You can start selling online in India without paying anything to join a marketplace. Amazon.in and Flipkart charge no registration or monthly fee; you pay per sale. Flipkart takes 0% commission on products priced below ₹1,000 as of 2026. Your own Shopify store, by contrast, costs ₹1,499 a month on the Basic plan in 2026.
That single difference decides most of what follows: where you list, what you can price, and how long your money takes to come back.
What are the ways to sell products online?
There are four routes open to a small seller in 2026, and they differ mainly in who owns the customer and who holds your money first.
A marketplace seller account. Amazon, Flipkart and Meesho all run open self-serve onboarding, so a first-timer can sign up without an introduction or a minimum order commitment. Myntra does not: it has no public seller landing page and onboards through the login-only partnerportal.myntra.com, which makes it a brand route rather than a beginner route. Meesho's own site says it charges suppliers zero commission to list products; the rest of its current charges are visible only inside its supplier panel. On a marketplace the buyer pays the platform, and the platform pays you on a settlement cycle.
Your own store. A store builder like Shopify gives you a website, a cart and a checkout. Payments land in your gateway, then your bank, on the gateway's own cycle. Nobody sends you traffic.
Social commerce. The WhatsApp Business app still carries a product catalogue with in-app orders and payments, and Instagram and Facebook catalogues run through Meta Business Suite. This is the cheapest way to test whether anyone wants your product, because you already have the contacts. JioMart already sells groceries inside WhatsApp, so buyers are used to the format.
ONDC. The open network did not exist as a seller option when most "how to sell online" guides were written. You join through a seller app on the network rather than through one marketplace's portal. ONDC reports over 500 million transactions to date and 300-plus network participants, with more than 1.16 lakh retail sellers across 630-plus cities onboarded as of December 2025. In February 2026 it tied up with India Post for warehousing, packaging and logistics aimed at MSMEs and artisans.
One correction worth making before you plan anything. Older articles still claim that around 40% of retail buying in India happens online. That was never accurate. Online retail was roughly US$80 billion in FY26 and growing about 21% year on year, but Bain and IBEF still project only about one in ten retail rupees going online by 2030. The opportunity is real and it is small in share terms, which is exactly why a focused seller in one category can get somewhere.
Marketplace or your own website: which one actually pays off?
For a first-time seller with an untested product, the marketplace wins on cost, because your fixed monthly outgo is zero and the traffic is already there.
| Marketplace (Amazon, Flipkart, Meesho) | Your own store (Shopify) | |
|---|---|---|
| Cost to join | No registration fee on Amazon.in or Flipkart, 2026 | Domain plus a plan; Shopify India runs ₹20/month for the first 3 months |
| Fixed monthly cost | Zero. You pay per order | ₹1,499/month Basic on annual billing; Grow ₹5,599, Advanced ₹22,680, as of 2026 |
| Per-sale cost | Referral fee 0% to 30% by category on Amazon.in, closing fee from ₹1, shipping from about ₹37 per item | Payment gateway charges, plus a 2% (Basic), 1% (Grow) or 0.6% (Advanced) transaction fee if you don't use Shopify Payments |
| Who brings buyers | The platform | You, entirely: ads, social, word of mouth |
| Control over pricing, data, look | Limited; the platform sets the rules | Full |
| Returns | Platform's return window; you authorise, inspect and refund | Your policy, but also your courier problem |
| When money reaches you | 3 to 7 days after dispatch on Flipkart depending on seller tier; roughly weekly on Amazon after the first cycle | Your gateway's settlement cycle |
The product decides the route. A ₹400 kitchen item with a thin margin belongs on a marketplace, where commission at that price point is often zero and the traffic is free. A ₹3,000 handmade or made-to-order product with a healthy margin can carry the cost of its own store and repeat buyers, because you keep the customer's number instead of renting it.
Most sellers end up running both. Listings on a marketplace for discovery, a WhatsApp catalogue for repeat buyers who already trust you, and eventually a store of your own. Amazon even sells Multi-Channel Fulfilment, which ships orders that came from your own website out of its warehouse. Just keep stock counts synced, because two channels selling the same last piece is how cancellations start.
Which documents and registrations do you need to sell online?
The base set is small: PAN, a bank account in the business name, an address proof and a pickup address. On Amazon.in the pickup address has to be in the same state as your GST registration.
GST is where the rule changed, and most guides have not caught up. Since 1 October 2023, under Notification 34/2023-Central Tax, a small goods seller who supplies only within one state through an e-commerce operator and stays under the threshold (₹40 lakh, or ₹20 lakh in special-category states) can sell on a GST enrolment number generated on the portal instead of a full GSTIN. So "GST registration is compulsory before you sell online", the line every 2021-era article carried, is no longer the law.
