You’ve had a rough week. The news is grim, your energy bill landed like a punch, and somehow you’ve just spent £47 on a skincare set you didn’t plan to buy and a houseplant you definitely don’t need. Sound familiar? That’s doom spending, and it’s quietly becoming one of the defining financial habits of this decade in Britain.
The term has been circulating in financial wellness circles for a couple of years now, but doom spending UK search interest has genuinely spiked in 2026 as the cost-of-living hangover drags on. It’s not reckless splurging in the traditional sense. It’s more specific than that: impulse buying triggered by economic anxiety, a kind of “things are bad so I might as well enjoy something now” logic that feels emotionally rational even when it’s financially destructive.
What doom spending actually is (and isn’t)
Doom spending isn’t the same as being bad with money. It’s a coping mechanism, and a surprisingly sophisticated one psychologically. Financial therapist Simonne Gnessen, co-author of Sheconomics and founder of Wise Monkey Financial Coaching, has described it as a response to “learned helplessness”, when people feel they have no meaningful control over big financial forces, they redirect agency into small, immediate purchases that deliver a quick dopamine hit.
The logic goes something like this: if my rent is going up regardless, if inflation is still biting, if a recession feels baked in, then £30 on a new game or a meal out isn’t really the problem. So why not? The trouble is that this reasoning, repeated dozens of times a month across millions of people, adds up to a serious structural drain on household finances.
The FCA’s Financial Lives survey is blunt about the scale of the problem. In its most recent wave, 7.4 million UK adults showed characteristics of low financial resilience, meaning they’d struggle to absorb even a modest financial shock. Amongst 18 to 34-year-olds, the demographic most likely to self-identify as doom spenders, the picture is notably worse. Savings buffers are thin, and discretionary spending hasn’t dropped in line with income pressure.
Why anxiety and the high street are a dangerous combination
British retail has known about the anxiety-spending link for years. Walk into any Primark on a bad news day and the tills are busier than you’d expect. The high street, and increasingly the scroll of an Instagram or TikTok shop, is engineered to intercept exactly this emotional state. Flash sales. Low-price-point impulse items at checkout. “Treat yourself” messaging that makes spending feel like self-care rather than a financial decision.
Online shopping has accelerated this massively. The friction that once existed between wanting something and buying it, driving to a shop, queuing, handing over cash, is almost entirely gone. One-click purchasing on ASOS, Amazon, or Vinted means the gap between impulse and transaction can be under 30 seconds. That’s not long enough for the rational brain to catch up with the anxious one.
I’ve spoken to people who describe checking out online baskets the same way they used to scroll social media, almost unconsciously, as a form of distraction. One woman in her late twenties told me she’d set up a spreadsheet to track her doom purchases after realising she’d spent over £300 in a single month on things she’d returned within a week. “I wasn’t even keeping the stuff,” she said. “I just needed to feel like I was doing something.”
The class dimension nobody’s talking about
Here’s something the doom spending conversation tends to flatten: this behaviour doesn’t look the same across income brackets. For higher earners, doom spending might mean an impulsive weekend trip or a piece of furniture they didn’t need. For people on lower incomes, it’s more likely to be small, frequent purchases, a meal from Deliveroo when cooking feels like too much, a few items from Poundland or a cheap fast-fashion haul. The psychological driver is identical; the financial consequence is proportionally much heavier.
There’s also a loneliness angle here that connects to what researchers and councils are increasingly flagging across the UK. Britain’s loneliness economy has normalised spending as a substitute for connection, buying things becomes a low-effort way to feel something when social energy is depleted. That’s not a coincidence. It’s a pattern retailers actively exploit.
Can you actually stop doom spending?
Financial therapists are fairly consistent on this: willpower alone doesn’t work, because doom spending isn’t primarily a discipline problem. It’s an emotional regulation problem. Telling someone to “just stop” impulse buying when they’re using purchases to manage anxiety is about as effective as telling someone anxious to “just relax”.
What does seem to help, according to practitioners like those at the Financial Wellbeing Centre and independent financial therapists, is building in friction deliberately. Some people use browser extensions that add a 24-hour delay to online checkouts. Others move to cash-only spending for a month to make the exchange feel real again. A few therapists recommend a “doom journal”, writing down what you were feeling when you added something to a basket and checking in the next day on whether the urge is still there.
The data does suggest that awareness helps. In the FCA’s own consumer research, people who tracked their spending even loosely were significantly more likely to report feeling in control of their finances, not because tracking magically created more money, but because it interrupted the unconscious loop.
There’s also something to be said for addressing the anxiety itself rather than just its spending symptom. If economic stress is the root cause, and you’re working in a job that feels unstable or dealing with side-hustle tax anxiety, those underlying pressures need somewhere to go. Understanding what HMRC’s new real-time tax reporting rules mean for your finances as a freelancer, for instance, can actually reduce the ambient dread that pushes people toward spending as relief.
The bigger picture for UK finances in 2026
Doom spending UK isn’t a niche quirk. It’s a systemic response to a prolonged period of economic instability, and it feeds into a feedback loop that makes that instability worse at the individual level. People spend to feel better about a situation they can’t control, reduce their financial resilience, and then feel more anxious as a result.
What’s different now compared to previous periods of economic stress is the infrastructure around impulse spending, the apps, the one-click checkout, the social commerce. Generation Z, who came of age financially during the cost-of-living crisis, are particularly caught in this. They’re simultaneously the most financially stressed young cohort in decades and the most heavily marketed-to through channels specifically designed to convert mood into spending.
None of this means individual behaviour doesn’t matter. But blaming people for doom spending without acknowledging the environment that engineers it is too easy. The FCA is watching the data closely. British financial therapists are seeing more clients present with spending patterns clearly linked to economic anxiety. And millions of people are quietly wondering where their money went at the end of every month, and finding the honest answer uncomfortable.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is doom spending and why is it trending in the UK?
Doom spending is impulse buying driven by economic anxiety, the feeling that things are bad enough that you might as well enjoy small pleasures now. It’s trending in the UK because prolonged cost-of-living pressure has created exactly the kind of chronic financial stress that triggers this coping behaviour.
Is doom spending the same as being bad with money?
No. Financial therapists distinguish doom spending from general financial mismanagement. It’s a specific emotional regulation response to anxiety, not a character flaw. People who are otherwise quite disciplined financially can fall into it during periods of sustained economic stress.
How much is doom spending costing UK consumers?
Precise figures are hard to isolate, but the FCA’s Financial Lives data shows 7.4 million UK adults have low financial resilience, meaning impulse spending is creating real vulnerability. Anecdotally, financial therapists report clients regularly spending £200-£400 per month on unplanned purchases they later regret.
What can I do to stop doom spending?
Financial therapists recommend building in deliberate friction rather than relying on willpower, browser delay extensions, cash-only periods, or a spending journal to identify emotional triggers. Addressing the underlying anxiety, whether through financial planning or mental health support, is more effective long-term than simply cutting up your card.
Is doom spending worse for younger people in the UK?
FCA data suggests yes. Adults aged 18 to 34 have thinner savings buffers and higher rates of impulse spending relative to income. Gen Z in particular grew up financially during the cost-of-living crisis and are heavily targeted through social commerce channels designed to convert low-mood scrolling into purchases.