Inside Gen Z’s rising plush toy craze as they delay adulthood

Christmas is just around the corner and if you’re not sure what to get your Gen Z family members, a stuffed animal could be the answer this year.

2025 has proven that toys aren’t just for kids, as more and more young adults boast extensive plush collections. Experts say it signals a desire for community and a return to childhood.

The popularity was driven by a maniacal craze for Labubu dolls — collectible toys produced by a Chinese toy company Pop Mart — as well as for the soft toys, also called “Jellies”, designed by British brand Jellycat.

Brightly colored stuffed animals and wide-eyed dolls can be seen lining walls, or falling from overstocked shelves, in videos posted by Gen Z on TikTok.

The platform, which has become a barometer of Generation Z trends, currently hosts millions of videos showing young adults obsessed with stuffed animals.

The videos range from building a “Labubu Wall”, to hacks to find Authentic Labubusor a five-rack shelf dedicated to displaying frosts.

“This is the biggest year we’ve ever seen of adults buying toys,” Melissa Symonds, UK toy director at global consumer analytics company Circana, told CNBC Make It in an interview.

“Adults of all ages are buying toys, but it’s primarily the younger demographic, Gen Z, who are really driving this strong growth we’ve seen in recent years,” Symonds said.

In fact, a recent Research report found that 43% of UK adults bought a toy for themselves or another adult this year, and that figure rises to 76% for Gen Z shoppers aged 18-34.

Among toy genres, stuffed animals are the fourth most popular category among adults, with games and puzzles leading the way, followed by building sets like LEGO and action figures coming in third, according to Circanca data shared with CNBC.

It’s a similar story across the Atlantic, with sales of licensed toys increasing by 18% for American adults over 18 in the first half, according to Circana.

Symonds explained that companies exploit the so-called “joy economy” in which consumers seek comfort and nostalgia from products and experiences, particularly when faced with economic or political pressures.

“The economy, the wars, everything is really depressing and serious, whereas toys just bring a little joy back into life,” Symonds said.

Pop Mart and Jellycat have benefited from this trend. Pop Mart published a close notice 400% increase in net profit in the first half, and its revenue jumped 204.4% year-on-year to 13.88 billion yuan ($1.93 billion).

In 2024, about $423 million of the company’s global revenue came from Labubu dolls alone, Pop Mart previously told CNBC Make It.

Meanwhile, Jellycat saw its turnover increase by 66% to £333m in 2024, up from £200m in 2023. Its pre-tax profit more than doubled to £139m, up from £67m the previous year.

“Seeing the response from multiple generations to our new characters has been wonderful,” Arnaud Meysselle, CEO of Jellycat, said in a statement to CNBC.

“It was amazing to meet so many adults discovering Jellycat for the first time at our recent experience launches in Beijing, Seoul and Los Angeles – and to welcome many more to our online communities,” said Meysselle.

Fans of Jellycat, Labubu and plushies in general range from company workers has military personnel who extol the benefits of toys on their mental health on TikTok, as they grapple with increasingly stressful adult lives.

Circana’s Symonds said it is a symptom of the “Peter Pan effect” which refers to a psychological syndrome in which adults struggle to grow up and take on responsibilities.

“There’s almost this irony that when you’re a kid, you look forward to growing up, but then when you’re an adult, you realize that being a kid was the best time of your life,” she said.

“There’s a bit of this Peter Pan effect when they [Gen Z consumers] I don’t want to grow up, but I think it’s just about maintaining that element of joy that brings them happiness.”

Gen Z adults have had a pretty tough time, as many say they haven’t been able to reach the adulthood they were promised. Economic and geopolitical the unrest has disrupted their lives, images of war are broadcast daily on their social networks and the cost of living continues to skyrocket.

Some of the conflicts they have witnessed during their adult lives include Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022, Israel-Hamas War.

And to top it all off, rising inflation means their purchasing power is decreasing every day with economic milestones like buy a house Or start a family feel out of reach.

Many Generation Z are rather “Catastrophic spending” to fill the void. This is a phenomenon where people spend on small luxuries like trips, designer items, or even expensive toys, because they know they may never be able to afford bigger milestones like owning a home or even children.

Delaying parenthood also means Gen Z has more disposable income to spend on small luxuries.

“I think maybe part of it is that they’re [Gen Z] choosing to have slightly older children, so they have a slightly longer period of time where they have money, but don’t necessarily have to spend it on schools or lunch boxes, so they choose to spend it on themselves to bring themselves a little happiness,” Symonds said.

Some 85% of British Gen Z said they experienced feelings of lonelinessaccording to a Hinge survey of 2,000 Gen Z adults in the UK in March. According to the study, more than half of low-income young adults have experienced severe loneliness.

Jellycat’s Meysselle explained that the brand has sought to create a community for its fans since launching Instagram and TikTok accounts in 2022, both of which have accumulated more than two million followers since.

It has also invested in themed pop-up experiences that fans can visit in person, from Jellycat Fish & Chips at Selfridges in London, Jellycat Patisserie at Galeries Lafayette in Paris and Jellycat Diner at FAO Schwarz in New York.

AAbout 80 percent of fans who attended the Jellycat space experience in Seoul, launched in November, were aged 20 to 30 – the largest percentage of adults to participate in a Jellycat experience so far.

Selfridges toy buyer Joe Evans told CNBC Make It that Jellycat is the best-selling toy brand and that in the past two years there has been “a meteoric rise” in Gen Z and millennial customers who want to “feel like part of a community and collect toys.”

“When you buy a Jellycat you feel like you’re part of a community, you feel like you’re part of something, there’s a lot of groups online talking and people are racing for the best and newest product,” he added.