Sell Your Used Board Games — 0% Fees

Used board games typically sell for £5 to £40, and on WishThrift it costs you nothing to list — no fee, no commission, so you keep the whole amount you agree. Board games sell on completeness, and there is only one way to establish it: count the pieces against the rulebook before you list.

The short version

Typical range: £5 – £40 — see the full board games value guide
What decides your price: condition, and how well you evidence it in photographs
Cost to sell here: nothing, at any price
Category: Toys & Games

Before you photograph it

Ten minutes here is worth more than anything else you will do. Buyers are deciding between your listing and someone else’s, and preparation is what visibly separates the two.

Open the box and count every component against the contents list in the rules. State any shortfall exactly.
Check the box corners and the board hinge, which is where age shows and where damp damage appears first.
Punch-out tiles that are still on the sprue are a selling point — note it if the game is unpunched.

The photographs that sell board games

Four photographs do almost all the work. Shoot in daylight, near a window, with the item against something plain — and do not use the flash, which flattens texture and hides exactly what buyers are trying to see.

The box lid straight on, filling the frame
All the components laid out together on a plain surface
The board opened flat, showing the hinge and any wear
The rulebook, plus the box corners and any tear, water mark or repair

Photograph the flaws too. It feels counterproductive, but a listing that shows the worst of an item gets fewer questions, fewer withdrawn offers and fewer arguments at handover. Buyers who can see the damage stop imagining something worse.

Writing the title and description

Title, edition and completeness: “Catan, 2015 Edition, Complete with Rules” or “Monopoly Deluxe, Missing 1 Token”. Edition matters to hobby gamers because components and artwork change between printings, and the word complete is what most buyers filter on.

Then state these in the description, because a buyer who has to ask is a buyer who might not bother:

Exact title and edition or printing year
Whether it is complete, and precisely what is missing if not
Condition of the box, board and cards, described separately
Whether any expansion content is included

What buyers will actually ask

You will receive the same three messages about board games. Answering them in the listing itself removes the back-and-forth, and answering them well when they do arrive is what turns an enquiry into a sale.

“Is everything there?”

Count it against the rulebook and say the result. A missing piece disclosed up front is a small discount; a missing piece discovered at home is a complaint.

“Which edition is it?”

Photograph the back of the box, where the printing year and publisher are almost always shown.

“Have the cards been sleeved or shuffled hard?”

Look at the card edges and say. Hobby buyers care about card wear because marked backs make a game unplayable competitively.

Pricing it so it actually sells

Start from the honest condition grade rather than the price you hope for. WishThrift listings use five grades — New with Tags, Like New, Good, Fair and For Parts — and what each grade means is worth reading before you choose, because grading up is the most expensive mistake sellers make. It does not raise the price; it produces a buyer who arrives expecting something else.

The board games value guide prices all five grades for this item. Pick your grade, take the figure, and if you sit between two grades price toward the lower one. Items priced honestly sell faster than items priced hopefully, and on a free platform there is no fee eating the difference anyway.

What you keep, compared

On a £22 sale — roughly the middle of the range for board games — here is what the commission-charging platforms would take, and what you would keep on each:

Where you sell it	Fee	You keep
WishThrift	£0	£22
Poshmark	−£4	£18
eBay	−£3	£19
Mercari	−£2	£20
Etsy	−£1	£21

Seller-side rates verified 26 Jul 2026 — Poshmark: 20% commission on sales of $15 and above; eBay: 13.6% final value fee, plus a per-order fee; Mercari: flat 10% selling fee; Etsy: 6.5% transaction fee, plus a listing fee and payment processing. Percentages are applied to the sterling figure above; the fixed per-order and processing charges those platforms add are quoted in their own currency and are not included here, so the real deductions are slightly larger. Full breakdown: marketplace selling fees compared.

Timing and getting it to the buyer

Rises sharply from October to December and again in January. Out-of-print hobby titles sell quickly at any time of year; mass-market family games are seasonal and cheap.

Boxes are light but bulky and corners crush in transit, so pack in an outer box rather than a bag. Collection works well for heavy bundles of several games.

WishThrift does not process payments or arrange delivery — you and the buyer agree both directly — so confirm payment has cleared before the item leaves your hands, and keep the conversation on the site so there is a record of what was agreed.

Ready to list it? It takes about two minutes, costs nothing, and there is no commission when it sells — create a free account or see how selling works.

Frequently asked questions

What are used board games worth?

Usually £5 to £40, though out-of-print hobby titles reach considerably more. See the board games value guide for a breakdown by condition.

Can I sell an incomplete board game?

Yes, and there is a real market for it — other owners buy incomplete copies for spares. Say exactly what is missing in the title and description and price it as a spares copy rather than a playable one.

Do I need the original rules?

It helps a great deal, but most publishers host rules as free downloads. Say the rulebook is missing and point out that it is available online, and most buyers will proceed.