How to Cancel a Bid on eBay

If your financial situation changes, an item isn't what you thought it was, or several other reasons, you may want to cancel a bid on eBay. Here's how to do it, as long as the rules you must follow.

Cancel Bids More Than 12 Hours Before Auction End

Provided there are more than 12 hours before the associated auction ends, you can cancel, or retract, any bid you place on eBay. That said, it's stipulated by eBay you can only retract a bid if: 

• You've accidentally bid the wrong amount (e.g. $900 instead of $9).
• The seller has "significantly" changed the description of the item.
• The seller isn't responding to your messages.

In practice, it's possible to retract bids even if none of these circumstances apply.

How to Retract a Bid on eBay

With this warning in mind, you can complete the retraction by navigating to eBay's Retract Bid webpage. To do this, you can either access the retraction form, or you can navigate to eBay's Help pages and go to the section on retracting bids, where you can find an alternative, newer link for retracting bids.

In cases where you use the old retraction form, here's what you do:

1. Open the retraction form.
2. Enter the item number of the item on which you've mistakenly bid.
3. Choose your reasons for canceling from the Your explanation of the retraction drop-down menu.
4. Select Retract bid.

How to Cancel a Bid on eBay via the Help Page

And here's how you retract a bid via eBay's Help pages:

1. Select Help & Contact from the left-hand side of the menu bar at the top of the screen.
2. Type Retracting a bid into the search bar.
3. Select Retracting a bid when it appears.
4. Select the item for which you'd like to retract a bid. It will be under the Retract your bid subheading.
5. Select Continue.
6. Choose the appropriate reason for canceling your bid.
7. Select Continue.
8. Select Retract bid.

Cancel Bids Less Than 12 Hours Before Auction End

It's also possible to retract an eBay bid when an auction is scheduled to finish in under 12 hours. However, a few differences apply in such cases.

For one, you can retract bids only within an hour of having made them. In other words, if there are less than 12 hours before an auction ends, any bid you place during this period must be retracted within an hour of making it. Assuming this condition holds, you can then go about retracting exactly as described in the section above.

How to Cancel a Bid by Contacting the Seller

Nonetheless, there is, in fact, one way in which you can attempt to have a bid canceled even when an hour or more has elapsed. To do this, you have to contact the seller and ask for them to cancel the bid:

1. Go to the item's listing and select Contact Seller.
2. Select Other from the Select a topic menu.
3. Select Contact the seller.
4. Enter a topic heading, then type a message requesting bid cancellation and your reasons for wanting to cancel the bid.
5. Select Send a copy to my email address, if so desired.
6. Type the verification code shown in the image, then select Send.

How to Remove a Bid on eBay's Mobile App

Retracting a bid on the eBay mobile app is pretty much identical to retracting a bid on the eBay website. You can go to the retraction form, or you can follow the process below.

1. Under Your Recently Viewed Items, tap the item you'd like to cancel a bid for.
2. Tap the More button in the top-right corner of the screen.
3. Tap Help & Contact.
4. Scroll down and tap the item you'd like to cancel a bid for.
5. Tap Retracting a bid.
6. Scroll down and tap Continue.
7. Scroll down and tap your reason for retracting.
8. Tap Continue.
9. Tap Retract bid.