Calculate What Redbubble Actually Pays You

Why this matters

Redbubble's fee structure changed materially in 2025 and the payment threshold changed in July 2026, so a lot of published advice is describing a platform that no longer exists. More importantly, the two fees interact in a way that produces a genuinely counter-intuitive result on the Standard tier — one that decides what markup you should set, and that you will not discover by looking at a single sale.

Worked example

One sale, then one month, on all three tiers

An artist selling one t-shirt design. VERIFIED REDBUBBLE FACTS: the three tiers and their platform fee rates, the excess markup fee and its 20% threshold, the $150 monthly fee cap and its credit-back behaviour, and the $10 payment threshold. ILLUSTRATIVE ARTIST INPUTS, none of them benchmarks or recommendations: a $20.00 base price, a 30% markup, and sales volumes of 10 and 40 in a month. Base prices vary by product, by delivery destination and with currency movement, so check yours. DOCUMENTED FEE BASIS: Redbubble defines the platform fee as a percentage of monthly gross earnings and the excess markup fee as a separate deduction from gross earnings above the 20% markup threshold. This example therefore applies the platform fee to gross artist margin before account-fee deductions.

The same 40 sales produce $90.00, $152.00 or $240.00 depending only on the tier Redbubble has assigned. And at 10 sales on the Standard tier, the net is $20.00 whether the markup is 20%, 30% or 50%.

Three findings, and the second is the one worth acting on. The tier does more than any decision you make. On identical sales, Standard nets $90.00 where Pro nets $240.00. You cannot choose your tier and nobody can tell you how to move between them, so the only sensible response is to plan on the tier you are actually in — and to redo this arithmetic if it changes. **Below the cap, a Standard artist's markup above 20% is worth nothing to them.** The month nets $20.00 at 20%, at 30% and at 50%, because a 50% platform fee and a 50% excess markup fee together consume the entire excess. What the higher markup does is raise the retail price — $22.00 becomes $26.00 becomes $30.00 — while your earnings sit still. That is not our inference; Redbubble states that earnings above a 20% markup go entirely toward fees until the cap is reached. But it stops being true at the cap, which is why the 40-sale scenario matters. There, fees would have been $160.00, the cap holds them to $150.00, and the extra markup does reach the artist — $90.00 against the $80.00 that a 20% markup would have produced. So the honest answer to "what markup should I set?" is that it depends on your tier and your volume, and it is a calculation rather than a recommendation. One caution on all of this: none of it says anything about how many sales you will make. It says what a given number of sales is worth.

Assumptions: The $20.00 base price, the 30% markup and the sales volumes of 10 and 40 are illustrative artist inputs, not benchmarks, recommendations or expected results. Base prices vary by product, by delivery destination and with currency movement, so no universal figure exists. Sales volumes are arithmetic scenarios chosen to show behaviour below and at the fee cap; no authoritative source establishes typical Redbubble sales volumes or earnings, and nothing here predicts either. Redbubble defines the platform fee as a percentage of monthly gross earnings and the excess markup fee as a separate deduction from gross earnings above the threshold, so the platform fee is applied to gross artist margin before account-fee deductions. All figures in USD; the fee cap and payment threshold have separate GBP and EUR values.

Illustrative figures for teaching only — not a benchmark, average or guarantee.

Illustrative Beginner Scenario

Jonah, raising his markups

Situation

Jonah had read that his markups were too low and pushed most of his products from 20% up to 35%, expecting his earnings per sale to rise by roughly three quarters.

What went wrong

He was on the Standard tier and his monthly fees had never come close to the cap. The 50% platform fee and the 50% excess markup fee were together taking everything above the 20% mark, so his net earnings did not move at all. What did move was his retail prices, which rose across his whole shop.

What changed

He worked out one sale and then one month properly, and found the flat line. Then he ran the same arithmetic at a higher sales volume and saw that once total fees hit the $150 cap, the extra markup did start reaching him — which told him the markup question was really a question about volume and tier, not about a percentage.

Result

He set markups deliberately rather than by rule of thumb, with a note of the arithmetic behind the choice and a reminder to redo it if his tier or his volume changed. He has no idea whether his sales will grow, and the calculation does not tell him — it tells him what a given number of sales would be worth.

Lesson

On the Standard tier below the fee cap, raising your markup above 20% raises what customers pay and not what you earn. Whether that holds for you depends on your tier and your volume, which is why it is arithmetic rather than advice.

This is a composite teaching example, not a guaranteed result.

Confidence check

Before you set a markup, check you can answer these:

• Do you know which tier your account is in, and what that means for both fees?
• Can you say which fee is charged at the point of sale and which at the end of the pay period?
• Can you work out the excess markup fee on the portion above 20%, rather than on your whole margin?
• Do you know whether your monthly fees reach the cap, and what that changes?
• Have you checked whether raising your markup actually raises your net on your own tier?
• Do you know the current payment threshold and whether your balance clears it?