Etsy Listing Photo Requirements: the unedited-photo rule that AI workflows break

The specification, as published

The rule that actually constrains AI editing

Etsy requires that your listing include at least one unedited photo of the actual item against a real background — a photo that has not been edited or changed in any way. Some categories have documented exceptions, but the default is that one honest photo must exist in the listing.

Outside that required photo, Etsy explicitly allows photo-editing tools, including AI, to adjust lighting or colour, crop or resize, or change the background. So the policy is not anti-AI. It is anti-substitution: AI may improve the presentation of the real item, it may not replace the evidence of it.

Two hard limits follow. You cannot use editing to hide flaws, conceal damage, or change an item's appearance so it differs from what the buyer receives. And you cannot use images that create false expectations about what arrives. Etsy also recommends noting in the description when AI was used to edit listing photos.

What this means in practice

• A listing built entirely from generated images is not compliant, regardless of how accurate they look.
• The safe pattern is one unedited photo plus AI-cleaned supporting images — not the reverse.
• For digital products such as patterns, recipes or instructions, Etsy requires an actual result made using the instructions, not an AI-generated or simulated result.
• Transparent PNG is a trap: exporters default to it, and Etsy renders those areas black rather than white. Export on a solid background.
• If your first photo is under 635 px, the listing is not rejected — it is simply ranked lower. That is worse than an error, because nothing tells you it happened.

Etsy versus Amazon, in one line each

Amazon polices the pixels: an exact background value, an exact fill percentage, no border, no halo. It will suppress a listing that fails a machine check on an otherwise honest photo.

Etsy polices the honesty: fewer hard numbers, but a requirement that the real item appears unedited somewhere in the listing, and a prohibition on editing that misrepresents condition.

The practical consequence for anyone running one catalogue across both: an image set that satisfies Amazon's main image can still violate Etsy's authenticity rule if every photo has been generated. You need a real photo in the set either way.

Sources

Every figure above comes from the pages below, read on the date shown. Marketplace policies change without announcement, so if you are about to rebuild a catalogue on one of these numbers, open the source and confirm it still says what it said.

• Etsy Help — Requirements and Best Practices for Images in Your Etsy Shop — read Oct 26, 2026
• Etsy — Listing image requirements policy — read Oct 26, 2026