The online resale market is a massive opportunity for homeowners to make money online selling new or gently used clothing, accessories, or items you find around your home.
However, there are so many resale websites and apps out there, all with different costs and varying audiences.
Two resale giants where you can make money online are Poshmark and Mercari.
Both platforms have enormous audiences and make selling simple. But which of these two is better suited to your resale needs? Should you sell on Poshmark or Mercari?
Well, in this Mercari vs Poshmark breakdown, we're covering everything sellers need to know about each platform to help them make as much money as possible.
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About Mercari
Mercari began in Japan in 2013, but quickly grew into UK and US markets.
You can access the selling platform on your desktop, or you can use their app which is available on both Android and IOS.
The Mercari app has over 50 million downloads in the US alone, meaning there's a huge market of buyers and sellers making sales every single day.
Mercari is widely known as the ‘largest online flea market’ because there’s a huge focus on used items.
You can even sell things that aren’t in the greatest shape as long as you’re honest about that in the listing.
You can also sell a lot more than just clothing and accessories, including homewares, car parts, baby toys, and just about anything else you can think of!
About Poshmark
Poshmark is the king of online clothing resale and is known for its social media-like interface, which lets you follow sellers and create a community of people with similar fashion taste as you.
The platform has over 8 millions sellers with curated closets for you to browse and buy from.
Potential buyers can ‘like’ items in your closet when browsing and as a seller you can reach out with a price to encourage them to make a purchase.
Overall, selling on Poshmark is great if you’re looking to empty your closet of any old clothes, shoes, or accessories — and if you like thrifting, you can even buy and sell your finds for a higher price!
Mercari vs Poshmark – What Sellers Should Know
Here are some of the most important factors you should consider when choosing between Poshmark or Mercari:
- What you can sell
- Seller fees
- Ease of use
- Shipping costs
- Seller protection and refund policies
- Market size
- Payment terms
- Customer support
This is a lot to consider, but we’re going to break down everything you need to know to make the best decision for your resale business.
Now that you know the basics of each selling platform, it’s time to break down the details for this Poshmark vs Mercari throwdown!
What Can You Sell?
What you’re planning on selling will have a huge impact on the platform you can use, so let’s see what’s allowed on Mercari vs Poshmark.
Mercari Eligible Items
On Mercari, just about anything goes!
You can sell clothing, accessories, office supplies, baby toys, kitchen tools and accessories, car parts, or whatever else you want to get rid of.
Mercari does have guideline regarding selling prohibited items, which includes:
- Anything illegal
- Drugs, Tobacco, or alcohol
- FDA restricted items
- Counterfeit goods
- Weapons
However, if you're just flipping stuff online or selling some old clothing or electronics you have laying around, you shouldn't encounter problems.
Extra Reading – The Best Things To Sell On Mercari.
Poshmark Eligible Items
Poshmark has more limitations for what you can sell versus Poshmark because the platform focuses on clothing and accessories.
Here are all of the categories you can sell on Poshmark:
- Clothing (Women, Men, Kids)
- Pet Clothing & Accessories
- Handbags
- Shoes
- Beauty & Wellness
- Home (Kitchen, Bath, Bedding, Dining, Holiday, Office, Decor, Party Supplies, Storage)
Winner: Mercari has a more inclusive list of item categories that you can sell on their platform.
Seller Fees
Another important factor you’ll want to consider when choosing the right selling platform is the fees you pay as a seller.
Some resale platforms charge listing fees and others take a chunk of profit from your sales.
Either way, it’s important to look at how much these charges are, so you can decide how much it’ll hurt your potential profits.
Mercari Seller Fees
It’s completely free to list on Mercari, but the platform takes a portion of your profits whenever you make a sale.
The profit that you actually make equals the sale price, minus the selling fee, payment processing fee and shipping (should you choose to offer free shipping).
Here's how Mercari fees break down:
- Selling Fee: A minimum seller fee of 10% of your final sale price.
- Transaction Fees: A 2.9% payment processing fee and $0.30 charge.
Mercari charges buyers for shipping, but you have the option to pay for shipping, in which case this expense also comes out of your profits.
A 10% seller fee plus these transaction fees are a bit steep, but websites like Etsy and other online marketplaces often charge similar amounts.