Platform policy is a separate wall. Amazon.in still asks for a GSTIN unless you register under its tax-exempt-products option, which in practice means books. Flipkart requires a GSTIN for every category except books. The enrolment route is genuinely useful on ONDC and on your own store; on the big two marketplaces, expect to be asked for a GSTIN anyway.
If you do register, note that GST rates changed on 22 September 2025. The 56th GST Council moved to a two-rate structure, 5% merit and 18% standard, with a 40% de-merit rate on a few goods. Any pricing sheet built on the old 5/12/18/28 ladder needs redoing, and product tax codes on the marketplaces had to be re-mapped. If you are still learning how the paperwork works, our note on what happens when you don't pay GST covers the consequences side.
Food sellers got real relief this year. With effect from 1 April 2026, FSSAI raised the registration turnover threshold from ₹12 lakh to ₹1.5 crore, extended state licensing up to ₹50 crore, and made registrations and licences perpetually valid with no renewals. Street vendors registered with a municipal body or Town Vending Committee are deemed registered. For someone selling achaar, masala or packaged home food, basic registration now carries you much further than it used to.
Cosmetics, electronics and a few other categories carry their own approvals and category gates inside the seller panel. Read your category's requirement list before you buy stock, and take the GST and licensing position to a CA or the concerned authority rather than treating a blog as the final word.
What happens between opening a seller account and your first order?
Registration is now app-first: the Amazon Seller app on Play Store handles sign-up plus order and inventory management, and it works in 8 Indian languages including Hindi.
The sequence rarely varies. Register with PAN, bank details, tax details and pickup address. Build your catalogue, one listing per product variant. Set price and shipping mode. Then clear the gates: a GTIN or barcode for branded goods, or a GTIN exemption plus brand approval if you make the product yourself.
Photos and titles are where new sellers stall. Each category has its own image spec and title format inside the seller panel, and the attribute list differs between, say, a saree and a power bank. Read the one for your category before the photo shoot, not after a listing gets suppressed.
When an order arrives you pack it, print the label the platform generates, and hand it to the pickup rider, unless you are on full platform fulfilment and your stock is already in their warehouse. Your first payout takes longer than every payout after it. Amazon settles 14 days after registration and then roughly every 7 days, with 2 to 3 working days for the money to reach your bank. Flipkart's own pages quote both "as fast as 3 days" from dispatch and 7 days, depending on seller tier, so plan for the slower end.
How much does it really cost to sell online?
The headline change since the old fee tables: commission has collapsed at low price points. Flipkart charges 0% commission on every product priced below ₹1,000, and 0% across the whole Fashion category. Amazon.in's referral fee runs from 0% to 30% by category, with 0% on many categories when the item price is ₹1,000 or less, and it advertises up to 70% fee savings across 1,800-plus categories.
So if you sell under ₹1,000, your cost is mostly shipping and a fixed fee, not commission. Here is what a ₹699 order looks like in 2026:
| Line | Amount |
|---|---|
| Selling price (GST inclusive, 5% slab) | ₹699 |
| GST portion you collect and remit | ₹33 |
| Commission | ₹0 at this price point on Flipkart |
| Fixed / closing fee | From ₹1 on Amazon self-ship or Easy Ship; tier-dependent on Flipkart |
| Shipping | From about ₹37 per item, more for heavier or far-zone parcels |
| TCS held by the operator | ₹3 (0.5% of net taxable sales), claimable back |
| Left before your own product cost | About ₹625 at these floor rates, and lower as the fixed fee and shipping rise above the minimum |
Then subtract what the product cost you, packing material, and your share of returns. That last one is the number nobody budgets. Neither Amazon nor Flipkart publishes a 2026 return-cost table, so the only honest instruction is to open your own rate card in the seller panel and read the return and RTO lines for your category and weight slab before you set a price.
Two more items belong in the sheet. TCS at 0.5% of net taxable sales (0.25% CGST plus 0.25% SGST, or 0.5% IGST) is collected by the operator, reported in GSTR-8 and claimed back in your GSTR-3B, so it is a working-capital drag rather than a cost. And seller tier changes your fixed fee: Flipkart's Platinum tier pays the base rate minus ₹15 up to ₹30, while Bronze pays base plus ₹10. Rate cards are category-specific and they change during the year, so re-check yours each quarter.
How do you ship the product and get the money?
You have three shipping modes, and the choice is a trade between cost and effort: self-ship with your own courier, platform-assisted shipping where you pack and they pick up, or full platform fulfilment where your stock sits in their warehouse and they do everything.
