How Much Does Autotrader Cost for Dealers? 2026 US Guide

How does Autotrader pricing work for dealers?

You get a quote for one package level and sign a monthly contract. Your listings then run on both Autotrader and KBB.com, with some tools included and others billed as extras. For franchise stores, the franchise listings packages page names 4 levels: Connect Core, Connect Advanced, Connect Premier and Connect Premier Plus, with no prices shown.

Feature	In every franchise package?
Exposure on KBB.com	Included
Kelley Blue Book pricing and budgeting tools	Included
Co-op Program Services	Included
Chat & Text	Included
Warranty & Purchase Assurance Badging	Included
At Home Services Badging	Included
Buying Signals	Extra cost
Experian AutoCheck vehicle history reports	Extra cost

KBB.com is the main thing bundled in. Autotrader says "your listings get double the exposure on KBB.com" and that packages reach "the two biggest third-party listings sites, Autotrader and KBB.com."

Your cars can also appear beyond those two sites. Cox said on August 18, 2025 that "a vast majority" of current Autotrader clients get their listings syndicated automatically to the Car and Driver Marketplace and its 10 million unique monthly visitors.

Cox puts Autotrader, Kelley Blue Book and Dealer.com together at about 27.7 million unique visitors in August 2024, against 18.1 million for the nearest competitor, per ComScore. Those are Cox's traffic figures. They don't tell you anything about your own sales.

Package level also affects where your cars show up. Autotrader's VDP guide lists it among the dealer-controlled factors that affect search visibility, along with SnapLot360.

Who is an Autotrader listings package for?

Autotrader suits franchise and independent dealers who want their cars in front of shoppers on Autotrader and KBB.com and who can track which sales came from it. In the 2025 Cox Automotive Car Buyer Journey Study, 75% of buyers used third-party websites, compared with 59% who visited dealership sites.

It suits you less if you can't attribute sales. DealerRefresh's community review describes a common pattern: a dealer spending $3,000 to $5,000 a month tracks closely, finds only 2 to 5 attributable sales, and cancels. If your CRM doesn't tag the lead source on every deal, fix that before you sign.

Setup is easier if you already use Cox tools. The same review places Autotrader in the Cox ecosystem with Kelley Blue Book, vAuto, VinSolutions and Dealer.com, and says dealers on those tools report "relatively smooth inventory syndication." Dealers also praise the KBB Instant Cash Offer (Trade-In Marketplace) for drawing on shoppers' trust in the Kelley Blue Book name.

How much does Autotrader cost for dealers per month?

US dealers report paying about $2,000 to over $18,000 a month for Autotrader, with cost per sale of $800 to $900 or more, according to DealerRefresh's May 28, 2026 summary of 218 forum threads. Autotrader publishes no figure of its own. These are dealer reports, and your quote depends on your market and package.

Cost per sale is what you pay Autotrader for each car you sell to a shopper who came from Autotrader. Here is the formula:

Cost per sale = monthly Autotrader spend ÷ sales tracked to Autotrader that month

Run it on at least 3 months of data, because one slow month can swing the number. Count only deals your CRM tags to Autotrader or KBB.com, and apply the same rule every month.

One dealer in the review wrote: "We tracked 4 vehicle sales over three quarters from our $3,700/month Autotrader subscription." Nine months at $3,700 is $33,300. That store paid about $8,325 per tracked sale, roughly 9 times the reported $800 to $900 range.

Example: a lot pays $4,500 a month and tags 5 sales to Autotrader in October. Its cost per sale is $900, at the top of the reported range. If better VDPs bring 1 more sale at the same spend, cost per sale drops to $750.

For comparison, Cars.com and CarGurus averaged about $2,500 and $2,711 a month per dealer in Q2 2026, as our CarGurus vs Cars.com cost guide shows. Autotrader's homepage claims a 69% higher close rate than its nearest competitor. That is the vendor's own claim, so check it against your formula.

