage efficiently by showing sell-through rate, excess inventory levels and inbound performance to avoid overstocking and long-term storage fees. You can use this information to automatically remove slow-moving inventory or run clearance promotions.

Automated Pricing Tool

Amazon allows you to set rules that adjust prices automatically based on competitors’ listings, Buy Box eligibility, and market demand. This can help you stay competitive and improve inventory turnover, although you should consider setting minimum price thresholds to protect profits.

Business Reports

Amazon’s reporting tools provide detailed insights on sales, conversion rates, gross margins and underperforming products to help you assess product profitability.

Receive International Payments to a Multi-Currency Account

If you’re selling to customers in other countries, receiving payments in multiple currencies can result in high currency conversion rates and cross-border fees. Platforms like Amazon will often convert funds to your home currency at less-than-ideal exchange rates.

Using a multi-currency account from providers like Wise, Payoneer, or Airwallex can help you maximize profits on international sales. You can get better exchange rates without the high fees often charged by banks. You can also hold sales revenue in local currencies to make business payments in those currencies or transfer funds when exchange rates are more favorable. This can reduce the cost of international sales, boosting your bottom line.

Read the guide on how to open a Wise Business account

Discover Wise: Receive Amazon Payments to Save on Currency Exchange

Understanding Amazon’s fees is key to long-term success on the platform. From choosing the right seller account to managing fulfillment and international payments, the decisions you make in the way you sell items affects your profitability.

Open a Wise Business account online

Wise Business can help you build a sustainable and profitable Amazon store. There’s no monthly fee and no need to manage multiple accounts. You can save time and stress by receiving Amazon payments in various currencies into your Wise account using local details. You can also hold over 40+ currencies and choose when to convert them to get the best rate. You can also make payments directly from your Wise account.

	Editor & Business Expert:
	Panna is an expert in US business finance, covering topics from invoicing to international expansion. She creates guides and reviews to help businesses save time and make informed decisions. You can read more useful business articles on her author profile.

	Author:
	Nicole is a professional journalist with two decades of experience in writing and editing, she has also run her own freelance business for the past five years. Her expertise spans the financial and technology industries, including payment processing and small business banking.

Sources:

¹Largest online retailers in the U.S. 2023| Statista
²Standard selling fees
³Many sellers say ‘Amazon’s definitely the best bang for the buck.' Here’s why.
⁴Amazon FBA (Fulfillment by Amazon)
⁵Amazon FBA (Fulfillment by Amazon)
⁶Update to US FBA fulfillment fees starts April 28
⁷Aged inventory surcharge
⁸Returns processing fee
⁹FBA disposal order fees
¹⁰Refund administration fee
¹¹FBA disposal order fees
¹²Unplanned services
¹³Fulfillment fees for Multi-Channel Fulfillment orders
¹³Are Amazon Strategic Account Services Worth It?
¹⁵Amazon Brand Registry