PM urged not to U-turn on protecting fans, as touts could fleece fans for £24 million this summer
The latest research from Which? underlines the scale of the rip-off music fans face without government action to shut down online ticket touts. The consumer champion looked at reseller listings on StubHub and Viagogo across 66 artists - including Ariana Grande and BTS - between April and September this year.
By comparing the face value of tickets with their inflated listings by third-party sellers on resale sites, Which? researchers calculated that resellers could make almost £24 million this summer. This figure breaks down as £13.3 million from listings on StubHub and £10.2 million from Viagogo.
Harry Styles fans will be hit especially hard as resellers could make £6.6 million from his live shows. Which? researchers found a single Harry Styles ticket with a face value of £200 listed on StubHub for an eye-watering £3,622.
Fans of other major artists such as Ariana Grande and BTS could be stung for £4.9 million and £1.3 million respectively. Which? found that a single BTS ticket with a face value of £450 was listed for £4,872 on StubHub, and an Ariana Grande ticket worth £135 was listed for £2,832 on StubHub.
The average markup prices for these artists are as follows:
Ariana Grande: 274%
BTS: 312%
Harry Styles: 159%
While not every seller on these platforms is a professional tout, Which? researchers worked out that professional resellers could account for £18.5 million - a huge chunk of the total value.
The government announced plans for a price cap in November 2025, days after Which? joined forces with fan and music groups, and artists including Coldplay and Dua Lipa called for the measure. In an interview with the NME, Culture Secretary Lisa Nandy suggested legislation would be included in next month’s King’s Speech.
But concerns have grown that the issue may have slipped down the government’s priority list after Arts Minister Ian Murray told a meeting of Westminster’s Ticket Abuse APPG that plans to protect fans may not feature in its programme of legislation set out by the Monarch.
A coalition of fan and music industry groups has written an open letter to the Prime Minister urging him to deliver on his manifesto commitment to protect fans. Signatories include management for Arctic Monkeys, Ed Sheeran, Fontaines DC, Keane, Nick Cave and Radiohead.
The letter states: “The predatory tactics used by touts, often operating overseas, are distorting the live events sector and causing significant harm to UK fans who are consistently excluded from attending shows due to exorbitant prices. Culture should be accessible to all.
“Fans now need a parliamentary timetable that guarantees delivery of these important protections. Including the Bill in the King’s Speech is the only way to do so. Without this formal commitment, the public will see this as yet another Government U-turn.”
Lisa Webb, Which? Consumer Law Expert, said:
“Our research shows professional ticket touts are preparing to make millions this summer by exploiting true music fans - a reminder of why new laws for a price cap on ticket resales are so urgently needed.
“The government promised to put fans first and make music and live events affordable for all. Backtracking on this promise without a clear timetable for legislation would be a gift to touts and a slap in the face for fans.
“The Prime Minister must shut down online ticket touts for good by including price cap legislation in next month’s King’s Speech.”
-ENDS-
Notes to editors:
The open letter to the Prime Minister was co-signed by:
AEG Presents
ATC Management (Radiohead, Nick Cave)
AXS Europe
Everybody's (Keane)
Featured Artist Coalition
Fan Fair Alliance
Grumpy Old Management (Ed Sheeran)
Kilimanjaro Live
LIVE
Live Nation
Music Manager's Forum
Music Venue Trust
National Arenas Association
O2
ROAM
Save Our Scene
Society of London Theatre & UK Theatre
Society of Ticket Agents and Retailers
The O2
Ticketmaster
UK Music
Which?
Wildlife Entertainment (Arctic Monkeys, Fontaines DC)
Government commitment to act against online touts:
The 2024 Labour manifesto (p89) stated: “Access to music, drama and sport has become difficult and expensive because of ticket touting. Labout will put fans back at the heart of events by introducing new consumer protections on ticket resales.”
In November 2025, the government announced its plans for a price cap on secondary ticket sales, with a press release headlined ‘Government bans ticket touting to protect fans from rip-off prices’.
On the day of the government announcement, Culture Secretary Lisa Nandy told the NME: “We’re bringing forward our new legislative session in the King’s Speech, then it’s got to pass both the Houses of Lords and Parliament to become law. We promised that we would do this in our manifesto, and we promised that it was ‘how’ not ‘whether’ we would take action. Once we have passed it, these new laws will come into force.”
Methodology:
An in-depth article about the research will be available here on Friday.
From October 2025 to February 2026, Which? collected details of tickets listed on StubHub and Viagogo for live events across 66 artists with shows happening in April - September 2026. These details included:
Price;
Face value;
Quantity of tickets listed;
Seating information (area, row etc); and
Whether the reseller was a professional trader
The collection was done multiple times for most live events and typically the same day they were sold on a primary platform, barring those that had been on sale for a while as fewer new tickets were likely to turn up. Where the collection was conducted multiple times, the tickets were deduplicated based on the face value, seating information and whether the reseller was a professional trader as prices can fluctuate between collections. Where the prices fluctuated, Which? took the price of the later collection as it is more likely to be the price which the ticket is subsequently sold at. For Viagogo where resellers could list various numbers of tickets, Which? took only the maximum number of tickets available based on the seller information, face value, and seating information. Where possible, Which? tried to deduplicate tickets across platforms but resellers may not always use the same name across platforms. Ticket price outliers were also removed from the sample.
The overall value of what resellers could make was calculated by subtracting the face value of the tickets from the ticket prices. As resellers would likely have paid fees when they bought it on the primary platform, we also took those into account. Which? assumed this would be 25% based on this analysis and another internal analysis that looked at 30 events and found that add-on fees on primary platforms were up to 24%. Additionally, the ticket prices listed on the secondary resale sites include add-on fees that the sites take so this needed to be considered as well. Which? looked at events from a 10% sample of artists and found that these add-on fees were on average, about 20%, which was then used as the assumption for our calculations.
For tickets where the face value was listed with a foreign currency, Which? used HMRC’s December 2025 exchange rates to convert them into GBP.
Right of replies:
A spokesperson for StubHub said:
“As a marketplace, we do not set ticket prices. We provide a safe, trusted and transparent platform where sellers set the price of a ticket, and buyers decide their purchase price. Prices can fluctuate over time - and we find tickets listed at exceptionally high prices rarely sell - meaning that static reports don't reflect actual sales. We are committed to keeping fans safe within the highly regulated UK market. Independent analysis shows that price caps on ticket resales push fans towards unsafe alternatives, and if caps were to be adopted in the UK, it could result in a cost to consumers of £1.2 billion in fraud each year."
A spokesperson for Viagogo said:
"Which?’s analysis focuses only on listing prices. In reality, completed sales often show tickets selling at or below face value. As of September 2025, nearly 30% of UK events on viagogo averaged under £50, and 84% under £100. On our marketplace, sellers set the price and fans ultimately decide the ticket value that meets their budget. Demand will be at its peak when tickets hit the on-sale but it’s not a normal reflection of what tickets can and will go for.
“Wildly inflated ticket listing prices outside the demand are not likely to sell at any point. In other markets where price caps exist, fans are left with one dominant primary platform. One solution to reduce ticket prices would be to introduce open ticketing in the UK, connecting primary sellers and resale platforms so tickets are verified and ownership is always updated."
About Which?
Which? is the UK’s consumer champion, empowering people to make confident choices and demand better. Through our research, investigations and product testing, we provide trusted insight and expert recommendations on the issues that matter most to consumers.
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