In terms of accessing your funds and potential fees, it's free to withdraw your funds as you have a minimum of $10 in your account.
It’s also free to transfer your earnings to your bank. Otherwise, you pay a $2 fee for the transfer.
Also note that you have a 100 listing limit when you initially start out and since Mercari encourages you to relist your items frequently to get more views, it can be easy to use this up.
Overall, selling on Mercari is fairly cost effective, and the advantage is the variety of products you can sell and how snappy listing is.
Poshmark Seller Fees
Poshmark's fee structure is a little different than selling on Mercari since it works according to the value of the sale.
Here's how Poshmark fees work:
- Sales Under $15: Pay a flat-rate fee of $2.95 per sale.
- Sales Over $15: Pay a 20% commission.
On both fronts, selling on Poshmark is more expensive than selling on Mercari.
For example, if you sell something worth $10 on both Mercari and Poshmark, you're paying about $1.30 in fees on Mercari while Poshmark charges you $2.95.
And, if you sell something for $100, you're paying $20 to Poshmark but only about $13 to Mercari.
So, Mercari is a lot cheaper to sell on than Poshmark, and that's one huge takeaway.
However, like Mercari, Poshmark charges buyers for shipping and lets you print out a prepaid shipping label when you ship an order.
Winner: Mercari has the lowest fees, which is great if you’re just getting started.
Creating Listings
If you’re trying to get your resale business up and running quickly, then the process for listing is something you want to consider when choosing your selling platform.
Some sites make selling easier than others since they're more intuitive and ask for less information in order to list.
Let’s take a look at what listing is like if you sell on Poshmark or Mercari!
Mercari Listing Creation
Listing on Mercari is quick and easy to do, since it doesn't require filling out many fields to upload an item.
To create a Mercari listing, you include up to 12 photos, a product description and title, and your price.
You can also add tags to your listings which help potential buyers find your items faster if they’re searching for it.
Mercari's mobile app also makes creating listings quite speedy, so this is another plus of selling on Mercari.
Extra Reading – 16 Mercari Selling Tricks To Get More Sales.
Poshmark Listing Creation
Creating a listing on Poshmark is similar to creating one on Mercari.
You start by uploading up to 16 photos of your item and then fill in required information, which includes:
- Title
- Description
- Category
- Size
- Original Price
- Listing Price
The main difference here is that Poshmark requires listing the original MSRP of what you're selling so buyers know how much money they're saving.
However, if you can’t find the actual price, you can also give it your best approximation.
Winner: Mercari requires the least amount of info to list, so the process can be a bit faster. But Poshmark lets you upload more photos. The selling process is similar for both platforms overall.
Shipping Costs
We briefly mentioned shipping fees already, but it’s an important consideration when choosing between Poshmark or Mercari.
If you’re covering shipping, it can eat away at your profits pretty quickly– but there are ways to avoid hurting your earnings too much which is the good news!
Mercari Shipping Costs
Mercari gives you the option of offering free shipping, or charging it to your buyers directly.
While it may seem easier to have the buyer pay for shipping, the reality is that your products seem way more appealing when free shipping is offered.
But, the best way to prevent shipping from chipping away at your profit margin is to work the shipping cost into the cost of the item.
This way, the customer is technically the one paying for the shipping while still getting the appeal of free shipping.
Luckily, Mercari has great shipping rates to choose from, so the cost of sending off your items will be pretty low to begin with and your package is insured up to $200 in case of loss or damage in transit.
You can also choose to handle the shipping yourself, if you prefer.
Poshmark Shipping Fees
Like Mercari, Poshmark charges buyers with shipping automatically, which keeps more money in your pockets.
Poshmark also keeps things simple and charges $7.45 for shipping on all orders.
The possible downside to this is that buyers may take longer to consider a purchase, especially when it comes to low priced items, since they know they’re responsible for shipping costs.
You can offer shipping discounts as a Poshmark seller, but like Mercari, this comes out of your profit margin in exchange for making your listings more appealing.
Winner: Both Mercari and Poshmark charge buyers with shipping costs, although you can offer free or discounted shipping if you want.
