Not sure, but usually I find $10-15 USD a fair price for sketches and $20-40 USD alright for "flats".
a +X for extra character and Y% discount for sequences are also cool, but I don't have exact numbers besides the first thing should be less than a second sketch.

I do want to encourage (the hypothetical) you to not go with hourly pricing, because some commissions I got have taken an afternoon while others have taken months. I'm willing to wait seasons on end for my art so long as the artist isn't pissed about me getting in their notes/messages/DMs going "hey hows it going" at least at a per-or-bi-week basis. Putting my own time on a price range just puts us both on a time crunch and can be annoying if I want to have something changed but it requires more money.

Good quality in terms of art/"service" can bump these numbers up a bit, of course. But these are numbers that I could see myself buying things.

Generally commissions are broken down by quality and/or how much of a subject is being drawn.


The most common ones I see are:

Sketch, refined line art, coloured in, fully shaded (more or less tiers may be used depending on the artist).

Head shot, halfbody, fullbody.


Backgrounds are usually priced separately if they're included, but not always.

Extra characters are usually either a flat price (sometimes per tier) or add X% additional cost to the picture, if extra character charges are included.


You can probably go for a range of 40-80 for fully shaded (adjust depending on vibes, inflation, and other factors), with the other tiers being some fraction of that final tier (again, mostly based on vibes).

If you're ever intending to live off art, you should take note of the amount of time it takes on average to complete a picture, and adjust the rates so that you're getting paid a decent 'wage' for the amount of time that you spend producing.


You will find that there is a conflict in what people consider the ideal price, a lot of people undervalue the price of art despite the fact that it is a luxury good (conflict of interest moment), but because a lot of newer artists do go for lower prices, this can hurt one's ability to get commissions unless they've managed to get a consumer base set up.

I’m pretty aware of this to a good extent. I’ve seen enough media about how to price/conduct commissions, horror stories about them, and more to know how to generally go about them. And of course, I’ve gotten enough commissions to where I know how they tend to be priced based on artist experience, as well as how pricing structures work to a decent degree since I’m the one paying people.

Hell, I’ve even made semi-convincing commission sheets every April Fool’s day for the past two years.
2024: https://www.furaffinity.net/view/56118670
2025: https://www.furaffinity.net/view/60419948/
Needless to say, I’m not totally unfamiliar with how the general form factor works. I don’t really plan to live off these, either. My persistent refusal to draw for other people in exchange for material goods or services aside, the rate I was charging on the 2025 sheet was equivalent to my pay at my summer job at the time. In my eyes, if I’m going to be drawing for money AT ALL, it should at least be worth the amount my services are worth to any other employer I have, freelance or otherwise. I know a couple people who do timed rates (Baalbuddy and Gammatrap come to mind, along with some people I know personally), so it’s not totally unheard of to do business like that. Even so, I have a general idea of how long work takes me (I even listed the averages at the time in my 2025 sheet, because again, if I’m charging flat rates it’s going to be roughly equal to the amount I’d get charging by the half-hour of work). Honestly though, if I ever went through with comms, I find time-based rates much more worthwhile and straightforward compared to having the commissioner (and myself) do differential calculus just to figure out how much money I’m owed for work based on a bunch of arbitrary factors. It’s a lot easier for me to just give an estimate of how long I’d think work will take and then bill at the end of the client agrees to paying somewhere in the region of that quote.

Really, I just wanted to pose this question because I want to know what people think my content is “worth.” I see quite a few people I watch charging reasonably-fair rates, but I just don’t think the art justifies the purchase. I’m someone who cares a lot about the art style of my commissioned artists—it’s why I even go out of my way to buy commissions I could feasibly draw myself if I cared enough. If I’m paying an artist, it’s because I want to see the idea drawn by them. It’s just too often I see comms open for artists I’m never going to ask to draw my ideas because my ideas aren’t solely aligned to their commissions.
Frankly, I feel like I fall into that category: I’m not remarkable enough to where my style itself draws people in with ideas solely applicable to my art style. Anyone who wants drawings done by me would likely be fine asking someone else who offers the same or better prices. On top of that, I’m just so horrible with deadline management and communication that I don’t think the commissioner experience would be that pleasant with me.