10 eBay Statistics You Need to Know in 2024 [Infographic]

So you’ve read about how lucrative ecommerce can be and you’re keen to give it a go. You know you’ve got to sell. But where and how do you begin?

Started in 1995, eBay has become one of the most popular online marketplaces for sellers to market and sell their goods today and is certainly an attractive and good option for an ecommerce venture.

But before simply launching yourself onto the platform, there are certain eBay statistics and facts that can help you with crafting the best eBay strategy for your ecommerce store.

That involves understanding everything – including how many people use eBay, its biggest markets, and their best-selling product categories.

In this article, we’ll present to you the ten most important eBay statistics you need to know in 2024.

If you’re serious about launching an ecommerce business on eBay, then you definitely need to take notice of this eBay dropshipping guide.

1. Number of eBay Users

One of the very first eBay statistics sellers should know concerns its usage – how many people use eBay.

As of Q3 2022, there are 135 million eBay users worldwide (eBay, 2022). This refers to the number of shoppers who have bought something on eBay at least once in the past 12 months. The number of eBay users in Q3 2022 marks a 2.2 percent fall from the previous quarter and a 11.2 percent decrease from the year before.

To that end, the company is working on helping sellers boost buyer engagement and encourage sales by allowing them to upload videos to their eBay stores and increasing the number of photos they can use on their product listings. 

Even though eBay’s a US-registered company, its users are scattered across 190 different markets. In fact, over half of eBay’s total gross merchandise volume comes from its international audience.

2. eBay App Usage and Downloads

The next eBay statistic you need to know is that its shopping app ranks among the most popular shopping apps in the United States. As many as 3.67 million shoppers use it every single month (Statista, 2021). This makes the eBay app more popular than those of some of its main rivals such as OfferUp and Alibaba, at least in terms of monthly active users. 

The eBay app is also extremely popular among Android users. Recent eBay statistics show that the app is used by over 1.6 million Android users every single day. This makes it the fourth-most popular shopping app on the Google Play Store, behind Walmart, Amazon, and SHEIN.

Even though the eBay shopping app was launched in 2008, it continues to generate many downloads every month. According to SensorTower, an app analytics company, the eBay shopping app was downloaded one million times in October 2022.

3. Top-Selling Product Categories on eBay

“Electronics & Accessories” is the top-selling product category on eBay with 16.4 percent of all items sold on eBay falling into this category (Edison Trends, 2018). Unsurprisingly, this ties in with what most eBay users search for.

If you’re interested in selling electronic goods and accessories, you might want to consider Bluetooth-related items. Five of the 12 most-sold electronic items on eBay offer Bluetooth capabilities.

But if electronics aren’t your thing, clothing and accessories are nearly quite as lucrative – 16 percent of all products sold on eBay are from this category. “Automotive” (11 percent), “Health & Beauty” (nine percent), and “Sports & Outdoors” complete the list of the five best-selling product categories on eBay.

4. Number of eBay Listings

Here’s another eBay statistic that could affect your decision on how and what to sell: there are a total of 1.7 billion listings on eBay (eBay, 2022).

That’s more than 12 times the number of eBay buyers, which means there are a lot of products vying for the attention of 135 million people! With electronics and accessories as eBay’s top-selling product category, expect all sellers to want a piece of that pie.

Undoubtedly, competition for sales is high, which means you must be prepared to go the extra mile with optimizing your product listings. Writing informative product descriptions and including relevant keywords will help send your products higher on eBay’s search results pages.

However, you shouldn’t only be considering the top-selling categories because there are plenty of other ways to get your products selling on eBay.

For sellers who are still unsure about what they should sell online, eBay actually has an extremely handy page that can help sellers decide what to list and sell. Their “best-selling items” page has a list of products that serves as a guide for potential sellers. Not only does it recommend categories, but it also dives into specific items in each category.

5. eBay’s Gross Merchandise Volume

eBay prides itself as an online platform to discover “great value and unique selection” and it sure has numbers to back that up. 

The latest eBay statistics from the third quarter of 2023 show that the amount of gross merchandise volume (GMV) on its marketplace hit $18 billion (eBay, 2023). In layman’s terms, that means that $18 billion worth of goods were bought and sold on its marketplace platforms during this period. This figure includes its mobile apps, localized counterparts, and ebay.com itself.

The $18 billion in GMV in Q3 2023 marks a 1.7 percent increase from the previous year, when total GMV registered at $17.7 billion, and a 1.2 percent fall from Q2 2023. Of the latest quarter’s GMV, $8.6 billion (or 48.3 percent) came from sales in the United States, which is the platform’s biggest market. The remaining $9.4 billion were generated by eBay’s global users. 

