Fidget Spinners: Have They Reached Peak Popularity? (Or, When Will This Madness End?)

Fidget spinners are taking over the world. From classrooms to offices, the spinning toys (that spin, and only spin), are wielded by children and grown-ups alike.

In fact, according to @SliceIntel, they now account for 17% of daily toy sale in the US.

#fidgetspinners now account for 17 percent of all daily toy sales https://t.co/TDnR1hf25o pic.twitter.com/NUrdb0Sndn

— Slice Intelligence (@SliceIntel) May 24, 2017

Fidget spinner hype has been growing steadily, with thousands taking to the internet to rant and rave about the craze. So far, fidget spinners have peaked at over 150k posts in a single day.

But like every playground trend, the sun will go down on fidget spinners. And, for some, the inevitable death of the fidget spinner can’t come soon enough.

What are fidget spinners?

In case you’ve not come across one just yet (and you will soon), fidget spinners are a handheld device with a central circle that’s held by the user while the outer part of the contraption spins.

They are said to relieve stress and anxiety as well as help children and adults with ADHD. The science behind them, however, appears to be dubious.

Hate for fidget spinners

There’s no shortage of bad feeling for fidget spinners.

Many teachers despise them. Schools have banned them.

Even dogs hate them.

Look how closely the resemble the creepy carpet in The Shining. They must be evil.

Searching for words like “annoying” near “fidget spinners” reveal thousands of mentions from frustrated commenters, suggesting that while they might be helpful for the user, they’re distracting for the people around them.

https://twitter.com/arin_k884/statuses/867938989822533634

Love for fidget spinners

That said, the social data doesn’t necessarily mirror the utter disgust I’ve experienced in my own bubble of fidget spinner skeptics.

Generally speaking, sentiment-categorized mentions are skewed positively towards fidget spinners (around 65% positive, 35% negative). Positive mentions have been growing and trending above negative for the last week or so, suggesting we are reaching a peak in popularity (if it hasn’t already happened).

Where is the love coming from?

People can’t seem to agree on them. This map of geo-tagged mentions in the US demonstrates just how divisive fidget spinners are.

While I expected to see a deep divide between how students and teachers discussed fidget spinners online (along the lines of baristas expectedly hating on Unicorn Frappuccinos more than the general population in our recent Starbucks analysis) that’s not what I found.

This chart shows sentiment-categorized mentions from the two groups of authors.

Perhaps teachers are more sympathetic to them than we think.

Also fairly unexpectedly, men seem to be singing the praises of fidget spinners more than women.