A woman stands in front of a rail of clothes, picks an item at random, and sets the auction start price. “Ready? Go! Last chance to order, girls, bid this up!” she encourages, as live-stream shoppers on Whatnot quickly swipe a button at the bottom of their phone screens to increase the bid in one-dollar increments. The auction lasts for 10 seconds, the winner is announced on-screen, and the item — an unbranded brown and white shirt dress that the seller says would fit a UK size 6 to 20 — is officially sold for $18.80 after a starting price of $9.40. She moves onto the next item, and the auction restarts.

A rapidly growing number of independent streamers in Europe, the US, and the UK are selling clothes, handbags, and trainers in similarly fast-paced, frenzied live streams that have gamified the e-commerce experience to a new level. On top of the seller’s auction chant and upbeat music, on-screen is a running comments section, and on some platforms, viewers can earn reward points that unlock perks the longer they engage, or enter prize giveaways that are drawn throughout the stream.

Proponents believe that live-stream selling is the future of e-commerce, creating new avenues for selling dead stock, vintage, and secondhand products while purportedly reducing return rates and overcoming inherent limitations of static e-commerce websites by allowing shoppers to ask questions and see the detail, flow, and fit of the garments. But others are concerned that live streaming is speeding up consumption and using manipulative tactics, like limited shopping windows and bidding, to encourage impulse-driven shopping habits.

Live-stream selling is well established in China, where revenue from fashion sales made via live stream topped $103 billion in 2024, driven by platforms like Diantao (formerly Taobao Live) and Douyin (TikTok’s Chinese counterpart). In Western markets, it’s more niche — but it won’t be for long. Last week, Vinted announced an investment into UK-based app Tilt for an undisclosed sum, while Ebay has been actively recruiting secondhand companies like Reskinned and The Cirkel to trial live selling on the e-commerce platform. Whatnot, a California-based live-streaming platform, raised $225 million in a Series F fundraising round last year, as its European seller base grew by 600% year-on-year. This line-up joins Amazon Live, TikTok Live, as well as a number of other dedicated live-shopping platforms like CommentSold and Sprii.

This form of social commerce, a blend of retail and entertainment, hinges on the seller’s ability to hold the audience’s attention. Live-stream sellers talk their viewers through products — primarily sizing and styling — sometimes trying on items in the process. Live streams typically last one hour 20 minutes on Tilt, with the average auction lasting 23 seconds. Sellers can auction dozens of items per stream, making it a lucrative avenue for independent traders, of which Tilt has 25,000. Whatnot sellers who go live three to four times per week can earn around $13,000 in monthly sales, according to its 2026 State of Live Selling report. (Whatnot declined requests to comment.)

“For about 30 years now, e-commerce has kind of been the same thing,” says Abhi Thanendran, co-founder and CEO of Tilt. “You go on some page, it’s a static grid, the products are listed, and people browse, and they hit a bunch of filters and have to make a decision. But none of that is really necessary if you actually speak to a human being in the process of exploring a product, and so that’s what live commerce really cracks: connection.”

Isabella Vrana, a London-based vintage seller and eponymous brand owner, had been selling clothes on Depop for seven years — British Vogue even crowned her the “undisputed champion” of the resale app in 2021. About two years ago, however, Vrana made the switch to Tilt and now makes 70-80% of her sales on the platform. “It’s very liberating to go live for an hour, sell what you sell, and then at the end of that hour, your inventory is free again,” she says. “I did a sale a couple of weeks ago where we sold 150 items in three hours, but on average, if I do two hours, I’m really happy if I sell 30 things.”

While Vrana sells vintage and pieces made by local manufacturing partners, it’s not typical for sellers to disclose where they source stock. These platforms are home to tens of thousands of individual traders, so it’s difficult to generalize. Some are thrifting one-off pieces, while others buy discounted pallets from outlets made up of damaged, sample, or returned product. Some fashion items are household names, some are unbranded, while others are dupes of popular labels. “One of our fastest-growing categories now is liquidation, so stock that people would return or the packaging is damaged, but the products are still usable,” says Thanendran. “Those usually just end up in the garbage, but now we allow people to sell it and give it a second home.” Tilt says its return rate is below 5%, much lower than the industry average of 30% for online sales in the UK.

