Inside Whatnot’s Booming Beauty Resale Business

Does a resale opportunity brew in beauty?

The resale market — which comprises roughly 8 percent of total fashion and luxury sales globally, per a 2025 Vestiaire Collective study — is becoming a potential growth frontier in beauty, too, as indicated by new data from Los Angeles-based live selling platform Whatnot.

Launched in 2019 with a focus on selling collectible figurines via live video auctions, Whatnot has since expanded to other categories including sneakers, jewelry, electronics and beauty and fashion, with the latter two being the platform’s fastest-growing categories. Beauty sellers on the platform have a signature “$1 start” auction format, and often incorporate giveaways of deadstock products to build momentum during livestreams.

Though Whatnot declined to share its number of monthly active users, it did confirm that more than 20 million new accounts were created in 2025, and live sales during the period reached $8 billion, with the U.S. being the platform’s largest market, and France being its fastest-growing. One in eight live sellers on Whatnot do the job full-time, and more than 4,000 beauty products are purchased each hour on the platform.

Whatnot vs. TikTok Shop

The business is smaller than that of social commerce competitor TikTok Shop, which was estimated by eMarketer to have reached $15.82 billion total sales in 2025, but the platforms’ models also differ in key ways.

Whatnot hosts independent sellers who are responsible for sourcing their own inventory, mainly via wholesale and overstock distributors. Many of the top-selling products on the platform thus include those which are discontinued; for instance, a Coach Open Road Eau de Toilette gift set which Interparfums Inc. stopped manufacturing in 2024, or Dior’s viral lip oil in a discontinued Bronze Glow shade.

Nearly no beauty brands sell directly on the platform, though that is slowly changing.

Yves Rocher has a presence on Whatnot offering exclusive bundles, of which more than 5,000 orders have been completed, and scent brand Hotel Collection has completed nearly 4,500 orders of its own. Products sold via these brand channels are similarly often sold on an auction basis, and on Friday, a yet-unnamed cosmetics brand will launch its first live show on the platform, as well.

On TikTok Shop, meanwhile, brands more commonly operate shops of their own. Top-performing players include Benefit Cosmetics, Medicube, Maybelline New York and Canvas Beauty, and adoption is growing fast as TikTok has soared to a top-10 (and sometimes, top-five) beauty retailer position in the U.S., per NIQ.

Live selling is a key growth area on TikTok Shop, but unlike on Whatnot, users can also make purchases at any time via videos posted on the platform, not just livestreams. Unauthorized sellers are also prominent on TikTok Shop, but less so than on Whatnot, particularly as TikTok has sought to incentive new sellers by cleaning up unauthorized products.

Long-discontinued products by brands like Kayali, Chloé and Alessandro Versace’s 19V69 Italia — previously known as Versace 1969 Abbigliamento Sportivo before losing a Versace trademark infringement lawsuit in 2018 — are among Whatnot’s top product by revenue in January.

Lip products by Ariana Grande’s R.e.m. Beauty and rollerball perfumes from fragrance brand Clean Reserve are among those seeing standout momentum on the platform.

The top 10 beauty products by January sales on Whatnot.