Listing anything on the Auction House in WoW: Forever costs at least 1 silver up front — even when the original formula says the deposit should be a handful of copper. Two days after launch, while most characters are broke and leveling, that is real money for a stack of bread.
Wowhead ran the numbers in a report published November 5 US time (November 6, 07:29 Beijing time): an item with a vendor price of 4 silver 61 copper should pay 92 copper for an 8-hour listing under the classic formula (20% of vendor price). The posting window shows 1 silver instead. Pick any cheaper vendor item and the deposit reads 1 silver, flat.
Where your deposit goes: refunded on a sale, gone on a cancel
Deposits are nothing new. In original WoW they scale with listing duration: 5% of vendor price for 2 hours, 20% for 8 hours, 60% for 24 hours. Sell the item and you get every coin back; cancel the listing or let it expire and the deposit is confiscated. Forever keeps that formula and adds one rule on top: no deposit ever drops below 1 silver.
Players were already asking about the AH on launch day
On November 5, hours into the global launch, a player named Latimere posted on the official US forums asking what was going on with the Auction House, complaining about items failing to post and deposits charged where none seemed to apply. The behavior had been spotted during the beta too (the beta closed October 24) — Wowhead notes it was reported there as a bug, because the deposit shown didn't match the gold actually taken from players. On live servers, the listed amount and the charge now agree. That makes the 1 silver floor a real withdrawal from your bag, not a display glitch.
No official word; the retail client is the prime suspect
Blizzard has not said anything about a minimum deposit. The November 5 official hotfix notes cover NPC respawns, a druid trainer fix and Plainsrunning stacking in battlegrounds, with no mention of the Auction House. How deposits are calculated per duration, and whether the floor is intended, is not announced. Wowhead's explanation: Forever runs on the retail client, which has carried a 1 silver minimum deposit since 2018 or earlier — an old rule that may have simply come along for the ride.
Do the math before you post
A silver is not pocket change in the opening weeks. Wowhead expects many players to just vendor their cheap odds and ends for guaranteed copper rather than risk a deposit on an item that may not sell. If you still want the Auction House, the report suggests two things: list cheap goods in larger stacks to spread the fee across every item, and think twice about the 24-hour window — its deposit starts at 60% of vendor price, with the 1 silver floor underneath.
Check the deposit line before you hit Confirm. If Blizzard ever touches this rule in a hotfix, that number is where the change will show first.