Over the past few weeks I asked sellers and buyers across multiple LEGO communities about their experience with BrickLink. I got responses from power sellers with 20+ years on the platform, casual buyers, people who've switched to BrickOwl, and people who've left for eBay entirely. Here's what came up most often.
1. Sellers feel ignored since the LEGO acquisition
This was by far the most consistent theme. Sellers described a platform where bugs get fixed but feature requests and suggestions are completely ignored. One person said: ”communication is completely one-way - they read the forums but never respond”. Multiple people independently used the phrase ”maintenance mode”.
2. The new inventory upload page is worse than the old one
Several sellers were frustrated by recent changes to the upload interface. One power seller who used to do hundreds of uploads said they've basically stopped listing entirely because the new page is ”bloated, laggy, crashes from various search or radio buttons”. They described it as fixing something that wasn't broken.
3. Platform changes are pushed without user input
No public roadmap, no changelog, no beta testing, no option to roll back. Changes just appear and sellers are expected to adapt. As one person put it: ”users should be at the forefront of this site and they clearly are not”.
4. Buying parts for MOCs is painful and time-consuming
Multiple buyers described spending hours manually comparing sellers and building carts just to get a reasonable deal on a parts list. The automated tools often don't give great results and there's a lot of manual work involved in finding the right combination of sellers.
5. Shipping is unpredictable
Some sellers show shipping as TBD, meaning buyers have to commit to a purchase before knowing the full cost. Several buyers said they immediately abandon carts when they see TBD shipping. Rising postage costs have also made the model of placing many small orders across different stores less viable than it used to be.
6. BrickLink works if you already know the quirks
This one surprised me. Multiple long-time users acknowledged that the platform works for them - but only because they've learned to work around its limitations over many years. One person said it perfectly: ”the people saying it works fine are the survivors”. New users face a steep learning curve that the platform does nothing to ease.
7. BrickOwl gets praise for responsiveness
Several people mentioned BrickOwl positively - specifically that its single developer is responsive, implements feedback quickly, and the buying experience is cleaner. The main drawback people mentioned is smaller inventory compared to BrickLink.
For anyone wondering - yes, I'm working on something based on this feedback (and I promised that I would share the results). It's still very early but if you're curious: brick-curator.com (we’re looking for beta testers)
Thanks to everyone across the various LEGO communities online who shared their experiences. Your feedback has been very insightful.
