The World's Most Expensive Labubu. When a Toy Stops Being a Toy

There's a moment at every auction when the room goes quiet. The auctioneer raises a hand, someone on the other side of the world taps their phone screen — and a small, toothy creature that began life as a sketch in a notebook turns into something no one ever promised it would be: a work of art worth more than an apartment.

Labubu was never meant to be an investment. It was meant to be mischief — an imp from a Nordic fairy tale that Kasing Lung dreamed up before anyone knew that little monsters could be fashionable. And yet, in June 2025, Beijing hosted the first auction in history devoted exclusively to these creatures — and the world found out how much people are willing to pay for a bit of childhood, rarity, and magic all at once.

Mint. The Only One in the World

It stood upright at one hundred thirty-one centimeters — the height of a ten-year-old. Mint green, with that grimace of his somewhere between a smile and a warning. First generation, made before Lung had even signed a licensing deal with Pop Mart. The auctioneer said just one sentence: the only one of its kind in the world. The rest happened in silence, on the screens of more than a thousand phones.

The price with premium reached 1.24 million yuan — about 170 thousand dollars. That day set a record not only for Labubu, but for Kasing Lung himself. The same man whose acrylic painting had landed at a Christie's evening auction a few weeks earlier. From a sketchbook to collectors' walls — in a single generation.

The Brown Giant. One of Fifteen

Right behind the mint one stood his bigger brother — one hundred sixty centimeters tall, brown, massive, one of only fifteen in existence on the entire planet. Where the mint one was unique, this one was a legend in a limited run: rare enough to set the room alight, real enough that it could actually be obtained.

Three Wise Ones Who Tripled the Value

The most beautiful story of this auction wasn't about size. The "Three Wise Labubu" set — three small figures from 2017, a run of one hundred twenty complete sets — had sold at Sotheby's a month earlier for 186 thousand yuan. It returned to auction in Beijing and in a single evening reached more than three times that price. This isn't inflation. It's the speed at which desire can grow.

The entire auction — forty-eight objects, all sold, none without a buyer — brought in 3.73 million yuan. A room for two hundred people and over a thousand bidders who never came inside, because they were bidding from the other side of the world, with a single thumb.

Why Anyone Pays That Much for a Toy

It's easy to laugh at this. Easier than admitting we understand. Because the truth is, you're not paying for vinyl or fur here. You're paying for the same thing art has always been paid for: for rarity, authorship, and a story you can wear as your own.

• Rarity — "the only one in the world" is not a slogan, it's a promise that no one else has it.
• The artist's hand — first generations and prototypes painted by Lung are treated today like original paintings, not products off an assembly line.
• A cultural moment — by buying such a Labubu, you're buying a piece of exactly that moment when the little monster became an icon.
• Emotion, not calculation — experts warn plainly: these are not financial instruments, just pop-culture artifacts. Buy with your heart, not an Excel sheet.

And maybe that's the most tender thing about this whole story. That in a world that reduces everything to numbers, people are still capable of spending a fortune on something that does nothing — it just stands there, looking at you with its toothy smile, reminding you that we once knew how to be amazed for no reason at all.

Magic Is Closer Than You Think

You don't need one hundred seventy thousand dollars to start. These records are the extreme — the highest notes of a song that also has its quiet, accessible tones. Every Labubu figure you hold in your hand belongs to the same family as the mint giant from Beijing. The same character, the same story, the same thrill of opening a blind box — just at a scale you can afford.

Because a collection doesn't begin with a fortune. It begins with one thing that makes you feel a little warmer. And if you want to be sure your Labubu is original before it ever thinks about an auction room — we've written about it separately: how to recognize a real Pop Mart.