Likewise, TikTok Shop says its return rate sits around 10%, similar to in-store purchases, but lower than broader e-commerce rates. A spokesperson said live shopping is the next best thing to shopping in-store, offering customers the chance to see products demonstrated on real people, ask hosts questions, and get full visibility of fit and quality in real time. To try and mitigate the possibility of impulse purchases or returns, the spokesperson added that live-stream shoppers are required to tap the product they are considering and view the product listing. A second tap to add the item to their basket or ‘buy now’ brings up a dedicated checkout page, where customers must review full order details, price, and delivery information before confirming payment. All customers also get a cancellation window for every purchase should they change their mind. Even after this window, customers can cancel any time before an item ships, which TikTok said offers a greater degree of consumer control than other platforms.

The darker side of streaming

Streaming platforms enable and reward impulsive shopping behaviors, however. With many auctions lasting less than 30 seconds, shoppers are bombarded with layers of noise and visual stimulation, a sense of urgency and scarcity, plus flash sales and incentives for engagement.

“How long does it take to make a considered decision? It definitely takes a lot longer than a few seconds,” says fashion psychologist Dr. Dion Terrelonge. “One way of thinking is automatic judgments that are driven primarily by emotions, habits, facts, and recognition, and the prediction that there will be a reward at the end of it,” she adds, referencing psychologist Daniel Kahneman’s two systems of decision-making. “And that is exactly what [live-streaming platforms] are playing up to, because they don’t want you to engage System 2, which is the more deliberated decision-making where we weigh things up a bit more, so that really does concern me.”

“Auction fever” is a well-documented phenomenon that live-stream selling taps into, influenced by a perceived sense of competition, time pressure, and the bidder’s emotional state, which can make them spend more than they originally intended. If given more time, the thinking part of your brain kicks in and you can exert more inhibition control, says Terrelonge. “Although you want to be impulsive, you can take a step back. You can start making comparisons like: ‘I can get this on here but I saw it somewhere else,’ or ‘I realize I’ve got three of those in my wardrobe already.’ You can also begin to do future consequence simulations.”

Live-stream shopping is frictionless — card and shipping details are pre-loaded onto apps, making it effortless to bid, pay, and receive items. To account for buyer’s remorse or accidental wins, platforms do allow for cancellations. Tilt lets bidders request a cancellation within five minutes of winning, TikTok Live gives one hour, while Whatnot gives 24 hours; however, Tilt and Whatnot make it clear that this is at the behest of sellers, with many sellers stating that they don’t accept cancellations or refunds in their show notes and bios.

Sustainable fashion advocates are adamant that consumption needs to slow down, regardless if it’s secondhand or new. It’s worth interrogating what impact the normalization of auction-style shopping could have on consumption habits, particularly on developing brains. Most platforms require buyers and sellers to be 18 years old, however Whatnot allows those as young as 13 to use the platform if a parent owns their account and supervises its use. “If I were in power, I would argue that it shouldn’t be for anybody under the age of 25, because your prefrontal cortex hasn’t even finished developing by that point,” says Terrelonge. “That means your brain pathways are massively vulnerable to being shaped by these external influences, and if you are on these platforms regularly, then that’s going to impact the way that you make decisions and your relationship with consuming.” Perhaps more realistic is tighter user-dictated controls: Whatnot, for example, allows users to set spending and time limits on its app.

Finding more sustainable ways to stream

Ebay launched its live-stream offering Ebay Live in 2022 in the US and in 2024 in the UK. Since then, the company has tapped Reskinned and The Cirkel, two London-based resale companies, to sell on the platform. The Cirkel took the show on the road to Paris, as well as the Global Fashion Summit in Copenhagen last month, where co-founder Eliza Batten hosted a live stream and audience demo for conference attendees, while Reskinned has completed a trial phase of 10 live streams to date.

“Ebay came to us saying, ‘We’re doing it a little bit differently, we want some more storytelling,’ and that rang some bells for us,” says Lucy Hall, strategic partnerships lead at Reskinned. “Buying secondhand isn’t always second nature to people, they need a little bit more hand-holding. We can talk people through the imperfections of a product or zoom in on a missing button, so it enables us to do more storytelling around the product.”

