FBA stands for Fulfillment by Amazon. You send your inventory to Amazon's warehouses; Amazon stores it, then picks, packs, and ships each order, and handles customer service and returns. In exchange you pay Amazon a fulfillment fee per unit, monthly storage, and a referral fee on every sale. The alternative is FBM (Fulfilled by Merchant), where you ship orders yourself.

Do I need a Professional seller account for FBA?

No — FBA works on both plans. The Individual plan costs $0.99 per item sold with no monthly fee; the Professional plan is $39.99/month. The breakeven is 40 units a month: above that, Professional is cheaper, and it unlocks bulk listing tools, Automate Pricing, and advertising.

How does Amazon FBA work? A beginner's guide

Q: How much does Amazon FBA cost?

Four main charges: a selling plan ($39.99/month Professional, or $0.99 per item on the Individual plan), a referral fee on each sale (15% in most categories), an FBA fulfillment fee per unit based on size and weight (a few dollars for standard-size products), and monthly storage per cubic foot. On a typical standard-size product the fees total roughly 30-40% of the sale price.

Q: How do FBA sellers get paid?

Amazon collects the customer's payment, deducts its fees, and disburses the balance to your bank account on a rolling cycle, typically every two weeks. Part of your balance may be held in reserve to cover potential returns before it is released.

Fee figures are Amazon's published 2026 US rates, as of 8 August 2026 — details and sources in the FBA fees guide.

FBA means Fulfillment by Amazon. You buy (or make) a product and ship it in bulk to Amazon's warehouses. From there, Amazon does the retail logistics: it stores your stock, and when a customer orders, it picks, packs, and ships the unit, answers the customer-service emails, and processes the returns. Your listings get the Prime badge and Prime delivery speeds. In exchange, Amazon charges you rent and labor: a fulfillment fee on every unit, storage on every cubic foot, and a commission on every sale.

That's the entire model. Everything else — sourcing, fees, profitability — is detail on top of it.

The FBA loop, step by step

Source a product From a manufacturer (private label), a distributor (wholesale), or retail clearance (arbitrage). This is where your capital goes, and where profitability is decided — run the unit economics before you pay a supplier, not after.
Create a seller account and list the product Individual plan ($0.99 per item sold) or Professional ($39.99/month — cheaper past 40 sales a month and required for advertising and bulk tools). List against an existing product page or create a new one.
Prep and ship inventory to Amazon Units must be labeled and packaged to FBA's requirements (poly bags, barcodes — or pay Amazon to do it). You ship to the fulfillment centers Amazon assigns; an inbound placement fee may apply depending on how you split the shipment.
Amazon fulfills your orders Your listing shows the Prime badge. Orders ship without you touching them — including nights, weekends, and the Q4 spike. Amazon's customer service and returns handling are part of the deal.
You get paid, minus the fees Amazon collects from the customer, deducts its fees, and disburses the rest to your bank on a rolling cycle, typically every two weeks (with part sometimes held in reserve against returns).

What FBA costs

Four charges do most of the damage: the referral fee (Amazon's commission — 15% in most categories), the fulfillment fee (per unit, by size and weight — a few dollars for standard-size products), monthly storage (per cubic foot, roughly tripling in Q4), and the selling plan. Together they typically take 30–40% of the sale price. The fees guide has every rate table with a dated source; the fee calculator looks up your product's exact numbers.

FBA vs. FBM: which should a beginner use?

FBM (Fulfilled by Merchant) means you store and ship orders yourself and skip the fulfillment and storage fees — but you also give up the Prime badge and take on the logistics. Rules of thumb:

FBA suits small, light, fast-turning products where the fulfillment fee is a few dollars and the Prime badge lifts conversion.
FBM suits large, heavy, or slow-moving items where FBA's fulfillment and storage fees would eat the margin, or sellers who already have shipping infrastructure.

Many sellers run both, product by product. The deciding math is the same either way: per-unit cost of each route against the conversion lift of Prime — the FBA vs FBM calculator models both sides and tells you the breakeven.

Is it worth doing in 2026?

It can be — the fees are knowable in advance, so whether a specific product is profitable is arithmetic, not luck. The honest treatment, including margin benchmarks and the five ways sellers lose money, is in is Amazon FBA profitable in 2026?

Starting without losing money: the short checklist

Model the unit economics first. Fees, ads, and returns included — the free FBA profit calculator does it in your browser. If a product doesn't clear ~15% net margin on paper, it won't clear it in practice.
Start on the plan that matches your volume — Individual under 40 units/month, Professional above.
Order small the first time. The most expensive FBA lesson is a pallet of inventory that doesn't sell; it pays storage while it teaches you.
Check your ROI and turns, not just margin — capital speed is what compounds.
Recheck fees before every reorder. Amazon revises rates during the year; a product that worked at January's fees may not work at October's.

Frequently asked questions

What does FBA mean?

Fulfillment by Amazon: you stock Amazon's warehouses, Amazon ships your orders and handles service and returns, and you pay fulfillment, storage, and referral fees. FBM — Fulfilled by Merchant — is the do-it-yourself alternative.

How much does Amazon FBA cost?

A selling plan ($39.99/month or $0.99/item), ~15% referral fee, a per-unit fulfillment fee, and monthly storage — typically 30–40% of the sale price in total. Full tables in the fees guide.

Do I need a Professional seller account?

No — both plans support FBA. Professional wins past 40 units a month and unlocks advertising and bulk tools.

How do FBA sellers get paid?

Amazon deducts its fees from each sale and disburses the balance to your bank on a rolling cycle, typically every two weeks, sometimes holding a reserve against returns.