What was eBay.com originally called?

eBay was originally called AuctionWeb.

Pierre Omidyar launched AuctionWeb in September 1995 as an online marketplace intended to connect buyers and sellers directly. It began as a project on Omidyar’s personal website, alongside other content, rather than as the fully branded eBay platform familiar today.

One famous early transaction involved a broken laser pointer that Omidyar listed as a test. It sold for more than its asking price, helping demonstrate that people would use the internet to buy and sell unusual secondhand items. The service’s auction format became its defining feature.

The name eBay emerged later. In 1997, the company changed the service’s name from AuctionWeb to eBay, associated with Omidyar’s consulting business, Echo Bay Technology Group. A common mistake is treating eBay as the original name; AuctionWeb was the launch-era name.