While Whatnot may offer a unique sense of community and abundance of deals, some users and experts warn it poses financial and psychological risks (Picture: Getty)
It was a free referral code from a friend that got Callum* first interested in the relatively little-known but rapidly growing online shopping app, Whatnot.
As he watched offers of endless deals for designer brands and rare items flash across the screen, the bricklayer selected a livestream ‘show’ to watch and a host appeared, rapidly auctioning off items in real time. Designer clothes, jewellery, collectors cards, gold and silver… the options were endless and the prices startlingly cheap.
Intrigued, Callum began his own search for bargains to bid for. Looking back, it was all too easy to become hooked, he says.
Search online for references to Whatnot, and you’ll find Reddit threads celebrating buyer ‘wins’, where just a few pounds or dollars have secured valuable designer or collectable items with high resale value.
With starting bids as low as £1, high-value prizes, flashy visuals, reward systems and a ‘fear of missing out’ for unique collectible items – not to mention real-time chats in niche interest fields – the app is packed with engaging features to keep users watching, and spending for longer.
However, though successes seem to come thick and fast, the reality for many users is not always so glossy.
Starting bids on Whatnot are as low as £1 (Picture: Getty Images)
While Whatnot may offer a unique sense of community and abundance of deals, some users and experts are warning that the app’s roulette-style mechanics exploit behavioural vulnerabilities, posing financial and psychological risks.
Callum*, age 33, first downloaded the app in an attempt to secure cheap deals on collectable items such as trading cards, silver coins and gold bars. Within months, he’d spent thousands – and found himself deleting and reinstalling the app in an addictive cycle.
He tells Metro that he believes it all boiled down to the app’s design features and ‘spin-the-wheel’ style ‘Surprise Sets’.
‘I’ve been on and off with it – it’s so hard to quit,’ Callum explains. ‘I don’t want to use it at all but it’s like any other addiction. It’s always [within arms reach] in your pocket.’
Introducing a complex web of urgency, competition and chance, the US-based online shopping app also allows sellers to register to host shows – some are completely new to the site, while others have even built a strong Whatnot presence with thousands of followers.
Last year, European sellers on Whatnot grew 600% year-on-year (Picture: Whatnot)
Launched in December 2019 by Grant LaFontaine and Logan Head, the app’s mix of real-time interactions and competitive bidding, has seen a rapidly expanding user base.
Last year, European sellers grew 600% year-on-year – with UK viewers watching over 5 million hours of livestream shopping content, the platform’s 2025 market report reveals. One UK user even auctioned 3,300 sports cards in a single show.
As well as the lure of cheap auction prizes, Callum explains that another appeal is the chance of winning main (or shelf) prizes during ‘Surprise Sets’, such as valuable or rare precious metal coins and bars, and sought after trading cards.
‘The biggest prize I’ve won is a 5g gold bar worth £650, which cost me just £29. But other times I’ve spent £500 and won nothing – just floor prizes of shillings and world coins or foreign currency such as cents, halfpennies, or sixpence.’
For Surprise Sets, sellers curate a prize pool, and buyers can bid anywhere in the region of £1 to £200 – depending on what is on offer – for a chance to spin a wheel. As outcomes are randomised, there is no guarantee a prize will be awarded at all, even if the wheel is spun.
For Surprise Sets, sellers curate a prize pool and buyers can bid anywhere in the region of £1 to £200 (Picture: Getty Images/iStockphoto)
Shows can often run to around 500 spins.
Regulations around Surprise Sets were tightened last year; sellers are now required to operate with transparency and display all items in the set during the show and keep them visible, to avoid hidden or undeclared items.
Despite tighter ruling, Callum feels that greater transparency does little to curb the underlying risks.
‘I’ve found the auctions to be very addictive, but the Surprise Sets are even more so – and feel exactly like gambling’, he explains. ‘I’ve probably spent thousands on the app.
‘I’ve won some really expensive silver and gold coins and bars, which are still going up in value and I have made money back from my wins [by receiving goods worth more than he spent], which has kept me using Whatnot. But I’ve also walked away after spending hundreds with nothing but useless rubbish to show for it.
‘The cheaper sets are worse because you pay less attention to your spending – you can easily spend hundreds of pounds on one stream,’ Callum adds. ‘You get a dopamine hit when you win, so you’re gambling on the fact that you could win the item.’
