How to Set eBay Time Away, and What Happens to Listings and Metrics While You Are Gone
eBay vacation mode is called Time Away. It has two modes, runs for a maximum of 15 or 30 days depending on which you choose, and excludes seven specific order types from the delivery date protection most sellers assume is universal.
That exclusion list is where sellers get hurt, and it is missing from every guide currently ranking for this term.
The two modes and their limits
Allow item sales keeps listings visible and purchasable. Buyers see a message at the top of the listing saying you are away, and eBay updates the estimated delivery dates automatically so you do not need to ship while gone. Maximum duration: 15 days.
Pause item sales hides fixed price listings from search results. Buyers who saved an item to a watchlist or cart cannot complete the purchase and see a note that you are not processing orders until your end date. Maximum duration: 30 days.
Neither can be extended past those limits in one session. For a longer absence, eBay's position is that you end listings and relist later.
The correct way to turn it on
The path is My eBay, then Account settings, then Time Away settings, then Schedule time away. Choose Allow or Pause, set a start and end date, select Apply.
This matters because much of the advice online is wrong. Guides published and updated in 2026 still instruct sellers to open the Messages tab, then Change Settings, then Store Vacation Settings. That was the pre-September 2020 interface, it was limited to Store subscribers, and eBay replaced it with Time Away for all sellers. If a guide sends you to Messages, everything else in it predates the change too.
The automatic response is configured separately, under Automatic response in the same settings panel, with its own start and end dates. Setting Time Away does not set the auto-reply.
The seven exclusions that damage your metrics
Whether you allow sales or pause them, eBay states that delivery dates will not be updated for:
- Second Chance Offers
- Auto-accepted offers
- Pending counter-offers
- Seller initiated offers accepted during Time Away
- Items with local pickup or in-store pickup as the shipping option
- Digital items
- Athletic shoes eligible for Authenticity Guarantee
Read that against how you actually sell. If you run Best Offer with auto-accept rules, or you send offers to watchers before leaving, those orders land with normal delivery expectations attached and Time Away does nothing for them.
This is the mechanism behind a complaint that recurs on eBay's own community boards: sellers who used Time Away correctly, sold a handful of items while away, and still picked up late shipment defects. The feature worked as documented. The orders fell inside the exclusion list.
eBay's stated remedy is to change the shipping format or handling times on affected items before you go. That is a manual job and nothing in the Time Away flow prompts you to do it.
Auctions keep running through a pause
Pausing item sales does not stop auctions. eBay states that when you pause, buyers can still see and buy your auction-style listings, with a message informing them you are away and an updated delivery estimate.
A thirty day pause with live auctions is therefore not a pause. Schedule auctions to end several days before you leave.
Timing is measured in hours, not days
Several popular guides tell sellers that hiding takes a couple of days and that listings take several days to return. eBay's own page says otherwise, and the difference matters if you are setting this the night before a flight.
Choose today's date and the on-listing message appears within minutes. Delivery date updates and listing hiding take a few hours. After Time Away ends or is cancelled, listings reappear in search after a couple of hours, automatically, with no editing required.
Choose a future date and Time Away begins at 12:01am on the start date and ends at 11:59pm on the end date.
eBay recommends starting a day before your absence and ending a day after your return. The first buffer clears last-day orders; the second gives you a day to process anything pending before listings go fully live.
What the break costs you
Fees do not pause. eBay states that listing-related fees and any subscription fees continue to apply during your time away, and the guides that mention this rarely put a number on it.
Take the maximum thirty day pause on a US Basic Store and you have paid 27.95 dollars on monthly renewal, or 21.95 on annual, for a month in which your fixed price listings were hidden from search. On Premium that figure is 74.95 or 59.95. On Anchor it is 349.95 or 299.95. Our comparison of Store subscription tiers across seven markets sets out each tier.
Insertion fees already charged are not refunded because you hid the listing.
There is a second cost that is real but unquantified. Search placement responds to recency and sales velocity, and thirty days of zero sales is thirty days without either signal. eBay does not publish how quickly that recovers.
The conclusion is not to skip breaks. It is that on an Anchor Store, a thirty day pause costs roughly 350 dollars in subscription for hidden inventory, and ending listings may genuinely cost less than hiding them.
What you still owe while away
Time Away does not suspend obligations. eBay states you must still fulfil orders sold before your start date and respond to open buyer requests relating to them.
Returns, claims and payment disputes filed while you are away run on their normal clocks. Those carry cost: an item not as described case attaches a surcharge to your final value fee, and a defect affects seller standing. Our itemized guide to every eBay fee covers which surcharges apply, and the fee calculator shows what they cost on a specific sale.
Plan to check in at least once. The feature manages buyer expectations. It does not manage cases.
Cross-listing sellers need to pause everywhere
Pausing on eBay does nothing anywhere else. A buyer on another marketplace can still purchase an item you have physically packed away, and the resulting cancellation lands on that platform's metrics.
Each platform hides this in a different place and the mechanics differ. If you cross-list, pause everywhere or pause nowhere. Our comparison of the main eBay alternatives covers how those platforms differ on the fee side, which is the other half of the cross-listing decision.
Ending it early
Go to Time Away settings, select Cancel time away or set the end date earlier, then Apply. Listings return to search automatically within a couple of hours.
The short version
Time Away is a communication tool, not a suspension. It updates delivery estimates and tells buyers you are gone. It does not stop fees, does not stop auctions, does not cover seven specific order types, and does not pause your obligations on existing orders.
Set it a day early, end it a day late, kill your auctions first, check the exclusion list against how you sell, and work out whether a month of subscription is worth paying for hidden listings.