Etsy Changing Photos to Square Format on Shop Home Pages in Early August

In a bid to enhance the shopping experience for buyers, Etsy has announced a significant change to its platform. Starting in August, the format of listing images in a seller’s Shop Home will be switched to square photos.

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This decision comes after the company conducted various experiments with different listing image sizes and ratios. The results strongly suggested that displaying square photos on the Shop Home page increased the likelihood of buyers making a purchase.

Etsy aims to provide consistency across the site and to achieve this, they have decided to align the photo format on the Shop Home page with square images, similar to other areas of the platform.

Sellers need not take any action to implement this change, but they are encouraged to adapt to the new format by capturing and uploading square images. To assist sellers in this transition, Etsy offers some helpful tips.

• The company advises sellers to upload rectangular and square images that work well with various crops and ratios. To facilitate this process, Etsy has introduced a new crop feature in the Listing Manager. This feature allows sellers to preview their photos in different formats, making it easier to choose images compatible with both rectangular and square dimensions.
• Etsy advises sellers to edit their current images or consider taking new photos optimized for both formats, especially for the first photo in an existing listing, as it will serve as the default image displayed on the Shop Home page.
• In order to make the process of uploading new products to the marketplace more efficient, Etsy has incorporated the crop feature into its new listing form. Sellers can use this feature to ensure their images are tailored to the platform’s requirements.

For sellers seeking further guidance on capturing the best images for their listings, Etsy has published a blog post titled ‘7 Essential Types of Product Photos.‘

While Etsy did not specify an exact launch date for this format change, the shift is expected to occur in early August.

Therefore, we advise sellers to optimize their images promptly, as leaving the cropping process to Etsy may not result in the best buyer experience.

Acting quickly will ensure sellers make the most out of this new feature to attract potential buyers and boost sales on the platform.