Features
BidWatch gives you a complete set of tools for tracking eBay auctions. From real-time countdowns to push notifications that reach you even when you are away from the browser, every feature is designed to help you bid smarter and never miss a deadline.
Live Countdown Timers
Every listing you add to BidWatch displays a real-time countdown that ticks down to the exact second the auction ends. The timers are synchronised with eBay's servers, so you always see the true remaining time rather than an approximation. As an auction nears its close, the countdown colour shifts through a three-stage urgency scale: green when there is plenty of time, amber when the window is narrowing, and red during the final critical minutes.
This colour coding makes it easy to scan your dashboard and instantly identify which auctions need your attention right now. When the clock hits zero, BidWatch automatically refreshes the listing after a short delay to pull the final sale price from eBay's API. You do not need to manually reload anything — the final result, including whether the item sold and for how much, appears on your card without any extra steps.
Price Change Detection
Auctions are dynamic. Bids come in, prices shift, and a deal can change in seconds. BidWatch monitors every listing for price movements and surfaces them with clear visual indicators directly on the listing card. When a price drops, a green downward arrow appears alongside the new amount, letting you know the item just became more affordable. When the price rises due to a new bid, a red upward arrow signals increased competition.
These indicators update automatically each time BidWatch refreshes your listings, so you can track bidding momentum without repeatedly visiting eBay. If you're watching one rare item or a dozen auctions at once, price change detection keeps you informed at a glance. Combined with the notification system, you can receive alerts the moment a price changes, even if BidWatch is running in a background tab.
Smart Notifications
Missing the end of an auction by a few seconds is one of the most frustrating experiences for any bidder. BidWatch addresses this with a layered notification system that gives you multiple warnings as a listing approaches its deadline.
The first alert fires at the five-minute mark, giving you enough time to open eBay and prepare your bid. A second warning at one minute signals that the auction is about to close. For last-second sniping, dedicated alerts at 30 seconds and 10 seconds keep you locked in during those decisive final moments.
Each notification category can be toggled independently, so you can enable just the alerts that match your bidding style. BidWatch also supports Web Push notifications powered by a background service worker. These push alerts work even when your browser tab is closed or your device is asleep, so you never have to keep BidWatch open just to receive warnings. All you need is a browser that supports the Push API and an active internet connection.
- Time warnings: 5-minute and 1-minute ending alerts
- Snipe alerts: 30-second and 10-second final countdowns
- Price alerts: Notifications when a watched listing's price changes
- Ended alerts: Confirmation when an auction closes
- Push delivery: Background notifications via service worker, no open tab required
Side-by-Side Comparison
When you are torn between two similar listings, the comparison view lets you evaluate them head-to-head in a dedicated overlay. Select any two listings from your dashboard and BidWatch places them side by side with live-updating countdown timers, current prices, and bid counts.
Directional arrows highlight the differences between the two items. A green arrow on price points to whichever listing is cheaper, helping you spot the better deal. A green arrow on bid count indicates which listing has less competition — fewer bids generally mean a better chance of winning. Time arrows show which listing has more remaining time, useful when deciding where to focus your attention first.
On mobile devices, the comparison layout stacks vertically so you can still review both listings comfortably on a smaller screen. Selection uses a simple numbered badge system — tap a first listing to assign it badge 1, tap a second for badge 2, and the compare overlay opens automatically.
Auto-Refresh
Auction data goes stale quickly, especially in the final hour. BidWatch's auto-refresh system keeps your listings up to date without manual intervention. You can set a custom refresh interval in Settings, and BidWatch will poll eBay's API at that cadence to pull the latest prices, bid counts, and time remaining.
To avoid unnecessary API calls, BidWatch uses smart refresh tiers that adapt based on how close each auction is to ending. Listings ending within the next few minutes refresh as frequently as every 30 seconds, giving you near-real-time data when it matters most. Listings ending in several hours refresh less often to conserve bandwidth. This tiered approach means you get rapid updates for urgent auctions without hammering the network for items that still have days left.
If you ever need the absolute latest data immediately, a manual refresh button bypasses the cache and fetches fresh results directly from eBay. Auto-refresh and manual refresh work together, so you always have control.
Folders and Organisation
Tracking more than a handful of auctions can get overwhelming without a way to group them. BidWatch lets you create custom folders with names that make sense for your workflow — categories like "Cameras", "Vinyl Records", or "Parts for the Project Car" keep everything sorted.
You can drag listings between folders or assign them during the add process. A favourites system lets you star the listings you care about most, so they are always easy to find. The dashboard offers filter tabs that segment your view into All, Active, Ending Soon, and Ended, letting you quickly narrow focus to only the listings that are currently relevant.
Folders persist across sessions in your browser's local storage, and they are included when you export your data, so your organisational structure travels with your backup.
Multi-Language Support
BidWatch is available in seven languages: English, Spanish, French, German, Italian, Portuguese, and Japanese. The interface language is detected automatically from your browser settings on first visit, though you can change it at any time from the language selector in the toolbar.
Every piece of interface text — buttons, labels, tooltips, status messages, and modal dialogs — is fully translated. BidWatch also supports 14 eBay country domains, from ebay.com and ebay.co.uk to ebay.de, ebay.fr, ebay.com.au, and beyond. Each country selection automatically configures the correct marketplace ID and affiliate tracking parameters, so links and API calls always target the right regional eBay site.
Currency symbols and price formatting follow the listing's original currency, and the timezone setting ensures that all countdown timers align with your local clock. So it works the same no matter where you're bidding from.
Export and Import
Your auction data belongs to you. BidWatch lets you export everything — your full list of tracked listings plus your settings — as a single JSON file. This file serves as a complete backup that you can store wherever you like.
Importing a backup restores your listings and preferences in one step. The import system is backwards-compatible with older export formats, so if a newer version of BidWatch adds settings that did not exist when you created the backup, those new keys simply take their default values while your existing data loads intact.
Export and import also enable cross-device transfer. Save your data on one machine, copy the JSON file to another, and import it to pick up exactly where you left off. Since BidWatch stores all data in your browser's local storage and never sends personal information to any server, the export file is the only way to move your data — and you control it entirely.
Themes and Customisation
BidWatch offers a dark mode and a light mode, each carefully designed for comfortable extended use. Dark mode uses deep neutral backgrounds that reduce eye strain during late-night bidding sessions, while light mode provides a clean, high-contrast layout for daytime use.
Beyond the base theme, you can choose from multiple accent colour palettes — silver, copper, slate, forest, navy, carbon, and more — to personalise the interface to your taste. Accent colours affect buttons, highlights, tags, and interactive elements throughout the app.
Additional customisation options include text scaling for readability, background visual effects, and accessibility adjustments. All theme and customisation preferences save automatically to local storage and are included in your exported backup file, so your visual setup follows you across sessions and devices.
Item Information
Knowing the headline price is not enough to make a smart bidding decision. BidWatch's item information panel gives you a detailed breakdown of everything that affects the true cost of an auction win.
For each listing, you can view the seller's details including their username, feedback score, and positive feedback percentage. This helps you gauge trustworthiness before committing to a bid. The panel also shows a full shipping breakdown with the listed shipping cost, delivery method, and estimated arrival.
Where applicable, BidWatch calculates tax estimates so you can see the projected total cost — item price plus shipping plus tax — in a single view. This full cost calculation removes the guesswork from auction bidding and prevents surprises at checkout. All of this data is fetched directly from eBay's API and presented in a clean, readable card that you can open with a single tap on any listing.