GunBroker Fees for Sellers: Fee Calculator and What You Really Pay

Last updated October 4, 2026

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GunBroker charges nothing to list a gun and takes its cut only when the gun sells. Add the $7 document fee that private sellers pay on every sold gun, and the total comes to between 5% and 8% of the price for a gun that sells for $400 to $1,000.

I’ve gone through GunBroker’s own fee pages line by line. Type your price into the calculator for your exact number, then read on for the fees most sellers miss: the up-front charges for a reserve and upgrades, and what you’d give up by using Valet instead.

GunBroker Fee Calculator

GunBroker Seller Fees at a Glance

Fee	Amount	When you pay it
Listing a gun	Free for a basic auction or fixed price listing	Never
Final value fee, guns	6% of the first $400, 4% up to $15,000, 3% up to $20,000, 2% above	Only if it sells
Final value fee, black powder and other categories	8% up to $15,000, 3% up to $20,000, 2% above	Only if it sells
FFL document fee	$7 per sold gun for private sellers, $5 for licensed dealers, $10 for NFA items	When it sells
Reserve price	2% of the reserve, $1 minimum, $100 maximum	When you list, even if it doesn’t sell
Listing upgrades	$0.10 to $7.00 each	When you list, even if it doesn’t sell
Marketplace service fee	1%	Paid by the buyer, not you
Membership	None	Never

Source: GunBroker’s fee page, read October 3 and 4, 2026. GunBroker can change its fees, so check before you list.

Table of Contents

How the Final Value Fee Works

The final value fee is GunBroker’s main charge, and you pay it only when a listing ends with a winning bidder or a Buy Now sale. It’s tiered, so the rate drops as the price climbs. For guns, parts, optics, ammo, NFA items and collectibles, you pay 6% of the first $400, 4% of the part from $400 to $15,000, 3% from $15,000 to $20,000 and 2% above that.

GunBroker’s own example is a $1,500 gun: 6% of $400 is $24, 4% of the other $1,100 is $44, and the fee is $68. Here’s what the fee comes to at common prices, with the $7 document fee a private seller adds on top:

Gun sells for	Final value fee	With the $7 document fee	Share of the price
$100	$6.00	$13.00	13.0%
$250	$15.00	$22.00	8.8%
$400	$24.00	$31.00	7.8%
$500	$28.00	$35.00	7.0%
$750	$38.00	$45.00	6.0%
$1,000	$48.00	$55.00	5.5%
$1,500	$68.00	$75.00	5.0%
$2,000	$88.00	$95.00	4.8%
$3,000	$128.00	$135.00	4.5%
$5,000	$208.00	$215.00	4.3%

Black powder guns, muzzleloaders and anything outside the main gun categories pay more: a flat 8% up to $15,000. A $1,000 muzzleloader pays $80 in final value fees, against $48 for a $1,000 cartridge gun.

Three Example Sales, Worked Out

Here’s how the fees play out on three real-world kinds of sale, using GunBroker’s standard fees for a private seller.

• A $250 used revolver, no upgrades. Final value fee $15.00, document fee $7.00, total $22.00, or 8.8% of the price. You keep $228.00 before shipping.
• A $900 rifle with an $800 reserve and a Featured listing. The reserve costs $16.00 and Featured costs $2.95, both paid when you list. When it sells, add a final value fee of $44.00 and the $7.00 document fee, for $69.95 in total. If it doesn’t sell, you’re out $18.95, though it can relist with the same options for free until the listing expires.
• A $3,000 collectible with a Showcase spot. Showcase costs $4.95 up front. The final value fee is $128.00 and the document fee $7.00, for $139.95 in total, or 4.7% of the price.

The middle example is the one to learn from. Most of the up-front cost is the reserve, and it’s gone the moment you list. If you set the starting bid at a price you’d be happy with, you may not need a reserve at all.

The $7 FFL Document Fee

GunBroker’s own rules require a dealer transfer for guns sold between individuals, and its Master FFL service handles the dealer paperwork. For that, it charges the seller a document fee on each sold item that needs a transfer: $7 if you’re a private seller, $5 if you’re a licensed dealer and $10 for an NFA item.

The fee is separate from the final value fee and from the receiving dealer’s own transfer fee, which the dealer charges to the buyer or the seller. GunBroker charges it even if you use your own compliance software. On a cheap gun, it’s a big share: on a $100 sale, the document fee costs more than the final value fee.

The buyer picks the receiving dealer at checkout, and our FFL transfer fees page shows what dealers charge for the transfer itself.

Reserve Prices and Listing Upgrades

This is where sellers lose money without noticing. A reserve price and every upgrade is charged when you create the listing, and none of it is refunded if the gun doesn’t sell. A reserve costs 2% of the reserve amount, with a $1 minimum and a $100 maximum, so an $800 reserve costs $16 before a single bid comes in.

