topic Re: Sudden decline in eBay sales from Australia listings in Selling

Sudden decline in eBay sales from Australia listings

dougalaus — Thu, 12 Feb 2026 02:49:22 GMT

I have experienced a dramatic drop in sales in 2026. I have 620 listings currently and the only thing I have changed is to declare that I will not despatch to USA. The reason for that is that I will not get involved in the stupidity gnerated by that country's imposition of duties. However, I do not think that can affect my sales overall. In Australia there are some cost of living challenges but not of a magnitude that would stop people from buying on ebay. It feels like ebay has made a policy change or amended the visibility of listings but I have no specific indications of anything like that. Ebay's income must also have dropped so I hope they are on the case and can find a solution.

Re: Sudden decline in eBay sales from Australia listings

love_of_cars — Thu, 12 Feb 2026 06:35:41 GMT

Yeah man, my sales are lower than the Mariana Trench over the past few weeks and I'm still selling to the US, UK and NZ.

Re: Sudden decline in eBay sales from Australia listings

davewil1964 — Thu, 12 Feb 2026 07:43:12 GMT

Unless you pay eBay to promote listings, your listings will drop in 'best' match.

If your category has buyers who don't sort by 'best' match (the default) then your listings will appear by whatever criteria the potential buyer selects.

Unfortunately most buyers don't seem to understand how the site works, nor the search options available to them.

I note that you have 4 feedback in the last month vs 72 in the last year, a statistical glitch of 2.

Re: Sudden decline in eBay sales from Australia listings

dougalaus — Fri, 20 Feb 2026 00:52:19 GMT

Thanks Dave. I have not changed my categories, listing parameters and practices or anything else. I never paid ebay to promote listings even when my sales were higher last year. Other ebayers are also complaining about reduced success rates. This suggests, then, that ebay may have changed its practices without any clarity (in my perception) on the matter.

I am disappointed that ebay did not react to my post so will ask the question on the help page.

Re: Sudden decline in eBay sales from Australia listings

sandypebbles — Fri, 20 Feb 2026 00:57:40 GMT

eBay staff very very read the member to member forum and they never reply to posts here

That said, it is important to note that there are two scammers using hacked accounts who do post here pretending to be from eBay who have posted asked a member to message them with their details, and both who regularly post here, claiming to be 'eBay experts' and offering 'advice'

They even have fake social media pages

Other members here have frequently asked the mods to remove these people/block them from posting but so far have refused to do so

IF you do get a message or a response from someone claiming to be eBay, it is not

Re: Sudden decline in eBay sales from Australia listings

dougalaus — Fri, 20 Feb 2026 01:50:50 GMT

An ebay representative confirmed that they have not chnaged their practices or methodology. He could see on my account that some nuyers have not posted feedback but that has always been the case. He also noted that there is one defect (couldn't find a sold book; refunded buyer and apologised).

In the end he could only suggest I keep listing items and hope that sales will improve.

Re: Sudden decline in eBay sales from Australia listings

*casey* — Fri, 20 Feb 2026 04:38:54 GMT

"and both who regularly post here, claiming to be 'eBay experts' and offering 'advice'"

And S is now dropshipping from AliExpress / Temu !

Re: Sudden decline in eBay sales from Australia listings

sandypebbles — Fri, 20 Feb 2026 04:40:40 GMT

No surprise when they are 100% supported by all parties in their scamming

Re: Sudden decline in eBay sales from Australia listings

south.coffee — Fri, 20 Feb 2026 04:50:31 GMT

Depending on your selling category, sales can fluctuate seasonally. Generally many people are on holidaze in January and with back to school / work and Christmas credit cards coming in, you can get a push back in sales.

Another issue gaining relevance is the switch to Ai search engines which appear to be dishing up mixed results, unless a buyer has very specific search terms. Plus as we all know, eBay is rolling out Ai every which way to save money, them, not us...

We refer to Ai as 'Advertising Income' or 'Artificial Information' but more the former...

Re: Sudden decline in eBay sales from Australia listings

*casey* — Fri, 20 Feb 2026 05:18:09 GMT

" However, I do not think that can affect my sales overall. In Australia there are some cost of living challenges but not of a magnitude that would stop people from buying on ebay.

Other ebayers are also complaining about reduced success rates"

Ask around.