How to use Autotrader on your lot to lower cost per sale

To lower your Autotrader cost per sale, track every attributable sale and make each VDP meet Autotrader's own checklist: 10+ photos, a price, a video or SnapLot 360 walkaround, and content live within 24 hours. You can work through these steps in one week:

1. Pull your last 3 Autotrader invoices and every deal your CRM tagged to Autotrader or KBB.com, then run the formula above. Write the number down. It is your baseline for renewal talks.
2. Check 10 live VDPs against that checklist: several custom photos, a price on every car, and a video or walkaround. Our car photo shot list covers the shooting order.
3. Get new arrivals live within a day. For every day a car sits unlisted, you pay the monthly fee and shoppers can't see that car.
4. Show all-in prices. Cox paused Good and Great price badges on Autotrader and KBB.com effective May 13, 2026, as our Autotrader dealer fees guide explains. FTC FAQs published September 15, 2026 say the advertised price must include a mandatory doc fee on third-party listing sites too (our agency guide covers it).
5. Ask your rep for a written quote for each Connect level, with Buying Signals and AutoCheck priced as separate lines.
6. Post a short video of every car on your own social channels, so shoppers can find the same unit outside the paid listing.

Who makes the videos, and how often

Video is one of Autotrader's top 3 merchandising best practices, but the US numbers linking it to Autotrader results are old. Cox reported that vehicles with videos had a 13% increase in VDP views on Autotrader.com in Q4 2016, and a 2015 Cox study found 65% of consumers saw vehicle videos as an important part of car shopping. Both figures are dated.

The hard part is volume. Filming a walkaround of every car, every week, needs a person and hours most sales staff don't have. With used-vehicle days' supply at 49 days in September 2026, a car that waits a week for its video has already lost part of its selling window.

A21 Social, our top pick for this job, takes filming off your staff's list. It reads your Cars.com and CarGurus listings, uses AI to build short vertical videos from the listing photos and details, and posts them to Instagram, Facebook, TikTok and YouTube on its own. It does not import Autotrader listings or post to Facebook Marketplace. You run it alongside your Autotrader package for the cars you also list on Cars.com or CarGurus.

Plans cost $49, $129 or $199 a month, plus applicable sales tax. Against the $3,700 monthly Autotrader bill in the DealerRefresh quote, the $49 plan adds about 1.3% to spend. For other options, see our AI video tools for dealerships.

Common mistakes with Autotrader contracts

The costliest mistake is budgeting from figures that don't apply to a US store. The others come from judging on leads, upgrading before fixing VDPs, leaving fees out of prices and signing without exit terms.

• Budgeting from UK prices. The haswent.com breakdown covers the UK only, and its package names (Starter through Ultra) and £2,995 monthly average per retailer are UK Autotrader Group figures. If you bring those numbers to a US negotiation, you start from the wrong anchor. Price only from a written US quote.
• Judging Autotrader by lead counts. Autotrader's features page claims 31% more total leads and 79% more email leads, with no dated source or stated baseline. Leads that don't close still cost you the full fee, so base your renewal on cost per sale.
• Upgrading the package while VDPs stay thin. Package level and video both affect search visibility, and paying for more reach on cars with few photos and no video wastes the upgrade. Meet the 10+ photo and video checklist first, then compare levels.
• Leaving mandatory fees out of listed prices. FTC FAQs from September 15, 2026 say the advertised price must include a mandatory doc fee, including on third-party listing sites. A missing fee puts both the listing and the store at risk, so list all-in prices everywhere.
• Signing without exit terms in writing. DealerRefresh dealers describe cancelling after tracking poor results, and the public Autotrader pages we read show no contract terms. Get the term length and notice period in writing before you sign.

What to do next

Work out your own Autotrader cost per sale this week, then decide whether your package has earned its renewal. If your number is above the $800 to $900 range dealers report, take it to your rep and ask for a written quote at each Connect level.

Then fix what you control. Show all-in prices, put 10+ photos on each car and get new arrivals live within 24 hours, and add a video for every unit. After 90 days, rerun the formula with the same attribution rules.

To get video on every car without anyone filming, connect A21 Social to your Cars.com or CarGurus listings and it will post a short video of each car to your social channels.

How we checked this guide

In November 2026 we read Autotrader's US B2B dealer product pages, the DealerRefresh community review of Autotrader, an older DealerRefresh pricing thread, Cox Automotive press releases and research, and the haswent.com packages breakdown, which covers the UK only. We could not verify actual US package prices, whether Autotrader sets US prices by listing count, or any 2025 or 2026 US data linking video to more leads. The monthly spend and cost-per-sale figures come from dealers, because Autotrader publishes none. Every figure in this guide links to its source.

To put a video on every car you list on Cars.com or CarGurus this week, try A21 Social from $49 a month.