To better meet buyers’ expectations when it comes to shipping prices, Etsy has three flexible options that can be used to offer free shipping to local and international buyers: free shipping guarantees, our smart pricing tool, and shipping profiles.
You can also learn strategies for offering free shipping in our Seller Handbook.
Jump to a section:
- How to set up free shipping
- How to set up a free shipping guarantee
- How to use the smart pricing tool when you offer a free shipping guarantee
- How can I use shipping profiles to offer free shipping?
How to set up free shipping
The simplest way to make free shipping work for your shop is to price your items to include the shipping cost in the item list price.
You can choose to offer free shipping to buyers only located in your country, or to all buyers around the world based on your shop’s needs.
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If you frequently ship orders to US buyers specifically and want to automatically offer them free shipping, consider including shipping in the item price.
- If you want more flexibility and control over your shipping prices and prefer to make those choices yourself, consider setting up shipping profiles.
What does offering free shipping cost me as a seller?
Sellers still need to pay the shipping carrier to deliver your orders to buyers. By bundling shipping costs into the price of your items, customers will know what they need to pay for their orders upfront, and your overall cost to ship it to them remains the same.
Imagine that you sell a $35 item, and you currently charge a $5 flat rate to ship it. By adjusting the item price to $40, you recover your shipping cost without charging a separate shipping fee.
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Current pricing |
Pricing with free shipping |
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Item list price |
$35 |
$40 |
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Shipping price |
$5 |
$0 (Free!) |
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Total price for the buyer |
$40 |
$40 |
You can update your international shipping costs to account for any shipping prices that you included in your item prices. If you lower your shipping prices for international shipping, your international customers don’t have to pay more than they did before you adjusted your item prices to recover your shipping costs.
For example, you sell a $35 item, and you currently charge a $5 flat rate to ship it domestically, and $10 to ship it internationally. You can change the item price to $40 to recover the cost of shipping, and charge no shipping fee to ship domestically, and $5 flat rate to ship internationally.
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|
Current international pricing |
International pricing with free domestic shipping |
|
Item list price |
$35 |
$40 |
|
International shipping price |
$10 |
$5 |
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Total price for an international buyer |
$45 |
$45 |
To update your international shipping prices:
- In Shop Manager, choose Settings.
- Select Shipping settings.
- Choose Edit next to a shipping profile.
- Take the number you are charging for domestic shipping.
- Subtract it from your international shipping cost.
- Set the price and choose Save profile.
Sellers outside the US and India can set up a different listing price for domestic orders and international orders. This means you can price your items to include different shipping costs for international orders.
How to set up a free shipping guarantee
A free shipping guarantee automatically applies free shipping for US buyers when they purchase the following from your shop:
- Any individual item $35 USD and up.
- Orders with a total cost of $35 USD and up.
Once you set it up, the free shipping guarantee will also be applied to new listings you create that are over $35 USD, no matter what your shop currency is set to. Your shipping prices for buyers in other countries will not be changed from what you have set in your shipping profiles and item listings. The free shipping guarantee applies to both domestic and international sellers shipping orders to US buyers.
If a buyer chooses to purchase shipping upgrades, they will be charged for those even if their order qualifies for free shipping.
- On Etsy.com, select the Shop Manager icon
- Choose Settings
- Choose Shipping settings
- Choose Get started in the Free shipping guarantee tab
- Choose Next
- Choose Set free shipping
You can disable your free shipping guarantee from the same tab.
After setting up a free shipping guarantee, you can recover your shipping costs by using our smart pricing tool to bulk edit your listing prices for items costing $35+. If you adjust the price of your items to recover shipping costs using the smart pricing tool, turning off your free shipping guarantee won’t undo those changes.
You can also use shipping profiles to recover shipping costs and include the price of shipping for buyers outside of the US, or if you want to offer free shipping for all orders from your shop.
How to use the smart pricing tool when you offer a free shipping guarantee
Etsy’s smart pricing tool can help you adjust item prices in bulk to recover the cost of offering free shipping.
You’ll have access to the smart pricing tool if:
- Your shop is located in the US
- You don’t already offer free shipping on your items $35 or more
- You have set up a free shipping guarantee
- Set up a free shipping guarantee for your shop.
- Select Edit item prices.
- Choose if you want to edit your item prices for items $35 and over to recover shipping costs. The options you see will depend on if you offer fixed shipping prices, or if you use calculated shipping.
- Select Next.
- Choose if you want to edit your item prices for items under $35 to recover shipping costs on orders. You can choose the amount calculated by Etsy’s data analysts to help recover shipping costs over time, choose a different amount, or to keep your current prices.
- Select Review & edit.
- Under each item image, you can see the new list price you have chosen. You can also see the previous list price and shipping price.
- If you want to edit individual item prices, click the price under that item and enter the new price you want to charge.
- If you want to adjust multiple item prices at one time, click Edit item prices if you want to edit the new list prices of your items.
- Select the items you want to edit.
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You can choose to:
- Decrease amount by: Decrease the new list price for selected items by this amount.
- Increase amount by: Increase the new list price for selected items by this amount.
- Set amount: Set the new list price for selected items by this amount. - Enter the amount in the text box.
