No Buy 2025
Key Points
January is the time to start a new life and develop healthy habits, which gives rise to social media challenges that spread like wildfire.
Next up is “2025 without shopping”. We figure out who wants to buy nothing for the entire year and why, whether it is really possible and what it can lead to.
The Shopping Ban That’s Taking Over Social Media
Remember that last January we started with loud budgeting? “Loud budgeting” replaced “quiet luxury”, and the consumption pendulum swung in the other direction.
A year later, the pendulum continues its trajectory towards even greater, radical savings.
Social media users are massively declaring 2025 “the year without shopping” and posting calls on social media to join.
Why No Shopping in 2025 Could Be Your Ticket to Financial Freedom
The new (and in fact, just gaining significant momentum) trend has the same old reasons. Economic recession, inflation, rising cost of living in all areas.
Despite the fact that experts promise a slowdown in global inflation to 3.5% from a peak of 9.4% by the end of 2025, people note a decrease in the standard of living with an unchanged or even increased income. And we are talking about a global “cost of living crisis.”
In the era of social media, it is common to cope with crises collectively, including through challenges.
By engaging in such, users feel their individual task as a common one, and receive support from their “teammates”.
From Shopaholic to Minimalist: The Rise of No Buy 2025
However, the reasons given by the participants in the challenge vary. For example, 35-year-old Elicia Berman from New York has been planning to refuse purchases for the second year already.
In 2024, she aimed to pay off her credit card debt. “I think the difference is that this year I will reinforce good financial habits.
It is definitely hard, but new habits do change your life. After a while it is nice to get out of the vicious circle of constantly buying new things and selling them.”
Can You Go a Year Without Shopping? Here’s How People Are Doing It
Rebecca Sowden
I think people are just angry about their financial situation in general
says Rebecca Sowden, a blogger and co-founder of the budgeting app Qube Money.
— And every dollar you spend is a vote for what you believe in.” She adds that “everyone is tired of everything being so expensive,” and that being tired of your own shopping habits is one way to start a reboot.
Breaking the Shopping Habit: Tips for Thriving in No Buy 2025
Does that mean that by embarking on the thorny path of No Buy, you will stop buying altogether?
Of course not. In the modern world, it is possible to completely eliminate spending money only by completely excluding yourself from social life.
The point here is to refuse shopping as a dopamine drug. It is a way to reward yourself or console yourself in those cases when you later regret excessive spending.
Thus, the bank Ally published an article on its website. It replaced the No Buy Challenge with the Low Buy Challenge. A challenge to minimize purchases, not to refuse them.
A Challenge for Your Wallet and Mindset
As in any case of fighting bad habits and acquiring new, healthy ones, you need to act gently, gradually, out of love for yourself, and not out of punishment.
One TikTok user shared that she saved $10,000 in a year by not shopping in 2024.
She didn’t buy new clothes, accessories, or household items. She stopped taking coffee to go, but sometimes allowed herself to buy second-hand items and concert tickets for no more than $100. She plans to continue the challenge in 2025.
Bloggers who have already practiced not shopping last year give a set of simple rules and practical recommendations that can help.
From Impulse Buys to Intentional Living
For example, another TikTok challenge participant, Mia Westrup, suggests first reviewing your budget and then dividing all your expenses into “green” (essential household purchases like groceries), “yellow” (things that fall under the “entertainment” category and where you can find a free alternative: for example, instead of buying a book, but borrow one from a friend or the library) and “red” (the exact things that you should put a moratorium on: impulse shopping on a marketplace, more jars of cosmetics, mass-market clothes on sale).
“If you like to gamify your life, having rules to keep yourself in check may be the best approach to a year of no shopping,” Westrup says.
Budgeting Goes Viral
“Having small indulgences makes it easier to stick to your commitment. This will avoid bigger expenses like clothes or cosmetics.
A moderate, flexible plan is key to making a year of no shopping a success,” advises Elicia Berman.
The point is simple: if you restrict yourself too much, you are more likely to fail. “If you break your own shopping ban, don’t give up.
You haven’t failed—just get back up and keep going.”
Shopping Detox: How No Buy 2025 Is Changing Consumer Culture
And Hannah Blass, a former shopaholic who spent the entire year of 2024 with minimal purchases, offers another trick.
“Shop from yourself”. If you take stock of your closets, you can find things that you bought a long time ago and forgot about them.
They will give you exactly the same joy of novelty as fresh purchases.
This is also true for bookcases, kitchen cabinets and other storage places – go through them, catalog your belongings and rejoice in something forgotten and rediscovered.
Among other tips – careful planning of purchases: do not go to the grocery store on an empty stomach and without a list of products, and for clothes – without understanding what you already have and what specific items are missing.
And also find a like-minded person, or even more than one: you can encourage each other, share successes, and control if necessary.
A public promise also imposes additional responsibility.
For those looking for moments of entertainment amidst their No Buy challenge, online gaming can be a creative outlet.
Exploring platforms like Dragon Slots is one such option.
By using the Dragon Slots login, players can engage in fun activities without overspending.
Finally, a period of time without shopping does not necessarily have to be a year long.
Rebecca Sowden believes that a month can be much more effective: it is easier to hold out, especially if you are prone to impulsive shopping, and at the end of the month there is excitement (and will it be possible to consolidate the success with another one, and then another and another?).
As with any trend, No Buy 2025 should be approached consciously, adapting it to your realities.
Not all of us spend an “extra” $10 thousand on clothes and interior items, but even a couple of thousand rubles that you save per month will bring you closer to a big goal, the joy of which will certainly be many times greater than from momentary purchases.
