Marketplace fees, from the rate cards
Auction Marketplace Fees Compared: What Sellers and Buyers Pay in 2026
Every online auction marketplace publishes a rate card, and almost none of them are easy to compare. Commission is quoted by category and partner tier, event fees by format, and the fee your buyers pay is often not on the card at all. This page puts the published figures for HiBid, Proxibid, LiveAuctioneers, Invaluable, the-saleroom and GunBroker side by side, adds what it costs to run the same sale on your own website, and gives you a buyer's premium calculator that shows who keeps what on a single lot and across a year.
Figures checked against each marketplace's own pages on October 13, 2026. We build one of the alternatives, so read the Circuit row with that in mind.
Seller and Buyer Fees by Marketplace
Commission figures are for arts, antiques, collectibles and firearms unless stated. Bronze, Silver and Gold are ATG's partner tiers; on Proxibid and LiveAuctioneers the lower event fees are conditional on using ATG's marketplaces or white label exclusively. "Not published" means we could not find the figure on the marketplace's own pages, not that there is no fee.
| Marketplace | Owner | Seller commission on hammer | Event, listing and other seller fees | Fee charged to your buyers | Payment processing |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| HiBid HiBid alternatives | Sandhills Global (402 Ventures LLC) | 2% of online hammer, all categories | $0.25 per unique bid, capped at $150 per auction; $75 webcast setup; $195 listing-only; optional $1 card authentication capped at $50. AuctionFlex 360 subscription $95 to $295 per month. | None. HiBid does not handle payments; the auction house charges its own premium. | Auction house processes its own cards |
| Proxibid Proxibid alternatives | Auction Technology Group (ATG) | 5% arts and antiques, estates, firearms and all other; 3% vehicles; 2% farm and heavy equipment | Live: $675 + $0.50 per lot capped at $1,275 (Bronze), $675 (Silver), $525 (Gold). Timed: $275, $225 or $25. $500 activation for live and again for timed. Silver and Gold require exclusivity. | Not published. The user agreement defines a "Proxibid Premium" the seller incorporates into the buyer's total; many auction houses show it as a separate online surcharge. | atgPay 3.99% + $0.25 per card transaction; ACH 1% + $0.50 |
| LiveAuctioneers LiveAuctioneers alternatives | Auction Technology Group (ATG) | 5% of hammer, all categories except real estate | Live: $895 (Bronze), $675 (Silver), $525 (Gold) per event day; $1,095 for non-US clients without payments or shipping. Timed: $275, $225 or $25. $500 activation for live and again for timed. | Not on the rate card. Auction houses commonly publish a higher premium for LiveAuctioneers bidders than for bidders who register directly. | LivePayments 3.99% + $0.25 per card transaction; ACH 1% + $0.50 |
| Invaluable Invaluable alternatives and fees | Liquidity Services (since October 1, 2026) | Pricing parity program: per-lot commission of 5% under $5,000, 4% from $5,000, 3% from $10,000, 2% from $15,000, 1% from $20,000, each applied to the whole lot. Standard commission outside the program is not published. | Not published. Private Label sites offered with no upfront or listing fees on Silver and Gold plans. | 5% online buyer fee on top of the auction house's premium, unless the auction house joins the parity program and absorbs it. | Invaluable Payments, rates not published |
| the-saleroom Who owns the auction marketplaces | Auction Technology Group (ATG) | Not published on a public page. Trade notices in 2018 reported an increase to 4.95% plus VAT. | Not published | "Around 4.95% of the hammer price" online commission, per the-saleroom's help centre; VAT is added by most UK auction houses. | Not published |
| GunBroker GunBroker alternatives | GunBroker.com, LLC | Final value fee on firearms and collectibles: 6% up to $400, 4% from $400 to $15,000, 3% from $15,000 to $20,000, 2% above. Other categories 8% up to $15,000, then 3% and 2%. | No insertion fee for basic listings. Optional upgrades $0.10 to $7.00 per listing; reserve price 2% of reserve, $1 to $100. FFL document fee $5, $7 or $10 per sold item. | 1% Marketplace Service Fee on every purchase; 10% premium on Collector's Elite items. | Seller collects payment |
| Bidsquare Circuit vs Bidsquare Cloud | Independent, founded by regional auction houses | Not published; flat-rate and percentage options quoted on request | Not published | Not published; set with the auction house | Not published |
| Circuit (your own website) Circuit pricing | N.Z. Circuit Auction Ltd. | Standard Plan: 2% on bids placed through your online platform, none on floor or phone bids. Enterprise Plan: fixed price, no commission. | None per event. Standard Plan $250 per month with annual commitment ($350 month to month). No setup fee. | None. Your premium is the only premium your bidders see. | Your own card processor; integration add-on $100 per month on Standard |
Three of the six marketplaces belong to one company. Auction Technology Group owns Proxibid, LiveAuctioneers and the-saleroom, as well as BidSpotter, EstateSales.NET, Auction Mobility and Wavebid; see who owns the auction marketplaces. Invaluable was bought by Liquidity Services on October 1, 2026. HiBid belongs to Sandhills Global.
Buyer's Premium and Marketplace Fee Calculator
Pick a marketplace to load its published rates, or type your own. The calculator shows what the winning bidder pays, what your auction house keeps after the marketplace's commission, and what the marketplace takes from both sides. Tiered fees (GunBroker, Invaluable parity) are calculated per lot the way each rate card describes. Event fees, payment processing and tax are left out of the per-lot figures and handled in the annual estimate below.
Circuit Standard Plan: 2% on bids placed through your online platform, no buyer-side fee. Floor and phone bids carry no commission.