In some categories buyers can hardly find items listed by good, honest Australian sellers amongst all the scam listings, dropshipping rubbish, more often than not listed by Chinese sellers.

eBay likes to call them 'Top Rated Sellers'

Buyers are fed up with it and are increasingly leaving this site and shopping elsewhere.

This ,in turn, affects ALL sellers , especially our Australian sellers

Re: Sudden decline in eBay sales from Australia listings

padi*0409 — Fri, 20 Feb 2026 06:33:18 GMT

@*casey* wrote:

Buyers are fed up with it and are increasingly leaving this site and shopping elsewhere.

I completely agree with you Casey, 5 or more years ago I would have had 50 or so items on my Watchlist.

What is it now ? Three......................!!!

Re: Sudden decline in eBay sales from Australia listings

chameleon54 — Fri, 20 Feb 2026 10:54:40 GMT

@*casey* wrote:
" However, I do not think that can affect my sales overall. In Australia there are some cost of living challenges but not of a magnitude that would stop people from buying on ebay.

Other ebayers are also complaining about reduced success rates"

Ask around.

In some categories buyers can hardly find items listed by good, honest Australian sellers amongst all the scam listings, dropshipping rubbish, more often than not listed by Chinese sellers.
eBay likes to call them 'Top Rated Sellers'

Buyers are fed up with it and are increasingly leaving this site and shopping elsewhere.

This ,in turn, affects ALL sellers , especially our Australian sellers

Ebay have just released their financials for the December 2025 quarter. Gross Merchandise Volume ( stuff sold ) up 10% on same quarter 12 months ago. Active buyers up 1 % from 134 Mil. to 135 mil.

https://investors.ebayinc.com/investor-news/press-release-details/2026/eBay-Inc--Reports-Fourth-Quarter-and-Full-Year-2025-Results/default.aspx

I couldnt find the active seller number easily, but unlikely to be 10% more than 12 months ago.

SOOOO - there are still buyers out there and they are buying much more than 12 months ago. It just depends on what they are buying and who they are buying it from.

As for the OP's post, I had a dramatic decline in sales a few weeks ago. It was only me as I benchmark against a couple of similar sellers in my categories and they were going gangbusters. The difference is they list new items every day, I list when I get some spare time. I started regularly listing high quality items daily and re-kick started the selling accounts. I had my best week ever in sales a couple of weeks ago.

Re: Sudden decline in eBay sales from Australia listings

*casey* — Fri, 20 Feb 2026 10:59:46 GMT

" I had my best week ever in sales a couple of weeks ago"

I'm sure the OP will be very pleased to hear that !!!

Re: Sudden decline in eBay sales from Australia listings

chameleon54 — Fri, 20 Feb 2026 11:12:41 GMT

The best week followed a dramatic slow down that had me very worried. I thought it might be terminal for my accounts. As well as listing daily, I also sent out a stack of offers on old stock that had sat around for years. Price reduction averaged 30%. I had a huge response to the offers - much higher than expected.

I have always believed the eBay algorythms have a strong response to new listings and sales. The more you sell, the higher visibility you receive and so you sell even more. The reverse is also true. Slow sales lower visibility and so sales drop even further.

This can result in a death spiral if not addressed. I have found the way to address it is to list new items regularly, list popular items that you know will sell at a reasonable price to get things started and send out offers to get sales going again.

I hope this helps the OP and others who are experiencing a rapid decline in sales and shows things can be turned around quickly and quite dramatically.

Re: Sudden decline in eBay sales from Australia listings

*casey* — Fri, 20 Feb 2026 12:21:47 GMT

"In some categories buyers can hardly find items listed by good, honest Australian sellers amongst all the scam listings"

To add, when a seller is down to 19.1% feedback and the problem has now been ongoing for over a year

The 48,950 items still listed do tend to clog up the system !!!

https://community.ebay.com.au/t5/Buying/2-months-I-have-no-item-and-seller-won-t-answer/td-p/2634906/page/2

Re: Sudden decline in eBay sales from Australia listings

artrato3 — Fri, 20 Feb 2026 21:08:00 GMT

Thanks for the heads up

Re: Sudden decline in eBay sales from Australia listings

springyzone — Fri, 20 Feb 2026 21:09:27 GMT

Disgraceful that any account can get down to 19% feedback and still have almost 50k items listed.

