eBay gives every seller a product research tool for free. It used to be called Terapeak, and it is genuinely good: the sold prices in it are eBay's own transaction records, not estimates. If demand data is all you need, stop reading and go use it.
This page exists because demand data is only the first of four questions a listing decision actually turns on. eBay's tool answers one of them well and leaves the other three to you.
What eBay's Product Research does well
It reports what actually sold: real prices, real dates, real quantities, going back as far as three years. Nothing on the market beats it for accuracy, because it is not inferring anything — it is eBay reading its own database. It shows sell-through rate, average price and listing counts, and it costs nothing.
For a reseller listing second-hand goods, that is often the whole job. You find the item, you check what it sold for, you list it. No supplier to source from, no brand risk to weigh. If that describes you, a paid tool is hard to justify and we would rather say so.
What it does not tell you
The gap shows up when you are sourcing products rather than selling things you already own — which is where most dropshippers and arbitrage sellers live.
Whether the product can get your account suspended
eBay's tool does not flag VeRO or policy risk. It will happily show you strong sales history for a branded item that will have your listing pulled — and, repeated, your account with it. One suspension ends the business; the research tool that led you there never mentioned it.
How crowded the niche already is
Sold counts tell you people are buying. They do not tell you that 400 sellers are already in the listing and you would be the 401st with zero feedback.
What you actually keep
A $45 sale is not $45. After final value fees, shipping and the item cost, it might be $8. eBay's tool shows the sale price and stops there.
Where to buy it
No supplier lookup. You leave the tool and start opening tabs — AliExpress, Amazon, Walmart, a calculator — which is where the twenty minutes go.
Side by side
| eBay Product Research | Seller Radar | |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free with any eBay account | From $29/mo |
| Sold price history | Up to 3 years, eBay's own records | Daily snapshots, shorter history |
| Data accuracy | Exact — it is eBay's own data | Official eBay API, no scraping |
| Sell-through rate | Yes | Yes |
| VeRO / policy risk flags | Not covered | On every product |
| Competing seller count | Limited | Yes, with saturation context |
| Margin after eBay fees & shipping | Not covered | Built-in simulator |
| Supplier prices (AliExpress, Alibaba, +4) | Not covered | One click, 6 channels |
| Consider / Avoid recommendation | Not covered | On Growth and above |
| Export to Excel / CSV | Yes | Yes, with scores and links |
| Works without an eBay store subscription | Research yes, Sourcing Insights no | Yes |
Sourcing Insights, eBay's supplier-side feature, requires a paid store subscription. The rest of Product Research is free to all sellers.
Which one you should use
Use eBay's free tool if:
you sell items you already own, you list a handful of things a month, or you are still deciding whether selling on eBay is for you. Paying for research before you have a process to apply it to is premature.
Consider Seller Radar if:
you source products to resell, you have a monthly listing limit that makes every slot count, and a policy strike would take your income with it. At that point the question stops being “what sold?” and becomes “is this one safe, is it crowded, and what do I keep?” — three checks you are currently doing by hand, if at all.
We are not claiming better data
eBay's sold history is deeper and more authoritative than ours, and we are not going to pretend otherwise — it is their marketplace. Seller Radar pulls from the official eBay API, so the marketplace figures agree; what we add is the layer that runs after demand: risk, saturation, real margin and sourcing, in one screen instead of six tabs.
Try it against a product you were about to list
7 days free on the Growth plan. No credit card required.