Swept up in a whirlwind of bidding to regain losses, he has often found himself flustered and dejected once streams have ended. ‘Once, I had spent more money than I’d wanted to on a Surprise Set and felt like I had to keep going to win the top prize and earn some money back.
‘I got more and more stressed and frustrated as I kept spinning only to lose. Afterwards, I felt so angry. I had wanted to quit but I just couldn’t.’
A report from Whatnot revealed that UK viewers watched over 5 million hours of livestream shopping contentin 2025 (Picture: Whatnot)
Professor Mark Griffiths, Distinguished Professor Emeritus of Behavioural Addictions, a Chartered Psychologist and Director of the International Gaming Research Unit believes Whatnots ‘spin-the-wheel’ element does fall into a category of gambling: ‘you’ve clearly either won or you’ve not’, he tells Metro.
With 38 years’ experience in exploring addiction patterns and evaluating responsible gambling tools, Professor Griffiths explains that paying to spin and subsequently receiving a prize of very little monetary value is common in the gambling industry, and known as ‘losses disguised as wins’.
Following his experiences on Whatnot, Callum admits to suffering from low self-esteem and low mood, which impacts his relationships with others. ‘It’s been a really tough time. It has caused a lot of personal frustrations and financial stress,’ he says.
‘I want to be able to stop using it. My bank account lets you block certain sites, but as Whatnot is not classed as a gambling site, I can’t block it. I’ve tried everything’.
Other users have also reported addictive spirals of compulsive spending, citing the app’s addictive design as the main ‘hook’. On Reddit, one reported using previously untouched credit cards to pay for clothing purchases. They wrote, ‘The deals, community, and fear of missing out keep me deleting and redownloading the app hundreds of times… I realized I was digging into debt… All of this ‘positive’ aspect of the app is what keeps me in the cycle of spending.’
Professor Griffiths explains that paying to spin and subsequently receiving a prize of very little monetary value isknown as ‘losses disguised as wins’ (Picture: Getty Images)
Ethical considerations should be central to app development, says Professor Griffiths.
‘Everything is designed to keep you on the app, which is potentially rewarding, is addictive,’ he explains.
In a study funded by GambleAware, researchers found that gambling games with faster playing speeds – or higher event frequencies – increase people’s risk of harm and problem gambling. While the gambling industry is heavily regulated, with fines issued and licence removal for non-compliance, to enforce a duty of care and for sustainable play, Whatnot is not monitored by GambleAware or the Gambling Commission as it is not considered a betting site.
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‘From my perspective that is something that’s socially irresponsible. Personally, I think [regulations] should apply to all social media, video games and commercialised apps,’ adds Profession Griffiths.
A Whatnot spokesperson told Metro that the company is committed to user wellbeing and has introduced new ‘Account Controls’ since December 2025, allowing users to set personalised limits on both watch time and spending. Once a limit is reached, users are unable to continue watching livestreams or complete purchases until the selected timeframe has passed. ‘These are safeguards many marketplaces still don’t offer’, they insist.
‘We aim to put our users in control,’ the spokesperson explained, saying that support teams share wellbeing resources with users who say their time or spending feels difficult to manage.
Whatnot introduced new ‘Account Controls’ in December 2025 (Whatnot)
However, both Callum and Professor Griffiths feel that these measures should instead be mandatory not voluntary.
The company added surprise-based formats have long existed in retail and are enjoyed by many buyers, while the spinning wheel was introduced to help sellers randomise purchases more fairly. Whatnot is currently reviewing whether the wheel feature should remain on the platform.
‘Compulsory spending and time limits, or enforced breaks, can help protect users,’ Professor Griffiths says. ‘You should provide an enjoyable experience without exploiting others. People have individual responsibility, but if marketing and product design keep them on the app, companies share that responsibility.’
Callum agrees:‘It needs to be regulated in the same way that gambling sites are,’ he says. ‘I’m frustrated I’ve spent my savings on it and annoyed I got into it in the first place. Now I have to get help to quit and start over again.’
The Gambling Commission told Metro: As the regulator of commercial gambling our remit only covers products and services that meet the definitions of gambling set by Parliament in the Gambling Act.
Any product or service provided to consumers in Great Britain that meets those definitions should be subject to gambling regulation. Products which may share some features with gambling products, but do not meet the definitions fall outside our remit and therefore we make no comment on.
*Name has been changed
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