6. Importance of Mobile to eBay’s GMV

With consumers spending increasingly more time on mobile devices, many are now researching for and even purchasing products with their mobile phones. In fact, mobile commerce sales have been rising over the past few years and are projected to surpass $2.5 trillion in 2024. 

That said, expect eBay to place significant emphasis on its mobile apps going forward. This is especially since as much as $11.6 billion worth of eBay’s GMV in Q3 2023 were generated via mobile devices (eBay, 2023). Currently, more than half of all of eBay’s transactions are viewed on a mobile device before the purchase is carried out. So if you’re an ecommerce owner looking to sell on eBay, we recommend you go the extra mile to ensure that your product listings on the platform are optimized for mobile users.

7. Promoted Listings on eBay

With its massive pool of 1.7 billion eBay listings, it’s no wonder some eBay sellers are opting to invest a little more in advertising to ensure their listings are able to cut through the crowd and reach users.

As it stands, more than 940,000 sellers are using eBay’s “promoted listings” feature on over 250 million listings (eBay, 2019). This helps sellers to boost their listings’ visibility and, consequently, sales.

Using eBay’s prompted listings presents a win-win situation for both eBay and its sellers. Sellers can choose the rate they would like to apply to the listing and sellers are only charged for the promotion if the item is sold.

Clearly, it’s a feature that’s worked extremely well. This has helped to generate $89 million in revenue for eBay from just the second quarter of 2019 alone, marking a year-over-year growth rate of over 130 percent.

8. Free Shipping on eBay

If you want to take your eBay business even further, you may want to consider offering free shipping. As it stands, 71 percent of all purchases made on eBay have been shipped for free (eBay, 2019).

According to eBay, this is an added incentive that helps to attract more buyers and boost visibility by having listings placed higher in search results.

But even though free shipping may be an attractive option for buyers, as a seller, you may want to give this option a bit more thought.

Depending on the product you’re selling, offering free shipping may end up costing you more. This is especially for bulkier items sold to buyers in inaccessible areas or who are located far away from you.

Before you decide, you may want to check out our article on whether you should offer free shipping to help guide your decision.

9. eBay Boosts Business Growth

This next eBay statistic shows just how lucrative the marketplace can be for businesses selling on it. According to a report, as many as 95 percent of sellers say they rely on eBay for business success and call it a vital tool (eBay, 2023). 

More specifically, 29 percent of sellers claim their business wouldn’t be able to exist without eBay, while 36 percent say they rely “a lot” on the platform. Another 29 percent say their business is boosted by eBay. 

But how exactly is eBay helping brands grow? Data from the same report reveals that eBay has helped more than three out of four businesses reach and sell to new markets as well as identify new potential customers. In fact, an earlier survey suggests that one of the benefits of selling on eBay is its diverse buyers—nearly half of eBay sellers say this diversity is “essential” to their business.

The above numbers show that whether you’re a newly minted seller or looking to expand your brand presence, eBay holds plenty of growth potential and shouldn’t be missed out on.

10. Distribution of eBay Sellers

If the above eBay statistics still aren’t enough to convince you of the online marketplace’s popularity in the US, here’s another fact that can attest to that: nearly three out of every ten (28 percent, to be exact) of all eBay sellers are in the US (Statista, 2019).

That makes seven million US sellers out of the 25 million eBay sellers around the globe.

The second largest group of eBay sellers lies across the Atlantic in the UK, where 25 percent of all eBay sellers are. That means more than half of all eBay sellers worldwide are located in either of these two countries.

This is followed by China (17 percent) and Germany (16 percent). These four markets are home to 86 percent of all eBay sellers.

Australia completes the list of the top five countries where eBay sellers are located, with three percent of sellers from the land Down Under.

Conclusion

Now that you’ve been presented with the above-mentioned eBay statistics, you have a better idea of the preferences of eBay users as well as some characteristics of eBay listings. With that, you can start getting your eBay strategy up and running to give your competitors who are already on there a run for their money or to get a headstart on those who have yet to realize the ecommerce potential eBay holds. While you’re at it, don’t forget to check out the best dropshipping products to sell this fall for ideas!

Summary: eBay Statistics

Here’s a summary of the eBay statistics you need to know in 2024:

1. There are 135 million eBay users worldwide.
2. The eBay app is used by 3.67 million users in the US every month.
3. 16.4 percent of items sold on eBay fall in the “Electronics & Accessories” category, the top-selling category.
4. There are 1.7 billion listings on eBay.
5. $18 billion worth of goods were bought and sold on eBay’s marketplace platforms in Q3 2023.
6. As much as $11.6 billion worth of merchandise is purchased on eBay via mobile devices per quarter.
7. 940,000 eBay sellers use the “Promoted Listings” feature on over 250 million listings.
8. 71 percent of eBay purchases are shipped for free.
9. 94 percent of sellers say eBay contributes to their success.
10. 28 percent of eBay sellers are in the US.

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