Seller Protection & Refund Policies
When doing resale, things are inevitably going to go wrong.
Whether it's lost shipments, scamming sellers, broken merchandise, or simply just difficult buyers, having a platform that has policies in place to protect you as the seller is an important factor to consider.
So, let's examine what policies are in place to help protect your business for both Poshmark versus Mercari!
Mercari Seller Protection
Mercari usually favours the buyer if something goes wrong in a purchase, which is honestly pretty standard for most online marketplaces.
So, in most claims or disputes, you have to refund the buyer unless you can prove the buyer is lying or is responsible for whatever claim they're making.
This means it's important to keep photos of your listing, and take photos of when you pack and ship your items as well in case the buyer claims you never sent the package.
In terms of refunds, buyers have up to three days within their order arriving to ask for a refund and send it back.
Mercari actually holds your profits until both you and the buyer have left a rating for each other, so it could take a while for the funds to hit your account.
Mercari sellers also get shipment protection up to $200, so you’re covered if anything goes wrong in transit.
Poshmark Seller Protection
Poshmark’s prepaid shipping labels are insured against any damages or loss that may happen during transit.
With Poshmark, your funds are also held for up to 3 days just like Mercari if the buyer doesn’t immediately accept the shipment.
If a buyer requests a return, they must submit photos to Poshmark and give a good reason so the platform can review the request.
If a return request is approved, you have no choice but to accept the return and Poshmark automatically refunds the buyer.
Many sellers have noted that Poshmark is also very buyer oriented.
A good tip is to take ample evidence of you shipping the product in its described condition, since buyers will sometimes damage the item in order to get a return.
Even in these cases, Poshmark has been known to side with buyers, in which case you may have to submit a counterclaim or two before getting your money.
Winner: Pretty much a tie here, both platforms offer shipping protections but are not immune to buyer return scams.
👉 15 Ways To Make Money With Your Home.
Market Size
Another factor to consider when deciding to sell on Poshmark or Mercari is the actual size of each platform.
And on this front, the user base and number of app downloads is a pretty good indication of what your number of potential buyers may look like.
Mercari Market Size
Mercari has around 15 million active monthly users and over 350k new items listed daily.
The IOS and Android apps together have been downloaded over 50 million times.
When I look up Mercari's website traffic on SEMRush, it also shows around 55 million monthly users!
However, most of this traffic is from Japan, and there's only about 4 million organic visitors from the United States and Canada per month.
Poshmark Market Size
Recently, active users on Poshmark reached about 32 million.
This is more than double the size of Mercari, and there's actually over 8 million sellers, and a sale is made on the platform every second.
When I look up Poshmark's organic traffic on SEMRush, it shows around 11 million monthly users.
This is smaller than Mercari, but almost all of this traffic is from the United States, Canada, and the UK.
Winner: Poshmark has a larger active user base in North America while Mercari is better for selling in Japan. However, Mercari is still a viable, popular selling app in North America!
Payment Terms
So you’ve made a sale, but when do the funds actually get deposited into your account when selling on Poshmark vs. Mercari?
Mercari Payment Terms
As a seller, Mercari deposits funds in your account when the buyer receives the shipment and gives you a rating on the platform.
If the buyer doesn't do this within three days, the funds will automatically be added to your balance.
You can transfer Mercari funds to your bank once your balance has hit $10. If you want to transfer the funds before hitting this threshold, you pay a $2 fee.
Additionally, bank transfers can take up to five business days, or you can pay $2 to get the funds immediately through instant pay.
Poshmark Payment Terms
Poshmark is similar to Mercari in that you will receive your funds 3 days after the buyer receives the shipment, unless they accept the shipment in the platform prior to this.
You can then transfer the earnings to your bank through direct deposit, which takes 2-3 days to process.
Winner: Poshmark’s deposit period is faster than Mercari so you get your profits slightly sooner.
Customer Support
When deciding if you want to sell on Mercari or Poshmark, you also want to factor in what their customer support is like.
It’s good to know that if something goes wrong, you can access the support you need to have the issue resolved.
You also want to think about the customer perspective and why customers might shop more on one platform than others and what sort of customer support they receive.
Mercari Customer Support
Mercari has a Help Center that features the most common questions and problems you might encounter with detailed answers and solutions.
