In 2017, you couldn’t walk past a school gate without seeing one. Online and in shops they were sold out everywhere you looked. If you had one of these toys in the playground, you had solidified yourself as the cool kid. Teenagers did tricks, traded fidgets and even grown adults were spinning them in meetings. For a few weeks, the fidget spinner was the most wanted toy in the world.

By Christmas, they had all but vanished.

That speed is what makes the fidget spinner so interesting. We see toys explode in popularity and then vanish quite often, but very few come close to the level of popularity the fidget spinner reached. And it makes complete sense. As a toy, it's one dimensional, so it's no surprise the rise and fall happened so quickly.

But fast forward to 2026, nearly ten years later, and I can tell you we still sell lots of them. There are tons of styles, price points and materials to choose from now, and demand has stayed steady to a much smaller level ever since, from children and adults who find them interesting to collectors and neurodivergent people who use them to stim.

What is a fidget spinner?

A fidget spinner is a small, handheld toy with a bearing in the middle and two or more arms around it. You hold the centre between your thumb and a finger, flick one of the arms, and the whole thing spins.

The classic design has three rounded arms, like a flat three-leaf clover. Cheap ones are plastic. Premium fidgets are made from brass, steel, copper or titanium and can cost well over £100.

How to tell a good quality fidget spinner? When you spin it, the spin should last well over a minute and the fidget spinner should not shake or move.

Who invented the fidget spinner?

So this is where the story gets interesting. Catherine Hettinger is often credited as the original inventor. Her patent was granted in 1997 and she held it for eight years, but she let it expire in 2005 because she couldn't afford the $400 renewal fee. So, unfortunately, she never made a single penny from the toy.

It wasn't for lack of trying, though. She pitched her design to Hasbro, who tested it but decided not to bring it to market. With no one willing to take it on, she eventually let the patent lapse and gave up on the dream.

That was 20 years before fidget spinners sold in their tens of millions. In 2017, The Guardian ran her story and named her as the inventor, but many people disagree. They argue it simply isn't the same design that went viral. As painful as it may be for Catherine, patent experts have pointed out that the toy we know today is very different from the one she patented. Her design had no central bearing, and that bearing is the thing that makes a fidget spinner spin.

The design we know today is much closer to the Torqbar, made around 2014 by Scott McCoskery, an IT worker near Seattle. He fidgeted in long meetings, so he built himself a metal gadget with a bearing in the middle that he could spin quietly in one hand. People asked where they could buy one, and he started selling them online.

The Torqbar was never a cheap toy. It was made from metal and started at $139, with custom versions reaching $800. It found a loyal following among adults who wanted something well made to fiddle with at their desk. By his own account, Scott sold Torqbars "in the many thousands". A nice little business, but nothing compared to what came next.

When the craze hit in 2017, factories copied the idea almost overnight and sold spinners for a fraction of the price. One Chinese company went as far as copying the Torqbar's website, logo and product photos, then selling knock-offs at a heavy discount. Scott had filed an early patent application in 2016, but it hadn't been granted yet, so there was very little he could do to stop them.

The patent finally came through in March 2018. By then the trend had come and gone. Tens of millions of spinners had been sold around the world, and almost none of them earned him a penny.

I suppose there's a business lesson in this for anyone: sort your patent before you show the world.

Why did fidget spinners explode in 2017?

The rise in popularity was almost instant. Google searches for "fidget spinner" barely existed before 2017. They started climbing in the spring, and by May the fidget spinner had gone from nothing to the most popular toy on the planet.

At the height of this, spinners made up 17% of all online toy sales in the US on a single day. On Amazon they filled the top of the toy charts. This graph shows the sharpness of the increase of this ‘one hit wonder’ toy.


What caused this? A few things lined up at once

Nobody owned the design - with no patent standing in the way, factories in China could copy it as they wish. Within weeks there were thousands of versions that flooded the UK market.

It was made for YouTube - I didn't know this until I started researching this article, but children were learning tricks with them. I found videos of kids doing tricks, some with up to 13 million views. They'd spin them on their noses, pass them between their fingers and stack three at once, then show off what they'd learned at school.

It was collectable - light-up, metal, gold, spinners with six arms. Once a child had one, they wanted a better one. Again videos racked up views in the tens of millions, in fact these are still prevalent even today!

It came with a label - some sellers marketed spinners as a tool for ADHD, autism and anxiety. That gave parents a reason to say yes, and it gave adults permission to buy one for themselves.

And it wasn't just children. Let's not forget that the spinner was originally made so adults could fidget at their desks, and adults still make up a large part of our customer base today. Toy expert Richard Gottlieb put it well when he told the BBC that crazes spread through influencers, whether that's "the coolest kid on the playground" or "the coolest person in the office". Spinners had both.

Parents were a huge part of it too. At the peak, around 34% of sales came from middle-aged women, mostly mums buying for their children. So the same toy was sitting in school bags, on office desks and in kitchen drawers all at once. For a few weeks, everyone was in on it. What a time to be alive!

Did fidget spinners actually help?

Spinners were sold on the promise that they'd help people focus by some sellers. When researchers tested that, the answer was mostly no.

In July 2017, paediatrician Dr Ruth Milanaik reviewed the research and found no peer-reviewed studies on fidget spinners at all. Millions had been sold as focus aids, and nobody had checked.

When the studies arrived years later they weren't kind:

  • A 2020 study found that students who used a spinner while watching a lecture remembered less of it than those who didn't.

