Do I need to reply to every Etsy message to keep Star Seller response rate?

Hi! You don’t need to reply again just to “close” the conversation for Star Seller—Etsy’s Star Seller message response rate is based on replying within 24 hours to the first buyer message in a thread, not on being the last person to send a message in every back-and-forth.

In your specific situation (you messaged them an update, and they replied “thanks/ok”): you can usually leave it there and it won’t hurt your Star Seller response rate.

A couple quick tips so you don’t get tripped up:

• If a buyer starts a new message thread (or opens a new “Help with order” style message), make sure you send at least one reply within 24 hours.
• Etsy will sometimes show an “needs a response” indicator/banner on messages—those are the ones to prioritize.
• Don’t spam buyers with extra “Thanks!” replies purely for the metric; it’s better customer service to only respond when there’s something helpful to add.

If you want a safe one-liner when you do feel a reply is useful, something like “Thanks for confirming—your package is all set and you’re good to go!” is fine, but it’s optional in the “acknowledgement” case you described.