It’s trial and error to understand what shoppers respond to. During their hour-long lives, Reskinned sold an average of 20 pieces. “We didn’t do £1 [auction price] starts, which you’ll see is like a massive thing, we often did £5-15 starts, but that didn’t really work. People still want to feel like they’re getting a deal,” she says. Hall says that, while it’s too soon to say if the investment will reap strong financial returns, live streaming presents opportunities beyond just selling product — which Reskinned is currently exploring. “It’s all about using it, not just as a sales channel, but also as an educational tool around the circular economy,” she says.

Reskinned, which is B Corp-certified, wants to avoid creating a high-pressure shopping environment. “We’ve got to be really careful of how we use ultra-fast fashion techniques and impulse buying in something that we do as a sustainable brand,” says Hall. Reskinned runs longer auctions, with timers that add 10 or 15 seconds after each new bid to extend the auction time. Although Ebay Live doesn’t allow for cancellations or returns, Reskinned offers 30-day returns as part of its take-back program. “Bringing some entertainment and fast-paced energy, I don’t think it’s a bad thing, but I think you can use it in a good way, or you can use it in a less great way.”

Both Reskinned and The Cirkel tease what will be on sale a day before the live, giving shoppers time to review items in more detail. The Cirkel sells luxury handbags in its lives, with auctions often running between 1.30 to two minutes. Anything that doesn’t sell can be found on the e-commerce website, too. “We’re trying to convert more people to secondhand by making it feel like new,” says The Cirkel co-founder Austin Tasker. “I believe you won’t convert people into buying secondhand by telling them it’s a more sustainable choice, they’ll go for price, perceived style, quality, and convenience. Live shopping is just another way of making it convenient to buy, and having a really fun experience.”

Ebay is keen to assert that live shopping is not “one-size-fits-all” and experiences can be catered to consumer needs. “As live shopping grows, how it is experienced matters. We are building Ebay Live to be trusted, responsible, and supportive of more considered shopping,” says Ebay’s general manager of European fashion, Kirsty Keoghan. “Many Ebay Live sellers are creating thoughtful, community-led experiences that prioritize connection, discovery, and buyer confidence. As Ebay Live grows, we remain committed to making it a safe, reputable, and positive experience for our global community.”

Tilt live-stream seller Vrana differentiates her shopping experience by setting a more chilled mood. “I didn’t want it to have chaotic QVC vibes, I wanted it to feel calm,” she says. “I play relaxing music, I talk in my normal way of speaking, I don’t rush people. Women don’t want to be hassled when they’re shopping — it’s not what we enjoy, so I don’t feel like I need to make it into a game to keep people engaged.”

Likewise, Thanendran from Tilt says the platform harks back hundreds of years to in-person market selling, an almost ritualistic and heavily community-oriented form of shopping. “Everything on Tilt starts with a conversation,” he explains. “Before any auction begins, shoppers have the opportunity to ask sellers about fit, quality, condition ,and authenticity, and see items from multiple angles in real time. Static listings can’t offer that, and buyers return week after week to sellers they’ve built relationships with [week-on-week retention figures can hit 70%]. Most of our top sellers are deeply specialized [...] and buyers come to these sellers because they want their expertise — knowing they’ve handled the item, can speak to its history and condition, and stand behind it.”

Live-stream selling shows no sign of slowing: Thanendran predicts that in five years time, consumer adoption rates will rise up to 70%, making this form of buying and selling as ubiquitous as an Amazon order. As long as there is a broad spectrum of fashion brands on the market, from ultra-fast fashion to responsible and handcrafted, there will always be a variety of methods to buy and sell. Ultimately, it’s down to individual sellers to decide how they use the sales tactics on offer, either fuel impulsive consumption or lean into opportunities to build knowledge and community. For Reskinned, the opportunity for live-stream selling to be part of fashion’s circular economy for fashion is evident.

“What we’re trying to do at Reskinned is prolong the life of clothes, whatever stage of that journey it is,” says Hall. “We don’t want it to be exported to God knows where, we want it to live on in people’s closets, and then come back to us, so we can send it out again and keep that full circularity going.”