Live Auctioneers has a very broad following from local auction houses all over the country. You are very likely to find something of interest through this organization. The app is really good for browsing auctions and looking for items of interest. However, the app is horrible when it comes to actually keeping up with a live auction. It has a really hard time staying active and notifications seem sporadic. If you have the time, you could just sit through an entire auction, but they usually last all day. This may not be a problem if you are retired but its otherwise frustrating. If you really care about the auction, you will save yourself a lot of stress by using the website on a desktop or laptop instead of this app on your phone. Keep a tab open and check back that way. Considering this is the granddaddy of live auction websites, the app is pretty disappointing.
Excellent site except two big problems: if using your cell phone, the data speeds up or slows down depending on the cell tower being used for your call which means if you attempt to hit the ‘bid’ button with one bid amount being shown that the bid price can suddenly spike so that when you finish pressing said bid button you might very well be pressing the button for a bid you didn’t intend making - this happened to me where the intended $55 bid I was making suddenly spiked to $1050 as I pressed the bid button probably because the data transmission from the cell tower suddenly spiked. I immediately and frantically e-mailed this incident to the auctioneer web site. So that’s one issue. The second is that the auctioneer web site states the retract bid button is on the lower right of the web page during bidding. It is not. In fact no button is there that identifies itself as the stop bid button. As it turns out this ‘button’ is on the upper right edge as is represented as a vertical three dot sign. As least that’s how it appears on my iPhone screen. These issues need fixing. Other than that a great site.
The improvements to the app made in early 2019 are a huge improvement. The live bidding experience is richer (e.g. swipe photos, see item info while bidding) and you can now save searches in the mobile app (before you could only modify saved searches on the website). Many other thoughtful improvements, and I will note the competitors e.g. Invaluable have failed to keep up while others like Bidsquare still don’t even have an app (in 2019!). The folks at LiveAuctioneers are ahead of the pack and the latest updates demonstrate their commitment to investing in improving the app and making it easier to use and more powerful. Thank you.
Totally Fake & Scam! I brought a shoushan stone from this App under Jasper52 and When I received item, the item is different than the picture that they shown ,so I ask them what is going on, and come back said they are sent me the similar item with the same value, I mean this is totally fake and try to scam people, using a better picture to let the people bid and after someone won the bid then they told you that they can't sent you the item that you won but they are sending you a same value item, COME ON MEN Do Not Buy anything from here totally a set up, then after all this They are offer me 10 Dollar off, HAHA This is So Funny, or they offer me send the item back also telling me the way how they want me to sent back the Item this is ridiculous, and Funny! I don't want my money now I don't care, I just want to tell people this is a scam app and do not shop from here and teribble customer service!!! Thank you for reading!
I’ve been buying art my whole life, including on digital platforms. I’ve had a good experience with Live Auctioneers’ functionality and, most of all, the breadth of art, furniture and other rarities—on any given day, there are dozens of auctions to buy from. The interface of the app is clear and well designed. The watched search feature is excellent. Unfortunately there and some very bad actors they have allowed to remain on their platform, even labeling some of these “auction houses” that sell completely fraudulent work among their recommended sellers. I’m not talking about an old piece from an estate sale missing provenance. These are sellers repeatedly selling supposedly original paintings or drawings by famous artists—name one, really, and they have forged it. Live Auctioneers could easily deplatform these sellers and build trust and credibility but they remain and sadly people fall for it—some of this trash sells.
Not fast enough, I keep missing my items because the app doesn’t refresh quick enough
Hello, I love the idea of the app to go along with the website, but the way this app is made doesn’t allow for actual bidding to happen. Even when I’m watching my item come up in the queue, it sometimes flashes the item on screen for less than a second before the item moves on. Other times it waits so long that several other items pass by while I’m still stuck a few items back. I try to submit my bids, using both the bidding beforehand feature and attempting to bid live, but I still don’t win the item even when my bid was higher. I try to bid live so that I can bid my actual bid, not the “imaginary” bid it says that I’m the highest bidder for, then tells me my bid has been sent. But I never see my bid flash on the feed and I’m never able to win, despite having a higher bid. Please remedy this, you can’t use this bidding app as a bidding app, so I don’t recommend this app to anyone.
I’ve used LiveAuctioneers for over 5 years now and I have always loved their platform. Over the years it has been refined and much easier of an interface. It used to be rather clunky and a bit outdated, but it also wasn’t as popular. The recent update is great- because it allows to refine searches to show recent listed. This was a main issue I had with the app, and why I just regularly used the browser. I’m excited to see how they will grow
LiveAuctioneers does not vet listing auction houses and rife with fakes.
The app itself is fine as is the website. Unfortunately, you really need to vet anything you’re looking to buy all the way down to the auction house and possibly the provenance from the auction house. If you purchase, and eventually validate a forgery or fraud, there is no recourse via there company or platform. Very troubling since there’s a lot of trust built into auctions in general, and with no protections for the bidder without being live at auction, you’re pretty much throwing your money into the void unless the due diligence you perform is comprehensive. I am a victim. I have a fraudulent art piece confirmed by the artist as a forgery and have no recourse because the listing auction house a longer platformed and LiveAuctioneers provides no support in regards to recoupment of funds. Not even basic llc or contact information.
