OpenSea Fees vs Other NFT Marketplaces: Gas and Platform Fees Compared

Last Updated: October 21, 2026

OpenSea charges sellers a 1% platform fee on NFT sales, plus any creator earnings the collection sets, and both buyers and sellers pay blockchain gas fees for on-chain actions. Gas is now cheap on most networks: on October 21, 2026, Etherscan estimated an NFT sale on Ethereum at about $0.08, and on Base, Polygon and Solana a transaction costs a fraction of that. Among the other major marketplaces, Magic Eden and Tensor charge 2% on Solana, Rarible charges 2% on its EVM chains and 1.5% on Solana, and Blur charges nothing but is closing its website on November 12, 2026.

This guide explains every fee you can pay on OpenSea, how gas works for each action, and how OpenSea compares with Magic Eden, Tensor, Rarible, Blur and LooksRare on cost.

OpenSea Fees vs Other NFT Marketplaces at a Glance

Marketplace	Platform Fee	Who Pays	Creator Royalties	Main Chains	Status (October 2026)
OpenSea	1% on NFT sales	Seller (included in the listed price)	Enforced or optional, set by collection	Ethereum, Base, Polygon, Arbitrum, Solana and 15+ more	Active
Magic Eden	2%	Taken on each transaction	Optional (buyer chooses 0%, 50% or 100%), mandatory on some collections	Solana only	Active, Solana only since March 2026
Tensor	2% taker, 0% maker	Taker (the side that accepts a listing or bid)	Taker pays; optional royalties can be none, half or full	Solana only	Active, run by the Tensor Foundation
Rarible	2% on Ethereum, Base and Polygon; 1.5% on Solana	Seller	Set by collection, deducted from proceeds	Ethereum, Base, Polygon, Solana	Active, brand acquired by IMPOSSIBLE
Blur	0%	None	Royalty rules set by the protocol	Ethereum	Website closes November 12, 2026
LooksRare	0.5% (since April 2023)	Seller	Paid to collection owners	Ethereum	Little to no trading activity

Sources: official help centers and documentation of OpenSea, Magic Eden, Tensor, Rarible and LooksRare, and project announcements, as of October 21, 2026.

What Fees Does OpenSea Charge?

According to OpenSea’s help center, the platform charges:

• 1% on NFT sales. The fee is included in the price buyers see, so it comes out of the seller’s proceeds.
• 10% on primary drops. When creators sell newly minted NFTs through an OpenSea drop, OpenSea takes 10% of the mint price.
• 0% on private listings, which are listings reserved for a specific buyer.
• 0% OpenSea fee on token swaps. Third-party providers involved in a swap may still charge their own fees.

OpenSea has changed its fee several times. It charged 2.5% for years, cut the fee to 0.5% with the launch of its rebuilt OS2 platform in 2025, and then raised it to 1% on all chains from September 15, 2025, as part of the final phase of its rewards program. In March 2026, when it postponed the launch of its SEA token, OpenSea waived trading fees for 60 days from March 31 and said a new fee structure for active traders would follow. OpenSea’s help center lists the fee at 1% as of October 2026. Fees are set when a listing or offer is created, and OpenSea says it can waive them on certain sales.

Our OpenSea review covers the platform beyond fees.

Creator Earnings on OpenSea

Creator earnings, or royalties, are separate from OpenSea’s fee and go to the collection’s creator. On collections with enforced earnings, the set percentage is paid on every sale. On collections with optional earnings, the seller chooses how much to pay when listing or accepting an offer; the default is the creator’s preferred rate, and there is no minimum. Royalty rates vary by collection and are often between 0% and 10%, so they can cost more than the platform fee itself.

How Gas Fees Work on OpenSea

Gas fees go to the validators of the blockchain you trade on, not to OpenSea. OpenSea does not set them and cannot refund them, and you pay them in the chain’s native token, such as ETH on Ethereum.

Action	Gas Required?
Connecting your wallet	No
First listing of an NFT from a collection (one-time approval)	Yes, once per collection
Later fixed-price listings in the same collection	No
First offer with a new currency, such as WETH (one-time approval)	Yes, once
Later offers	No
Lowering the price of a listing (ERC-721)	No
Raising a price or canceling a listing	Yes
Canceling an offer	No, though an on-chain cancellation is optional
Buying an NFT	Yes, paid by the buyer
Accepting an offer	Yes, paid by the seller
Transferring or minting an NFT	Yes

Source: OpenSea help center, as of October 2026.

The main takeaway is that listings are signed off-chain and cost nothing after the first approval, while anything that moves an NFT or cancels a listing on-chain costs gas. OpenSea lets you cancel all listings and offers in one transaction per chain, which costs less than canceling them one by one.

How Much Is Gas on OpenSea Right Now?

Gas costs have fallen sharply since the NFT boom of 2021 and 2022. On Ethereum, average gas was about 0.051 gwei on the morning of October 21, 2026, and Etherscan estimated an NFT sale at about $0.08 with ETH near $2,450.

Blockchain	Gas Price (October 21, 2026)	Typical Cost
Ethereum	~0.051 gwei	~$0.08 for an NFT sale (Etherscan estimate)
Base	~0.005 gwei	~$0.002 for a token swap (Basescan estimate); NFT trades cost a fraction of a cent
Polygon	~246 gwei base fee, POL near $0.10	About a cent, by our estimate
Solana	5,000 lamports per signature, plus an optional priority fee	About $0.0005 per signature at SOL near $107

Sources: Etherscan and Basescan gas trackers, the Polygon gas station and Solana’s fee documentation, morning of October 21, 2026. Gas prices change by the minute and spike during busy periods.

