eBay Gives Depop Prime Placement, Sends Buyers Offsite
Less than a month after completing its $1.4 billion acquisition of Depop, eBay is giving the resale marketplace prime placement on its own site, directing eBay buyers off the platform to shop with its new subsidiary.
A large Depop banner is appearing above the fold on the eBay homepage, telling shoppers “There’s more to love on Depop” with a Shop Depop button that leads directly to Depop.com.
Seller Liz O'Kane, owner of Colorado Reworn, says she is also seeing Depop promoted at the top of fashion search results on both desktop and the app.
“I just didn't realize it would be this soon and this direct,” O'Kane said in the eBay Community, later pointing out that the homepage ad appears before a potential buyer even enters a search.
coloradoreworn
I tested the experience on desktop and was able to replicate it. Clicking the banner at the top of eBay search takes the user to the same search on Depop.
eBay also sells that top-of-search space to sellers through Promoted Stores, a cost-per-click ad product. Sellers bid and pay for clicks to get their stores in front of buyers there, while eBay is using the placement to send shoppers to Depop.
CEO Jamie Iannone told investors on the company's second quarter earnings call that eBay sees opportunities to use its scale to help Depop grow, including “introducing Depop to relevant customers on eBay to stimulate demand.”
eBay prohibits third-party sellers from using listings or communications to direct buyers to outside websites where they can complete a transaction, saying it has “invested a great deal to connect interested buyers with great sellers” and expects transactions resulting from that investment to stay on the platform.
eBay has done this before. After acquiring TCGPlayer in 2022, eBay began selling trading cards through a TCGPlayer-branded account that competed directly with other sellers on the marketplace. The account received Direct From Brand badging even though the inventory consisted of products from other brands, while eBay's ownership of TCGPlayer was not prominently disclosed.
The arrangement raised questions about eBay's repeated insistence that, unlike Amazon, it does not compete with sellers on its marketplace.
Liz Morton
eBay went a step further with Goldin. After acquiring Goldin from Collectors in 2024, eBay began inserting “Find It On Goldin” modules into relevant search results. Clicking those listings takes buyers off eBay to Goldin.com to complete the purchase.
The Goldin modules were not labeled Sponsored or Promoted, while similar carousel placements for third-party sellers farther down the page were paid ads that could trigger additional fees on attributed sales.
Liz Morton
Depop is much closer to eBay's existing business. Goldin primarily targets high-end collectibles, while Depop competes in secondhand fashion, where eBay already generates more than $10 billion in annual GMV and has been investing heavily to grow consumer-to-consumer sales.
Depop also uses a different fee model in the US, with no Depop selling fee but a 3.3% plus $0.45 payment processing charge for sellers and a marketplace fee of up to 5% plus $1 paid by buyers. New US users are currently being offered free shipping on their first eligible Depop order, though the marketplace fee still applies.
The Responsible Online Commerce Coalition asked the Federal Trade Commission in 2024 to investigate eBay and TCGPlayer for alleged deceptive and anticompetitive conduct, including concerns about eBay's growing vertical integration in trading cards. The petition also pointed to the Goldin acquisition as another example of eBay owning businesses that operate alongside sellers on a marketplace it controls.
Liz Morton
The FTC has not publicly accused eBay of wrongdoing over Depop or acted on the ROCC petition. But eBay now has multiple examples of using control over marketplace visibility to benefit businesses it owns, while independent sellers pay for access to the same buyers.
Wells Fargo and Citizens both downgraded eBay shortly after the acquisition closed, citing growing competition from Vinted and concerns about how much eBay may have to spend to keep Depop growing.
Citizens estimated Depop could spend more than $250 million on marketing this year, up from $119 million in 2025 after already recording $42 million of marketing expense in the first quarter. Wells Fargo estimated Depop's July marketing spending was running at roughly three times Vinted's already elevated level.
Liz Morton
Depop has also continued with high-profile marketing since the acquisition, including its recent Spotify partnership, though neither company disclosed the cost or results of that campaign.
Using eBay's own traffic could help offset some of that spending, and the company has already said some planned Depop investment will be funded by reallocating existing eBay C2C and fashion marketing dollars. But sending an existing eBay buyer to Depop doesn't necessarily create new GMV.
eBay expects Depop to contribute about 2.5 percentage points to consolidated FX-neutral GMV growth in the third quarter and roughly 1.5 points for the full year, while separately providing organic growth guidance for the existing business.
If an eBay buyer clicks a Depop promotion and makes a purchase there that otherwise would have happened on eBay, the referral has not created incremental GMV for the company. The transaction has simply moved from one eBay-owned marketplace to another, potentially at the expense of an eBay seller.
That doesn't mean every Depop referral comes at the expense of eBay GMV. Some could generate purchases that would not otherwise have happened or lead buyers to spend on both sites. Iannone also argued on the earnings call that strong growth at eBay and Depop before the acquisition showed Depop's momentum was incremental rather than cannibalizing the core marketplace.
But that was before eBay began actively sending its own buyers to Depop. As that cross-promotion expands, Depop's growth won't necessarily show how much demand is new and how much has simply shifted from eBay.