If you can’t find the right solution there, you can always email their customer support team or contact them via phone if it’s an issue of fraud.
Poshmark Customer Support
Like Mercari, Poshmark also has a very detailed support center where you can find solutions to common problems, but you can always email them if you have any further unresolved issues.
Winner: Both platforms have similar systems in place to handle complaints and issues.
Pros & Cons
So, is Mercari better than Poshmark?
Well, it largely depends on what you're selling and what your goals are. Plus, each marketplace has several pros and cons worth considering.
Mercari Pros
- Low Fees: Mercari has lower seller fees than Mercari so you keep more of the profits.
- Easy Listing Process: Mercari only requires a few photos, a price, and a description before you can list your item.
- Variety: You can sell more categories on Mercari than Poshmark, so it has more overall opportunities for sellers.
- Shipping Protection: Mercari offers great shipping rates and let’s you choose if you want to pay for it or not. Your items are also protected from loss or damage during transit.
Mercari Cons
- Delayed Payments: The rating system Mercari uses means that your funds can often be delayed up to three days, in addition to the time it takes to transfer the balance to your bank. Overall, you get your money from Mercari slower than from Poshmark.
- Relisting: Mercari recommends you relist your items frequently in order to secure your spot at the top of the search page, which can be time consuming and tedious.
Extra Reading – The Best Apps & Websites Like Mercari For Sellers.
Poshmark Pros
- Hassle-Free Shipping: Since buyers are responsible for shipping costs, all you have to do is print your prepaid shipping label and send off the package. You also have piece of mind that everything is insured against damages or loss during transit.
- Brand Recognition: Poshmark has fewer categories than Mercari, but it's the go-to platform for selling apparel and accessories.
- Large User Base: Poshmark has one of the largest user bases of all resale platforms, so you have plenty of potential buyers.
Poshmark Cons
- High Seller Fees: Poshmark takes 20% of every sale over $15 and is overall more expensive for sellers than Mercari.
- Lots of Work: The best way to grow your customer base is to stay consistent and put effort into building a community of people with the same sizing and style as you, meaning you have to be very active on the platform.
Extra Reading – The Best Apps & Websites Like Poshmark.
Verdict: Is Mercari Better Than Poshmark?
Unfortunately, there isn't a simple answer to if selling on Mercari vs Poshmark is better for sellers or not.
But, here are some of the factors that might make one selling marketplace the right choice for you!
Choose Mercari If…
Mercari is better to sell on than Poshmark if you have a wide variety of stuff to sell, especially non-clothing items.
This is because Mercari has way more categories for what you can sell, so depending on the items you’re listing, this may be the better option for you.
Mercari is also way better for second-hand items that might have a little more wear to them, because buyers here are looking for a bargain.
Finally, Mercari also has lower seller fees than Poshmark, so if you don't need money fast and can wait to make a sale, Mercari is more cost-effective.
Choose Poshmark If…
Poshmark is the king of reselling clothing and accessories, so it's a more obvious choice than Mercari if this is what you're selling.
Plus, Poshmark also has a larger North American audience than Mercari, so the market is larger.
Ultimately, if you're selling brand name clothing, shoes, or accessories, you’ll likely find people willing to pay the right price on this platform.
Just note seller fees are higher than Mercari, so factor this into your pricing and margins!
Choose Both Platforms If…
If you can’t decide which platform is best for you, why not try both!
Neither platform charges a listing fee so you can actively sell on both without worrying about extra charges.
Just make sure to stay on top of your listings and to remove ones from one platform if you end up making a sale on the other one!
Extra Reading – Mercari vs eBay – What's Best For Sellers?
Final Thoughts
So, is Mercari or Poshmark better for selling?
Well, here's a quick way to think about it.
Mercari: Low commission and no listing fee. Best for quick listing of second-hand items.
Poshmark: Largest user base. Best for curating your own shop with pricier brand name and designer fashion.
At the end of the day, you can always try both for your selling side hustle to find what works best for you! And both platforms can help homeowners clear out their closets and declutter their home.
I hope our Mercari vs Poshmark breakdown helps you make the right decision and ultimately make more sales!