I have used LiveAuctioneers to bid on over 50 auctions so far. Sometimes there are multiple concurrent auctions with items I am interested in. The issue I have is that my "favorites" are intermingled - could there be a way to filter favorites by auction? Another problem is sorting - there seems to be a programming error whereby "Time: Starting Soonest" sorts by the item title rather than lot number. (This also happens on the website accessed via web browser apps.) I also wish the LA app would provide access to past auctions when I navigate to a specific auctioneer.
The app is not too bad, however issues are with buying. Beware of the fees, they can reach up to 30% so lets say you won item for 100$. Your fee will be 130$ + shipping. Of course there is no returns, no complaining. Items sold as is, and description is not very clear of item condition. For example: I bought amber beads, picture every thing looks fine, reality some idiot prong few beads with hot needle. Was it in description ? You guess right. This is a giant flea market, with big boys fees. Even if you manage to secure a deal, fees make purchase unreasonable, unless you are a collector and do not care about price tag.
Submitted a detailed, reasonable dispute about a technical or human error whereby I had a winning bid and, in .06 seconds without any warning, suddenly lost a lot. Days later and only after I followed up, received a response that the lot was sold to someone else so nothing could be done. That was the whole problem. Why even bother having “support” if you won’t hold auctioneers responsible for unfair and unreasonable practices like swiping lots with no chance to bid again? Scrolling through auction calendar is also difficult because the same auctions on the same day appear over and over in changing order.
Frustrating as app often “freezes”; notifies of upcoming lots well after they have actually sold; fails to submit bids when places; has problems with tracking how much one has actually spent when auctioneer has maximum bid limit
I’ve been using the live auctioneers app for years without any problem. In the last couple of months I’ve noticed that it is completely in operable. Even though I have downloaded the latest version, it doesn’t take any time at all before it crashes. What I’ve noticed is every time I go to click on an image, the app completely crashes. I haven’t been able to shop on this site for a long time because of this glitch. I keep checking back hoping it will be fixed, but it’s not and now I’m just frustrated. I can’t say for sure, but I’m wondering if this glitch started when I got the newest iPhone , I’m thinking maybe it’s not compatible, but who knows.
The ‘favorites’ and ‘saved searches’ needs substantial upgrades - super awkward to use. also, would be great to have a ‘skip this auction’ option for events where you’ve already scrolled through the offerings, avoiding repeated thumbing through same items. Also - and this is huge - ability to filter for only desired types of items within a given auction (e.g., only show me ‘paintings’ from the 1000’s of items up for auction at a Sothebys event) to avoid needless scrolling through undesired items.
The same complaints as others, using the most updated version.
My first time using this app and already disappointed. An auction for a lot was closed, and I received 2 notifications-- that it was x number of lots away from going live, and when I opened the app, that I had already lost the auction. It says that I lost, the lot selling for the amount of my earlier placed high bid, with only one bid made? If a live bid outbid me, then the app isn't working-- either by not keeping up with a live bidder or showing the real-time bidding amount info; or leaving out live bid information altogether. I'm glad it wasn't for a higher priced item. Disappointed and reluctant to use the app again.
This platform had real promise but the platform themselves do not value the customers and only care about their auction fees. I entered an auction with BidHaus and the manipulated their bidding in the last second of an auction 50%, which pauses and increases bids. I received the logs and it show exactly this, did Live care nope said deal with the auction house not us. Gladly leaving the platform after a dispute filed and within 24 hours without any review of the actual issues settled with auction house. There are other platforms that prevent this and this should have NEVER occurred. I highly recommend to everyone find another platform as they do not care or defend the customer only the auction houses.
I’ve been using the app for several years. Through the entire time they have never fixed issues where items on your watchlist simply don’t update and you have to constantly go back-and-forth opening the live auction and going back to the favorites list to get them to update how many lots away they are. also notifications rarely work and the app logs you out constantly. Use the website instead.
I’ve had a lot of fun with this app. However, for the past month it’s a little broken. The categories no longer show up on the home page. They just sit there like a giant graphic waiting to load. But they never do. You can still search for things. But you can’t click on a category like “paintings” or “prints” and scroll through all the different offerings from the various auctions.
The app needs a little TLS. It’s been stable until The iOS 15 .3.1 update came out and ever since, if I have any other app open , then start this one, this app crashes immediately. If I close ALL other apps I have open, then this one will finally open without crashing. I can then switch and open other apps. So somehow this app may require a huge amount of ram to startup, or something else? It’s the only app I use that does this crashing. Everything else is stable.
The website is quite good, but the app forgoes too many websites features. You can’t look at sent messages, you can’t review auction houses, and it’s impossible to follow multiple Auctions from the app. And it’s impossible to pay from the app! Plus, for some reason, every saved search doesn’t load correctly unless you rotate your iPad from portrait to landscape during the search. And it never loads correctly on the iPhone at all. So, if you like to check your saved searches every day, forget, checking them on the iPhone with the app.
