How much it costs to sell on Amazon: the real 2026 numbers

"How much does it cost to sell on Amazon" sounds like a question with one answer, but it actually has three: what a seller account costs, what each sale costs, and what Fulfilment by Amazon costs if you choose to use it. The figures below are checked against official sources, with the date I checked them: 26 July 2026.

1. The fee to sell

Amazon offers two plans, and the choice between them comes down to one number: how many units you sell a month.

The Individual plan has no fixed fee: you pay €0.99 (excluding VAT) per item sold, on top of the category commission. The Professional plan costs €39 (excluding VAT) a month, regardless of how much you sell, and unlocks tools the Individual plan doesn't have: APIs, advanced reports, advertising, promotions and the ability to sell in restricted categories.

Amazon itself states the criterion: under 40 sales a month the Individual plan works out cheaper, above 40 the Professional plan does. It's plain arithmetic, not a sales pitch: 40 sales on the Individual plan come to €39.60 in per-item fees, a figure the Professional plan's flat fee only just exceeds.

2. The commission on every sale

This is the part that gets underestimated in back-of-envelope sums. Every sale, on either plan, pays a referral fee: a percentage of the total price (item plus shipping), different for each category.

The percentages range from a minimum of 5% (clothing and accessories up to €15, for instance) to a maximum of 45% (Amazon device accessories). Most categories sit between 8% and 15%. There's also a floor: if the calculated percentage would work out lower, a minimum of €0.30 per item kicks in. Some categories also carry a fixed closing fee on top: for a book, it's €1.01.

From 15 December 2025 and 5 January 2026 Amazon cut fees in several high-volume categories across Europe: clothing and accessories, home products, groceries, vitamins and supplements, pet products. Amazon states that, adding these cuts to the ones on Fulfilment by Amazon handling fees, the average reduction is around €0.17 per unit sold across European markets: that's a combined figure across both items, not the referral fee alone, and it should be read that way.

3. If you use Fulfilment by Amazon (FBA)

Most guides stop at "it depends" here, and that's partly fair: the cost of fulfilling an order depends on the package's weight and size, and the gap between a small accessory and an oversized item is too wide to fit one honest number. That's why Amazon provides the Fulfilment by Amazon Revenue Calculator, where you enter your product's actual measurements and get the real figure, not a blog average.

One item does have a precise number worth giving: monthly storage. For a standard-size product outside clothing, eyewear, footwear, backpacks and bags, the rate in Italy (non-dangerous goods) is €27.54 per cubic metre a month from January to September, rising to €52.20 per cubic metre a month from October to December, the quarter leading up to Christmas. Anyone holding stock for the holidays pays almost double for the space, and it's the kind of detail no rough quote ever includes.

One recent update deserves a correction, because a wrong figure is circulating: from 17 April 2026 a 1.5% fuel and logistics surcharge applies to Fulfilment by Amazon handling fees, across the main European markets including Italy. Some articles report 3.5% instead: that figure applies to the US and Canada, a separate announcement for a different market. For Europe, official source in hand, the percentage is 1.5%.

4. What's actually left for you

Add it all up: the plan's fee, plus the referral fee on every sale, plus, if you use Fulfilment by Amazon, fulfilment and storage. On a thin gross margin, these items eat through what's left fast, which is exactly why it's worth doing the sum before loading the catalogue, not after the first invoice.

There's no reliably sourced "typical" margin to give you as a benchmark: it depends too much on the category, the average price of the product, and whether or not you use Fulfilment by Amazon. Anyone promising you a single number is simplifying more than reality allows. The right way to do the sum is the one Amazon itself points to: the cost calculator, on your actual product, not on an average.

5. When it's worth opening a store

Amazon works well when demand for what you sell already exists, when the brand is registered (so it can be protected with Brand Registry), and when the margin per unit can absorb the fees described above. I've handled the Amazon store launch for two brands, Tosca Blu and Bric's Valigeria: in both cases the work wasn't "open an account", it was building product listings meant to be found and to convert, and looking after the marketplace presence afterwards. The cost side is what this article covers; the operational, step-by-step side is in the quick guide to start selling on Amazon, currently only available in Italian.

Where to start

Before opening an account, run the numbers through Amazon's own calculator on your actual product, not on an average read somewhere. If what's left is too thin to absorb the commission, storage and any sponsored advertising, a different plan won't fix that.

If you have a brand with a catalogue ready and want to know whether opening a store makes sense, get in touch: we'll look at margins and category together before opening anything.