  • In a classroom trial the same year, 60 children with ADHD lost attention more than twice as often when they were given a spinner.

Psychologist Mark Rapport, who has spent years studying ADHD, put it simply. Spinners are "more likely to serve as a distraction than a benefit".

Here's the interesting part. Movement does help many people focus, especially people with ADHD. Rapport's own research found that children with ADHD did better on memory tasks when they were allowed to move. So fidgeting isn't the problem. The spinner is.

Why the spinner gets it wrong

The main problem at the time was that most children weren't using them as a focus aid. For them it was simply a toy, so of course it became a distraction.

But even for people who use them to help with focus, spinners are easily one of the most distracting fidget toys, even for the people around you. They can also be demanding to use, and some people need both hands to get them going. Apart from listening in meetings, it's hard to do any other task with one in your hand. That's fair enough for a toy, but as a fidget tool, there are much more discreet options now that no one will even notice you using.

Occupational therapists talk about fidget tools doing two jobs: helping you focus, and helping you calm down. For focus, you want something you can use without looking. For calming down, something more absorbing can be fine.

Why did fidget spinners die?

It was a playground craze

This is the main reason. When the BBC covered the spinner in 2017, it opened by telling readers to forget bottle flipping and ditch their loom bands. That says it all. The spinner joined a long list of playground crazes at the time, remember Tamagotchis, Crazy Bones, loom bands? 

Crazes run on novelty and status. Owning one early made you interesting. Once every child in the class has one, the status is gone, and the children move on to the next thing. It was too one dimensional. They were no new levels, nothing to collect towards, and only so many tricks to learn.

Schools banned them

Teachers in the UK, US and Australia quickly got fed up. Spinners were spun under desks, dropped on floors and fought over at break. Schools in Manchester, Brooklyn, Chicago and Florida banned them outright. One Brooklyn school wrote to parents that they were "causing a distraction to students and staff."

Cheap copies wiped out the magic

With thousands of factories making them, quality dropped fast. People who actually used them to focus stuck to the higher-end models, which were usually metal and much better made and didn't wobble in your hand. Another red flag was a short spin time. We've seen so many cheap spinners that barely keep going for more than a few seconds.

Light-up versions had batteries that could be swallowed, and some caught fire while charging. Safety bodies in the US and Europe issued warnings about choking and burn risks. A £2 spinner that breaks in a week doesn't make anyone want a second one.

What the fidget spinner left behind

This is the part of the story that usually gets missed. The spinner failed as a focus tool, but it did something far more useful. It made fidgeting normal.

Before 2017, fidget tools mostly lived in special educational needs cupboards. A child who needed one often had to use something that marked them out as different. Primary teacher Danielle Timmons told the BBC that fidget toys had "only ever really been used by children with additional support needs."

Then, almost overnight, every child had one. Child psychologist Dr Amanda Gummer said at the time that the craze was helping to take the stigma away. Miriam Gwynne, whose autistic daughter used fidget tools, wrote that spinners meant her daughter could fidget without standing out.

Now that shift never really went away. Adults now fidget openly at work. Schools talk about fidget tools rather than banning fidgeting. And a whole industry of fidget and sensory toys grew up in the space the spinner cleared. The spinner was the first fidget toy most people ever owned. It just wasn't the best one.

Are fidget toys and spinners still popular?

Of course, in fact fidget toys have made another revival and have longevity because there are so many of them for kids to choose from. There is also the focus market we thrive in. Some of our customers have ASD or ADHD and use them to self-regulate and stim. Spinners have evolved too, into a huge range of styles and materials, much closer to what McCoskery had in mind. 

The trends back this up again. Take a look at UK search interest for "fidget toys" over the last 20 years. 

How fidget toys went from fad to favourite:

  • Before 2017: almost nobody was searching for fidget toys.

  • 2017: the fidget spinner trend hit, and interest shot up before dropping just as fast.

  • 2021: it exploded again, even bigger, as pop its took over TikTok during lockdown.

  • 2022 onwards: interest settled, stayed and has been slowly climbing ever since.

It's come full circle more than once. But look at the last 5 years, the interest has stayed. Some people still buy fidget toys just for fun but underneath that, there's still a market of people who use them for focus, and neurodivergent people who rely on them every day. 

It's also why fidget toys have lasted this time. There's something for everyone now:

What's gone is the idea that one toy is the answer for everyone, and that's probably a good thing!

Fidget spinner FAQs

What is the point of a fidget spinner?

It gives your hands something to do. Many people find the spinning motion and gentle hum calming, and a quality spinner can help some people focus and self-regulate. 

Do fidget spinners help with ADHD?

It depends on the person and what you use them for. Movement helps many people with ADHD concentrate, but studies found spinners could be distracting in class. Quieter fidgets you can use without looking, like cubes or putty, are often a better fit for focus.

Who invented the fidget spinner?

The modern bearing design is usually traced to Scott McCoskery's Torqbar from around 2014. Catherine Hettinger is often named, but her 1993 toy was a different design with no bearing. Neither made much from the 2017 trend.

When were fidget spinners popular?

The craze took off in early 2017, peaked in May and had faded by the end of that year. They never disappeared, though, and still sell today.

Are fidget spinners still popular?

Yes. The craze is over, but spinners have a steady following among adults, collectors, and people who use them to focus, stim or self-regulate.

Are fidget spinners safe for young children?

Not for under-threes. Small parts and button batteries are a choking risk. Buy from a trusted seller, check the age label, and avoid cheap light-up spinners with loose battery covers.