Or any items listed, for that matter.

Re: Sudden decline in eBay sales from Australia listings

brickworksmarket — Fri, 20 Feb 2026 21:30:08 GMT

Lately I have been using AI to tweak my selling methods as I can get an idea if it may improve sales when I run it through AI. It gives a time advantage and when you include numbers your not spending time calculating everything out. End of the day ebay is a numbers game and time is money.

Re: Sudden decline in eBay sales from Australia listings

springyzone — Sat, 21 Feb 2026 19:38:25 GMT

Ebay have just released their financials for the December 2025 quarter. Gross Merchandise Volume ( stuff sold ) up 10% on same quarter 12 months ago. Active buyers up 1 % from 134 Mil. to 135 mil.

I don't doubt you for a moment.

And it sounds as if your sales are going well.

I also agree that there are unlikely to be 10% more sellers on ebay than there were 12 months ago, if buyer numbers are only up about 1%.

So what that suggests to me is that there may have been a modest increase in the number of sellers plus there may have been an increase in the number of items listed by some sellers.

And to me, that screams China.

Admittedly, we only ever see a small cohort of sellers on this forum but the overall view I notice is that quite a few aussie sellers are not doing as well as they used to, although it does seem to depend a lot on what sort of stock they are selling.

But casey has also pointed out at various times that there seem to be more scam accounts around, some of which carry thousands of items.

Overall though, I suspect more Chinese sellers are on the bandwagon or else the same ones have increased their range of stock. It has changed the face of ebay, because I believe a lot of aussies who would once have used ebay have now moved to marketplace.

Ebay is the online equivalent of pandamart-flooded with cheap Chinese stuff, some of it not so safe either.

PS It is still better than pandamart though as you can still find some good stuff here, whereas pandamart is a wasteland.😑

Re: Sudden decline in eBay sales from Australia listings

chameleon54 — Sun, 22 Feb 2026 11:31:32 GMT

The thing that really stood out to me in eBays December Quarter 2025 results report was the VERY STRONG emphasis it was placing on pre-loved fashion and collectibles. This is a marked change in language and direction for the company and suggests it has stopped trying to copy a couple of other major sales platforms and is embracing its key strength and point of difference which is pre-loved fashion and collectibles. The following is an excerpt from the report ( my red highlighting to save people reading the scroller )

eBay delivered its largest-ever slate of eBay Live holiday shopping events, driving real-time engagement around pre-loved fashion, sneakers, collectibles and refurbished tech during a peak shopping season.
The company released a beta of its next generation Magical Listing experience on iOS and Android for new and reactivated sellers in the US. The AI-enabled tool radically simplifies the listing process, enabling these sellers to generate suggested titles, categories, item specifics and pricing guidance from a single photo. Early results have been powerful and the company plans to expand access in the coming months.
eBay launched a new AI-powered card scanning experience leveraging its Smart Lens technology, providing historical pricing, PSA population data and valuable insights to help support informed collecting and trading decisions.
Against the backdrop of another standout quarter for collectibles, the company released its year-end eBay Collected report, using marketplace data to highlight the products, athletes and cultural moments that defined 2025. The report reinforced eBay's position as a leading destination for collectors and enthusiasts.
Season 3 of King of Collectibles: The Goldin Touch debuted on Netflix and ranked in the top 10 shows in seven countries, including the U.S., U.K., Australia and Canada.
The company launched "Built to Spec," a new series of collaborations with cultural figures, builders and automotive enthusiasts to design custom vehicles using cars, parts and accessories sourced from eBay. The series debuted with actor and comedian Pete Davidson and highlighted eBay Motors' vast selection of parts and accessories.
eBay expanded its Authenticity Guarantee in Germany to cover apparel, shoes, accessories and jewelry, and introduced optional authentication for handbags, watches and apparel in the U.K. and Germany, enhancing trust across more pre-loved categories, brands and price points.
eBay entered a multi-year partnership with Condé Nast as the official Pre-Loved Partner across a portfolio of leading global media brands including Vogue, GQ and Vanity Fair. The collaboration underscores eBay's leadership in pre-loved fashion, expands cultural reach across key markets and supports discovery and trust in authenticated resale.