Weight and dimensions drive the bill more than distance for most small parcels, so the difference between a 400 g and a 600 g pack is real money on every order. Pincode reach comes free with the marketplace: Flipkart's seller hub cites 19,000-plus pincodes and 14 lakh-plus sellers.
On payments, both routes are alive. Prepaid has become the default now that UPI carries 81% of India's retail payment transaction volume, but Pay on Delivery still exists, and there the platform collects cash from the buyer and credits it to your bank on the usual settlement cycle. COD costs you twice, though: the money sits longer, and refused deliveries come back as returns you paid to ship both ways. If your category attracts casual orders, watch that ratio from week one. Sellers who also take card payments at a physical counter usually pair this with a card machine at the shop; our Hindi guide to POS machines and their types runs through the options.
How do you get the first 100 orders without an ad budget?
Search inside the platform is where your first orders come from, so write listings using the words buyers type, not the words you use in your trade.
That means the vernacular product name in the title where it fits, correct category attributes so filters pick you up, and photographs that show scale and the actual finish. Reviews compound: the first ten genuine ones move a listing more than any spend you can afford at this stage.
Outside the platform, work the audience you already have. A WhatsApp Business catalogue turns your contact list into a shop, and orders and payments happen in the same chat. Instagram and Facebook catalogues through Meta Business Suite give the same product feed a second home, and short video of the product being made or used does more for a handmade category than a static photo ever will. The demand is not only in metros: Tier-2 and smaller cities contribute roughly half of incremental e-retail orders and about 38% of summer-sale order volume, per IBEF's May 2026 report, and there are 290 to 300 million online shoppers in the country now.
Platform ad and discount tools are worth a small, capped budget only after your listing converts organically. Pushing paid traffic to a listing with two bad photos just buys you returns. For the broader promotion playbook, our Hindi guide to marketing your business goes wider.
Where do new online sellers lose money?
Most of the losses are self-inflicted and boringly predictable.
Leaving a listing live after the stock is gone is the fastest way to damage an account, because every cancellation counts against your metrics and weak metrics quietly cost you visibility. Pricing before you have added shipping, fixed fee and expected returns is the second: a ₹699 item that felt profitable at 40% margin can end the month at 10%. Choosing a category with a high return rate, apparel sizing being the classic, means you are running a courier business you did not plan for. And listing on several platforms without syncing stock produces cancellations on all of them at once.
The quiet one is bookkeeping. Marketplace payouts arrive net of fees, days after the sale, in one lump for many orders, and if that money mixes with counter cash and supplier payments you will not know for months which product actually made money. Keep online payouts, supplier bills and shop cash in separate records from day one. If you also supply local shops on udhar, a free khata app like OkCredit keeps every entry backed up and sends automatic payment reminders on outstanding balances. Sellers who start with a home-based product line, artificial jewellery for instance, usually find the ledger matters more than the catalogue by month three.
Frequently asked questions
Can I sell online without GST registration?
Yes, in a specific case. Since 1 October 2023, under Notification 34/2023-Central Tax, a goods seller supplying only within one state through an e-commerce operator and staying under ₹40 lakh turnover (₹20 lakh in special-category states) can use a GST enrolment number instead of a full GSTIN. But platform policy still applies: Amazon.in asks for a GSTIN unless you sell only tax-exempt goods such as books, and Flipkart requires it for every category except books. Confirm your position with a CA.
How many days does it take to get paid?
On Amazon.in, the first settlement comes 14 days after registration, then roughly every 7 days, with 2 to 3 working days for the credit to hit your bank. Flipkart quotes between 3 and 7 days from dispatch depending on your seller tier. On your own store, the timing is whatever your payment gateway's settlement cycle says.
Can I register with my home address?
A residential address can serve as your pickup and business address as long as the documents match. On Amazon.in the pickup address must be in the same state as the GST registration you enter, so a mismatch between your home state and your GST state will block you.
Is it fine to sell on more than one platform at once?
Yes. None of the large Indian marketplaces demands exclusivity, and Amazon's Multi-Channel Fulfilment will even ship orders from your own website out of its warehouse. The risks are operational: unsynced stock causes cancellations, and inconsistent pricing across platforms trains buyers to wait for the cheaper one.
How much money do I need to start?
The fixed part is close to zero on a marketplace, since Amazon.in and Flipkart charge no registration or monthly fee as of 2026. Real money goes into stock you can replenish, packing material, and the shipping and fee cost of every order until your first payout lands 14 days in. A Shopify store adds ₹1,499 a month on the Basic plan after the ₹20 introductory period. Returns vary widely by category, so estimates of what you will actually need differ a lot between, say, books and apparel.