In practice, the platform fee and creator earnings now cost far more than gas on any of these chains. On a $500 NFT, OpenSea’s 1% fee is $5 and a 5% royalty is another $25, while gas on Ethereum is under a dollar at current prices.

OpenSea vs Magic Eden, Tensor, Rarible and Blur

Magic Eden charges 2% on all transactions and nothing to list, and it has supported only Solana since March 9, 2026, when it ended its Ethereum, EVM and Bitcoin marketplaces. On Solana, royalties are optional for most collections, and the buyer chooses whether to pay all, half or none of them. See our Magic Eden review.

Tensor, the main Solana trading platform, charges a 2% fee to the taker and nothing to the maker, so placing a listing or bid that someone else accepts costs no platform fee. Since November 2025, the Tensor Foundation runs the marketplace and sends all of its fees to the TNSR treasury.

Rarible charges 2% on Ethereum, Base and Polygon and 1.5% on Solana, paid by the seller, and adds a 2% fee when buyers purchase listings it aggregates from other marketplaces on EVM chains. IMPOSSIBLE acquired the Rarible brand and key platform assets in 2026.

Blur charged no marketplace fee and became the largest Ethereum NFT marketplace by volume in 2023, but its monthly volume has since collapsed by more than 99%. Its website will shut down on November 12, 2026, while its smart contracts stay live on-chain. Read our report on Blur shutting down its marketplace.

LooksRare cut its fee to 0.5% in April 2023, but trading on the platform has dried up, and it now focuses on other products.

For Solana collections, Magic Eden and Tensor are the main options at 2%. For Ethereum and its layer-2 networks, OpenSea’s 1% is now one of the lowest fees among marketplaces that are still actively traded.

How to Pay Less When Trading NFTs

• Trade on low-cost chains. Base, Polygon, Arbitrum and Solana keep gas to fractions of a cent.
• Approve once, then list for free. After the first listing in a collection, new listings and price cuts cost no gas on OpenSea.
• Lower prices instead of canceling. Reducing a price is free on ERC-721 NFTs, while canceling or raising a price costs gas.
• Cancel in bulk. OpenSea’s cancel-all option clears listings and offers in one transaction per chain.
• Use private listings for agreed sales to a specific buyer, which currently carry a 0% OpenSea fee.
• Be the maker on Tensor. Listings and bids that others accept carry no Tensor fee.
• Check royalties before buying or selling. On many collections they cost more than the platform fee.

The NFT Market in 2026

Lower fees have not brought back volume. NFT sales totaled about $167.2 million in September 2026, according to CryptoSlam data, down from about $554.8 million a year earlier and about $1.78 billion in December 2023. Marketplaces have responded by consolidating: Magic Eden narrowed to Solana, Rarible changed hands, Blur is closing its website, and OpenSea has expanded into token trading, opening its mobile app with trading across more than 25 blockchains to all users on October 20, 2026. Follow the market in our NFT news section.

Data sources: OpenSea help center and developer changelog, Magic Eden help center, Tensor documentation, Rarible FAQ, LooksRare documentation, Etherscan and Basescan gas trackers, Polygon gas station, Solana documentation, CryptoSlam via Decrypt, and project announcements, as of October 21, 2026. Fees can change at any time; check each marketplace before trading.

This article is for informational purposes only and does not constitute financial advice.

Frequently Asked Questions

What fees does OpenSea charge?
OpenSea charges a 1% platform fee on NFT sales, included in the price buyers see, and 10% on primary drop mints. Private listings carry a 0% fee, and OpenSea charges no fee of its own on token swaps. Creator earnings set by each collection and blockchain gas fees come on top. The 1% fee has applied on all chains since September 15, 2025.

Do buyers pay fees on OpenSea?
Buyers do not pay OpenSea’s 1% platform fee, which comes out of the seller’s proceeds. Buyers do pay blockchain gas when they purchase an NFT, and on collections with enforced creator earnings, the royalty is part of the sale. On Ethereum, gas for an NFT sale was estimated at about $0.08 on October 21, 2026, and it is lower on Base, Polygon and Solana.

How much are gas fees on OpenSea?
It depends on the blockchain and network activity. On October 21, 2026, Etherscan estimated an Ethereum NFT sale at about $0.08 with gas near 0.051 gwei, while Base, Polygon and Solana cost a cent or less. Listing is free after a one-time approval per collection, but buying, accepting offers, transferring and canceling listings all cost gas.

Which NFT marketplace has the lowest fees?
Blur charges no marketplace fee but is closing its website on November 12, 2026, and LooksRare’s 0.5% fee comes with almost no trading activity. Among active marketplaces, OpenSea’s 1% fee is the lowest for Ethereum and its layer-2 networks, while Magic Eden and Tensor charge 2% on Solana, with Tensor charging nothing to the maker side of a trade.

Is OpenSea cheaper than Magic Eden?
On platform fees, yes: OpenSea charges 1% on NFT sales, while Magic Eden charges 2% on all transactions. The two now serve different markets, though. Magic Eden has supported only Solana since March 2026, where gas costs fractions of a cent, while OpenSea covers Ethereum, Base, Polygon, Solana and many other chains. Creator royalties often matter more than either fee.

Are creator royalties mandatory on OpenSea?
Only on collections that enforce them. On those, the set percentage is paid on every sale. On collections with optional creator earnings, the seller decides how much to pay, starting from the creator’s preferred rate, with no minimum. OpenSea’s Deals feature, which lets users swap NFTs directly, does not include creator earnings.

Is Blur still open?
Blur’s website, blur.io, will shut down on November 12, 2026, according to the team’s October 12 announcement, after its monthly trading volume fell more than 99% from its 2023 peak. Its smart contracts will stay live on-chain, and its Blend lending product will stop matching new loans on the same date. Users with funds in Blur’s lending products should review their positions before the closure.