- Select Apply.
- When you’re happy with the new prices you’ve set, click Publish.
- Select Publish again. It may take a few minutes for the new prices to show in your shop.
The new item prices will only apply to all items in your shop that you reviewed and approved, and all items $35 USD and over will have a FREE shipping badge that’s visible to US buyers.
The new prices will be the same for all Etsy shoppers, including shoppers outside of the US.
Choose either:
- Build in shipping prices to recover shipping costs: Increase your item prices to include the shipping price you've specified for each listing. This helps you recover the cost of shipping for items with free shipping.
- Keep your current prices: Keep your current item prices.
Then select Review & edit to review your item prices. You can edit the amount your item prices will be adjusted by to recover shipping costs as you see fit. The amount that you adjust your prices by to recover costs is up to you.
Sellers who use calculated shipping can choose one of the following options to recover shipping costs:
- Closest buyer: Increase your item prices by the amount it costs to ship to buyers in your postal code.
- Average buyer distance: Increase your item prices by the amount it costs to ship the median distance of your US orders in the last year. If you don't have enough orders for us to determine this distance, we use the median distance for similar items.
- Farthest buyer: Increase your item prices by the amount it costs to ship to buyers the farthest from you.
- Keep your current prices: Keep your current item prices.
Then click Review & edit to review your item prices, adjusting them as you see fit.
How are built-in shipping prices calculated?
The built-in shipping price change would increase your item price by the average amount US buyers would pay at checkout on Etsy, plus any handling fees you charged, rounded up to the nearest dollar. You’ll still need to pay the cost of shipping orders.
How does this tool adjust my shipping profiles?
The shipping prices in your shipping profiles will be adjusted to account for any price adjustments you made to your items. This means that most buyers will pay around the same total price they did before these adjustments.
US shipping prices: US standard shipping prices will be adjusted to 0.00 for any profiles with items with prices you adjusted.
Shipping prices outside the US: If you choose to build in shipping prices for your items with fixed price shipping, your shipping prices to other countries will be reduced by the same amount as your standard US shipping price.
Profiles with items $35 USD and over, and below $35 USD: If you had a shipping profile that had both items over and under $35 USD, all items $35 USD and over are moved to a new shipping profile. The new profile has the same name as the old profile, followed by (Reduced shipping).
Shipping profiles with variations: The price of your variations will change by the same amount that your base listing price changes. For example: If you increase the price of a silver ring by $5 and have a gold variation of that ring, the price of the gold variation will also increase $5.
How can I use shipping profiles to offer free shipping
If you set up a free shipping guarantee for your shop, all orders $35 or more shipping to the US will have free shipping for the buyer.
If you want to offer free shipping to buyers outside of the US, or you want to offer free shipping for all orders from your shop, you can use free shipping profiles.
Learn more about shipping profiles.
- Go to Shop Manager, then Settings.
- Go to Shipping settings.
- Select Edit next to a shipping profile that you want to change to free shipping. You can also choose Add profile. If you’re adding a new shipping profile, complete the required information.
- If you want to add free shipping for specific countries, make sure to select I’ll enter fixed prices manually under Shipping prices. Then, use the Add a location dropdown under Fixed shipping prices.
- Select Free shipping from the What you’ll charge dropdown.
- Select Save profile.
- Go to Shop Manager, then Listings.
- If you want to edit all your listings, select the checkbox at the top left. If you want to edit some listing, select the checkboxes under those listings.
- Select Editing options.
- Select Change shipping profile.
- Select your free shipping profile.
- Select Apply.
Added shipping costs can get in the way of buyers making a purchase. Free shipping is a great way to encourage shoppers to purchase from your shop.
Click a question to learn about how to offer free shipping, or to resolve common issues with free shipping:
The simplest way to make free shipping work for your shop is to include the cost of shipping in the item price. When you make this decision, remember that how you determine and set your prices is your decision.
By including shipping costs in your item prices, buyers know what they need to pay for your items up-front, and you don’t lose money on orders with free shipping. Learn more about how it can benefit your business to offer free shipping.
To better meet US buyers’ expectations when it comes to shipping price, you can set up a free shipping guarantee for your shop. A free shipping guarantee applies to orders $35 and over that ship to the US.
Even if you offer a free shipping guarantee, some orders with a US shipping address may not qualify for free shipping because of other account settings. Buyers must also:
- Set their region on Etsy to the US and
- Set their currency preference on Etsy to USD
A free shipping offer covers the lowest-cost available mail class. If an order exceeds the weight or dimensions of a low-cost mail class, a mail service that can accomodate the order is used. For example, if an order exceeds the allowed dimensions for USPS’ First-Class mail, USPS Priority mail is offered free.
To prevent this, check if you can update the dimensions of an item to fit within your preferred mail class. Remember that item dimensions used for shipping must be accurate, or you may incur a shipping label adjustment fee from the carrier.
If you’re a seller outside the US and India, you can set up a different listing price for orders shipping within your country and orders shipping outside your country.
When you set up domestic & global pricing for items with free shipping, make sure to add domestic & global pricing to all the other listings linked to your free shipping profile. Learn how to add domestic & global pricing to your listings.