eBay restricts search visibility for items in some categories for 24 hours after listing or edits

[kbcate]

As of today, October 1, 2024 this technical issue was first reported over 15 months ago and is still not fixed.  I reported it twice but gave up when 1. no reply came from anyone at ebay and 2.  an ebay user with no skin in the game replied twice with incorrect information. (the third time will not be the charm).

I've given up listing in this category because of how annoyed I am with ebay not addressing this issue well after a year since it first started.  The above subject title was copied from an ebay seller,  the_og_surplus. That thread was closed even though the technical issue remains. Searching the subject line will bring those replies up. 

[mtgraves7984]

A bit confused... are you saying that the indexing time is restricting visibility? If so, I don't guess I could argue that...

[wpt05]

@kbcate 

This is not a technical issue.  This is normal procedure.  

Find a listing | eBay

After you create a listing, it should show up in eBay searches within 24 hours. If you have trouble finding it, there are a few things you can do.

When you create a listing, your item should appear in eBay searches within 24 hours. To find it, search using keywords in your listing, and apply filters to narrow your results.

If you can’t find your listing after 24 hours, go to Selling and check whether it’s active, in draft, or has any other status. The listing needs to be active to be pulled into our search results.

If your listing is active, and it’s been 24 hours, here are some quick checks you can do:

• Make sure you didn’t misspell anything or run two words together in the item’s title
• Look for any typos that accidentally created profanity in your listing; search will block a listing if it spots profanity
• Remove any special characters (! @ / *) from the title
• Check if you’ve created a duplicate listing. If you have, you’ll find a note in the Selling section of My eBay or Seller Hub explaining that your listing won’t be available until you’ve received at least one bid on the identical active listing
• Make sure it’s okay to sell that type of product on eBay. If the item is from a category that’s not allowed, we’ll remove your listing and send you an email explaining why Learn more about prohibited or restricted items

[urban_picker]

Not just the indexing time, but I have heard from a couple of sources that Ai is not scanning everything before it's listed and that can hold things up also.

[eburtonlab]

Not just the indexing time, but I have heard from a couple of sources that Ai is not scanning everything before it's listed and that can hold things up also.

Some categories such as Sporting Goods/Hunting and Militaria seem to routinely require the full 24 hour indexing time, prompting some to conclude that listing in those categories likely prompts some additional human scrutiny rather than just the standard AI screening -- or possibly some combination of not having listed in that category before and the presence of certain keywords; eBay does not really explain what eBay is doing, so most folks can only speculate about what is going on and whether it is intentional or not.

[kbcate]

Thank you eburtonlab, I always hope for a reply from you. Two things to add:

If one has a "saved search" for items that show up in these categories, they DO show up in the feed at the time the seller lists it, prior to showing up as a live search item. This defies the scrutiny indexing theory. Why would ebay allow it to go up on the feed page and not as a general listing if it needs to be considered more? (and if it is a buy it now item, someone who has it in a saved search feed can get it way before other potential buyers even see it)

Also, to all the replies that state that this is policy, has always been this way, etc. they mustn't be

someone who has/had regularly listed in this category as taking 24 hours to go live was not the case up until its very marked happening in the summer of 2023. The lag time was a new, noticeable departure from the time it took for items to go live. 

So why can/do the items show up in the saved search feed at the time of listing and not through any other means?

[eburtonlab]

So why can/do the items show up in the saved search feed at the time of listing and not through any other means?

Unfortunately, eBay rarely provides much of an explanation of what eBay intends or why something is being done in a particular way.

Users can only make observations about what is happening, compare that to the minimal amount of info eBay does provide and try to draw conclusions from those observations.

[bigw1231]

This is the absolute best answer! I too can tell that ebay restricts listings as when I list on Fridays, its amazing how I will only get orders from a certain area of the country, whether its the midwest, southeast, northwest etc. And I always shake my head as it would appear that only those areas are interested in my items. But make no mistake, they definitely are throttling the search results.