Annual estimate
Enter your year and the table re-calculates the published fees for each option. Commission is applied to online hammer only. Event fees use the Bronze tier, the one with no exclusivity requirement, and assume 400 lots per live sale for Proxibid's per-lot fee. HiBid's per-bid fee is assumed to reach its $150 cap. Payment processing, tax, Wavebid or AuctionFlex subscriptions and buyer-side fees are excluded.
| Option | Commission | Event and platform fees | Approximate annual cost | Share of online hammer |
|---|
Circuit Enterprise is a fixed price quoted for your auction house and is not shown as a number. For most auction houses above roughly $1,000,000 of online hammer it is the cheaper plan; see pricing. For a worked example with the same assumptions written out, see the cost sections of our HiBid and Proxibid guides.
How to Read a Marketplace Rate Card
Commission is on hammer, not on what you keep
A 5% commission on a $1,000 lot is $50 whether your buyer's premium was 15% or 25%, and whether your consignor's commission was 10% or zero. On a lot where you earn 20 points between the two, 5 points to the marketplace is a quarter of your gross margin. Read the percentage against your margin, not against the hammer price.
Buyer-side fees are your reputation
When a marketplace adds its fee to your premium, the bidder sees one combined percentage and attributes it to you. A 20% premium becomes "25%" on Invaluable and "about 25% plus VAT" on the-saleroom. Auction houses that run their sales on their own site often publish a lower premium there, which is both a saving for the bidder and a reason to register directly.
Tiers are conditions, not rewards
ATG's Bronze, Silver and Gold tiers on Proxibid and LiveAuctioneers are not volume discounts. Silver requires using ATG's branded white label as your only white label solution or using ATG marketplaces exclusively, and Gold adds routing every invoice through ATG's payment processor. The event fee saving is real; so is what it costs you in options. Our Proxibid guide works through it.
Watch the small print
Every rate card we read reserves the right to change fees at any time, effective on posting. Category rates require 75% of lots to be approved items or the "all other" rate applies. Activation fees recur after twelve months of inactivity. None of these is unusual; all of them belong in your model.
The Alternative the Table Points To
Marketplaces earn a percentage of your hammer because they bring bidders. Once your auction house has a specialty, a client list and a name collectors recognise, most of the bidders in your sale are yours already, and the percentage is paying for a logo. White label auction software runs the catalog, bidding, registration and back office on your own website under your own brand, charges a subscription or a fixed price, and charges your buyers nothing. Circuit does that for auction houses selling collectibles, from AI cataloging through live and timed bidding to a CRM that keeps the underbidders. Many auction houses still list on a marketplace for reach; the difference is that the sale, and the bidder, live on their domain.
Frequently Asked Questions
From the published 2026 rate cards: HiBid charges 2% of online hammer plus small per-bid and setup fees. Proxibid and LiveAuctioneers, both owned by Auction Technology Group, charge 5% of hammer on arts, antiques, estates and firearms plus event fees from $25 to $895 per sale. Invaluable's pricing parity program charges 5% on lots under $5,000 falling to 1% above $20,000. GunBroker charges a tiered final value fee of 6% on the first $400 and 4% up to $15,000 for firearms. Most also charge for payment processing at about 3.99% plus 25 cents per card transaction.
Several do. Invaluable charges online buyers 5% on top of the auction house's premium unless the auction house absorbs it. the-saleroom charges around 4.95% of hammer as an online commission. GunBroker charges a 1% Marketplace Service Fee. HiBid charges buyers nothing. LiveAuctioneers and Proxibid publish no buyer fee, but many auction houses quote a higher premium to bidders on those platforms than to bidders who register directly.
Multiply the hammer price by the premium percentage and add it to the hammer. A $1,000 lot with a 20% premium costs the buyer $1,200 before tax and shipping. If the lot sold through a marketplace with its own buyer fee, add that percentage of hammer as well: the same lot on a marketplace charging 5% costs $1,250. The calculator on this page does the arithmetic and shows how much of the total the marketplace keeps.
The share of a sale a marketplace keeps once you add its seller commission, its buyer-side fee and any event or payment fees together. On a $1,000 lot sold at 5% seller commission with a 5% buyer fee, the marketplace keeps $100, or 10% of hammer, before payment processing. Auction Technology Group reported 2025 revenue of $190 million, most of it commission, which is the take rate across its marketplaces added up.
Usually, once you have bidders of your own. Own-website platforms charge a subscription, a low commission or a fixed price rather than 5% of hammer plus event fees, and they charge your buyers nothing. Circuit's Standard Plan is $250 per month plus 2% on online bids; the Enterprise Plan is a fixed price with no commission. The trade is that the marketplace's browsing audience is not included, which is why many auction houses run the sale on their own site and list selected catalogs on a marketplace for reach.
Each marketplace's own published rate card, fee schedule or help centre page, listed under Sources at the bottom of this page, and checked on October 13, 2026. Where a marketplace does not publish a figure the table says so rather than guessing. Rate cards change, so confirm the current page before you sign anything.
Marketplace Guides
- HiBid alternatives and fees
- Proxibid alternatives, fees and partner tiers
- LiveAuctioneers alternatives
- Invaluable alternatives and fees
- GunBroker alternatives for firearms auction houses
- Who owns the auction marketplaces
- Best white label auction software
- Buyer's premium and hammer price in the auction glossary
Sources (checked October 13, 2026)
- AuctionFlex 360 pricing (HiBid fees) and HiBid terms of use
- Proxibid master rate card 2026 and Proxibid unified user agreement
- LiveAuctioneers master rate card
- Invaluable pricing parity
- the-saleroom help centre: extra costs; 2018 seller commission figure from a Fellows notice to clients
- GunBroker: fees for using GunBroker.com
- Circuit Auction pricing
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