Here’s every upgrade on GunBroker’s fee schedule:

Upgrade	Price	What it does
Boldface title	$1.00	Puts your title in bold in search results
Colored title	$1.00	Colors your title red, green or blue
Featured listing	$2.95	Gives the listing extra exposure in search results
Highlight	$2.00	Highlights the listing in yellow
Scheduled listing	$0.10	Lets you pick when the listing goes live
Showcase listing	$4.95	Shows the item at random on GunBroker’s home page
On-site sponsored listing	$4.00	Shows the listing beside relevant search results
Off-site sponsored listing	$7.00	Shows the listing on GunBroker partner sites
Subtitle	$3.50	Adds a line of text under your title in search results
View counter	$0.50	Counts how many times the listing has been viewed
1-day or 3-day auction	$0.50	Runs a short auction instead of a standard one

There’s one consolation. If a listing with upgrades doesn’t sell, it can relist automatically with the same options at no extra charge, until the listing expires. An unsold auction listing expires after up to 90 days, and one with a reserve or a short duration expires after four times its listing duration.

My rule: skip the upgrades on a common gun that sells itself, like a popular used pistol or a plain .22 rifle. A Featured listing or a Showcase spot makes more sense on a rare or high-dollar gun, where a few more bidders can move the price by far more than the fee.

Auction or Fixed Price?

Both are free to list as basic listings, and both pay the same final value fee when they sell, including a Buy Now sale on an auction. A fixed price listing runs until it ends or sells out. An auction can also run as a 1-day or 3-day short auction for $0.50.

I use an auction for anything collectible, where bidders set the price, and fixed price for a common gun with a well-known going rate. Either way, the fees in the calculator above are the same.

What the Buyer Pays, Not You

• The 1% marketplace service fee. GunBroker charges it to the buyer on every purchase.
• A 10% buyer’s premium on Collector’s Elite auction items.
• Shipping, at the rate you set in your listing. GunBroker lets each seller set their own shipping terms and fees.
• The receiving dealer’s transfer fee, unless you agree to cover it.

How and When GunBroker Bills You

GunBroker doesn’t take its fees out of the sale. The buyer pays you directly, and GunBroker bills you separately. You need a bank account on file before you can list, and a credit card can be added only alongside it.

Fees build up over a calendar month. A statement comes out around the 2nd of the next month, and payment is due on the 20th. If your payment method fails, you can’t list anything new until you fix it.

One small trap: an inactive account that’s carrying a credit balance is charged $1 a month until the balance hits zero. Logging in once every six months avoids it.

If the Buyer Backs Out

If a bidder wins or buys your gun and then doesn’t complete the deal, you can ask GunBroker for a credit of the final value fee plus the cost of relisting with the same upgrades. You have 45 days from the close of the listing to ask, so don’t sit on it.

Shipping: The Cost the Calculator Leaves Out

Shipping is yours to price and pay up front, so build it into your listing. Wait until you have the receiving dealer’s FFL information before you ship anything. You’re responsible for shipping and transferring the gun legally.

Our how to sell a gun guide covers which carriers will take a gun from a private seller, including GunBroker’s own UPS shipping tool.

GunBroker Valet: Pay 25% and Skip the Work

Valet is GunBroker’s consignment service. You send the gun to one of GunBroker’s partners, and they do the work of selling it, for a flat 25% of the sale. That 25% covers shipping and insurance, the transfer, the final value fee, marketing and card processing.

On a $600 gun, Valet leaves you $450. Selling it yourself leaves $561 before shipping. Valet only makes sense if that gap is worth less to you than the photos, the listing, the questions and the trip to a shipper.

Top Seller Discounts

GunBroker’s Top 100 and Top 1000 sellers by gross sales pay lower final value fees, reset every quarter based on the previous quarter’s sales. In the Top 100 tier, a $500 gun costs $18.25 instead of $28. Top firearm sellers also get discounted document fees. If you’re selling a few guns from your own collection, you’ll pay the standard fees in our calculator.

How to Keep More of the Sale

• Price it right. A gun listed too low sells too low. Check what yours sells for first in our gun values guide.
• Use free photos, not paid upgrades. Thumbnails and multiple pictures cost nothing on GunBroker, and clear photos sell a gun better than a colored title.
• Skip the reserve on a common gun. It’s charged whether the gun sells or not.
• Relist before the listing expires. Relisting an unsold item before it expires is free.
• Claim your credit. If a buyer backs out, request the fee credit within 45 days.
• Write a bill of sale. Keep a record of who bought the gun and where it shipped. Our free firearm bill of sale form takes five minutes.

GunBroker vs Other Ways to Sell

Where you sell	What it costs you	Who does the work
GunBroker auction	About 6.5% on a $600 gun, plus shipping and any upgrades	You list, answer questions and ship
GunBroker Valet	Flat 25%	GunBroker partners do the selling
Armslist	$6.99 a month for the Premium Personal account needed to list	You meet the buyer locally
Mail-in buyer	The gap between their offer and the market price	They send a prepaid shipping label
Local private sale	Nothing, or a dealer fee where state law requires a check	You meet the buyer

GunBroker and Valet fees from GunBroker’s fee and Valet pages, Armslist pricing from its own pages, read October 3 and 4, 2026.

A local private sale costs the least, but in the 22 states with private-sale check laws you’ll likely need a dealer to run the check, and that costs a fee too. Our universal background check states page lists them.

If you’d rather skip listing, shipping and strangers altogether, WeBuyGuns and Cash for Arms make mail-in offers, and our WeBuyGuns review tracks one of those sales day by day. Get a quote from both and compare it with your GunBroker number above, because a mail-in offer will be below the auction price.

Not sure what yours is worth? Check before you list:

Frequently Asked Questions