The NFT Academy

Free tool

NFT profit calculator

Sell price minus buy price is not your profit. This works out what you actually keep once the marketplace fee, the creator royalty and gas on both sides come out — and tells you the price you need to break even.

Runs entirely in your browser. Nothing you type is sent anywhere.

Your trade

$

Used only to convert to dollars.

%

OpenSea 2.5%, Blur 0%, Magic Eden 2%.

ETH
ETH
ETH

Typical mainnet transfer: 0.002–0.008.

ETH
%

Often 0% in practice — royalties are rarely enforced now.

Net result

Profit or loss+0.2330 ETH
In dollars+$699.00
Return on cost46.2%
Break-even sell priceWhat you must sell at to get your money back0.5481 ETH

Where the money went

Naive profit (sell − buy)0.3000 ETH
Marketplace fee−0.0200 ETH
Creator royalty−0.0400 ETH
Gas, both sides−0.0070 ETH
Total you do not keep0.0670 ETH · $201.00

The gap between the naive number and the real one is what catches most first-time sellers out.

Estimates only. Gas is volatile and varies with network congestion; marketplace fees and royalty enforcement change without notice. Check the live figures before you commit to a trade.

Why the headline number is almost always wrong

The arithmetic people do in their head is sell price minus buy price. It is the wrong arithmetic, and the gap is not small. Four separate costs sit between the two numbers, and three of them are charged whether or not the trade works out.

1. The marketplace fee

A percentage of the sale price, taken by the venue. It ranges from 0% on some aggregators to around 2.5% on the established marketplaces. It comes out of the seller's side, so it reduces what you receive rather than what the buyer pays.

2. The creator royalty

A percentage the original creator set when the collection was deployed, historically 5–10%. The important nuance in 2026 is that royalties are frequently not enforced — several major marketplaces made them optional, and a large share of volume now moves through venues that pay nothing. Model both cases: it is often the difference between a profitable trade and a break-even one.

3. Gas to buy

You pay the network to process the purchase. This is sunk the moment the transaction confirms. It is also charged on failed transactions — if you lose a competitive mint, you still pay.

4. Gas to sell

Listing is often free, but accepting an offer or filling an order costs gas again. Approving a marketplace to move your tokens is a separate transaction with its own cost, usually one-off per collection.

The number that actually matters: break-even

The most useful output above is not the profit figure — it is the break-even sell price. That is the number the asset has to reach before you have made anything at all, and it is always higher than what you paid. Knowing it before you buy changes how you think about a purchase: you are not hoping the price goes up, you are hoping it goes up by more than roughly 8–12% before you see a cent.

A worked example

Buy at 0.5 ETH, sell at 0.8 ETH, 2.5% marketplace fee, 5% royalty, 0.004 ETH gas to buy and 0.003 to sell. The naive profit is 0.3 ETH. The real profit is 0.233 ETH — the fee takes 0.02, the royalty 0.04, and gas 0.007. You keep about 78% of what you thought you had made. At a 60% price rise that is a good trade; at a 10% price rise the same structure would have put you underwater.

What this calculator does not model

  • Tax. A realised gain is very likely taxable. Use the tax estimator for a rough figure.
  • Currency risk. If ETH itself moved between your buy and your sell, your dollar result differs from your ETH result. The dollar figures here use a single ETH price for both sides.
  • Failed transactions. Gas spent on reverted mints is real money and does not appear here.
  • Liquidity. A listed price is not a sale. Most NFTs do not sell at their listed price, and a large share do not sell at all.

Common questions

Why is my real profit lower than sell price minus buy price?
Because four things come out in between: the marketplace fee, the creator royalty, and gas on both the purchase and the sale. On a 1 ETH sale with a 2.5% fee and a 5% royalty you lose 0.075 ETH before gas — and gas is charged whether or not the trade goes your way.
What is a realistic gas figure to enter?
On Ethereum mainnet, a straightforward NFT transfer in normal conditions lands somewhere around 0.002–0.008 ETH. During a heavily contested mint it can be many times that. On Polygon, Base or Arbitrum it is usually a small fraction of a cent.
Do I still have to pay creator royalties?
It depends entirely on where you sell. Several major marketplaces made royalties optional, so in practice many sales now pay nothing to the creator. Set the royalty field to 0% to model that case, and to the collection's stated rate to model the other.
Does this account for tax?
No. This calculates your economic position on the trade. If you are in profit, that gain is very likely taxable — use the crypto tax estimator for a rough figure, and speak to a professional for anything material.