There have been instances where I bid on an item at a certain price during a live auction but then the price that registered with the app was much higher than what I actually bid. This glitch seems like it could cause real issues for some bidders. For the search function, it would be really helpful to be able to filter by location with more granularity that just “USA.” It’s a big surprise that you can’t select states or “with x miles of current location.” Also it would be helpful to have shipping information available as a filter- like being able to view all items where the auction house will ship items directly. Additionally, it would be helpful to be able to do a keyword search within an auction or auction house.
After watching several auctions for various coins, and attempting to win, I’m backing away from LiveAuctions for good. Case in point an auction for a coin that is certified (cert number clearly visible in image)… the same certified coin is listed by the auction house for multiple auctions a few days between each other. Day 1 the item “sold” for $500, yet the next few offerings of the coin were not taken down. Day 3 the coin come up as scheduled and “sold” again for $525! So which was if? Sold? Passed? Reserve not met? Too questionable for me to trust anything on this site. I’m out.
The app itself is pretty good. I’ve purchased 12 items and 11/12 were great and exactly what I wanted. However, one of the items came with a deficiency of 15% of the items I purchased, notified the auction...no response. In most of the auctions are fine print that pretty much says they’re not responsible for the accuracy of any of the items they auction. In essence, you as the buyer, have no protection that the item will be anything resembling what you ordered and there is nothing you can do about it.
In many ways Live Auction is a trailblazer. The application has traditionally been the standard bearer. Almost everyone I know in the industry uses Live Auction to search for goods and to preview upcoming auctions. The ability to review stored search parameters for items that occurred in PAST auctions is outstanding. If you have an older version of the app, don’t upgrade to the current version just yet. It has a few game stopping flaws. The area that my students found the most flaws is in the search function. If you saved your favorite search parameters in older versions of the app, you will lose the ability to alphabetize them in the new app. So… if you have sixty saved searches, they will be completely out of order. So pause. Live Auction is one of the most attentive companies in this space. They will fix the app.
The app is built great and everything is set up nicely. However almost every single auctioneer on this application isn’t going to let their high dollar stuff sell for anything too far from retail. I will make bids and then the bidding will start jumping by thousands. These are for auctions that start at zero. There are other auctions that just blatantly lie about the “est. value” and boost the prices by thousands. If you are looking for auctions where you can get stuff for a steal this place isn’t it.
My app is only showing 10 results for past sale searches when I can see there are many more. It won’t allow me to scroll beyond 10 results. It does this frequently, not always. Is there a bug??
Since a month ago the app is not showing any items I saved or bids. To view the items I have to go to the browser. I already deleted the app and re-installed but the issue is still there.
Live Auctioneers provides seamless services to every level of buyer or seller. I have been able to find guns here I would otherwise never find. The one time I needed help I got it instantly and without questions. The app has become my go to for all things firearms! 5-stars. Gcanan
Honestly i love this app but the interface desperately needs an update. The app will consistently say an item is more lots away than it is, the only way to remedy this is to cancel out of the app and reopen. It also consistently stops responding/freezes and again you have to exit out. This has caused me to miss out on a ton of items.
Seriously, what is going on with this app? I’m reloading it daily, refreshing constantly, but it doesn’t not work. A couple days ago during a live bid that I was winning it started refreshing at leaving me out of “live auction.” I ended up losing because I couldn’t keep bidding. It also keeps rearranging things on an hourly basis. Now when I sort my “likes” by “starting soonest” it puts bids from months ago at the top of the list. Nothing works on this app. Nothing. :-(
The load more button is hidden behind the “following search” button and can’t be used. Even when lined up perfectly, the “load more” button doesn’t work. Why don’t you list all at once? I don’t think anyone starts out only hoping to see the first 10-15 results and then thinks “I’m good”.
The auction side of this app works great. I’d like to recommend some quality of life changes: 1. Remember the place in a search page when backing out of an individual listing. 2. Integrate iOS system-level dark mode for nighttime browsing into the interface
This site/app is a total scam. I’ve been in ebay auctions for many years, both as a buyer and seller. On Live Auctioneers, the price action is highly unnatural. I’ve seen final prices magically reach the lot estimates, at 5x the “Sold” prices on eBay. It seems like auctioneers can use bots to artificially bid and fix the price ranges. Items that “sell” don’t have any buyer reviews, and identical lots magically reappear in a couple weeks. This is unethical if not downright illegal. Oh yeah, and they also had a data breach recently. So your data isn’t secure either.
I’ve been using this app for several years, and it’s my go to app for reputable online auctions. I really don’t have a single negative thing to say about it. Highly recommend!
I downloaded the app and decided to follow and bid on an item. I received approval to bid at the auction and bid on a few smaller items. Two lots from the item I wanted, the app froze. I has not moved from my previous position and my phone was plugged into a power source. I tried repeatedly to get it back up, with no luck. It finally started working the next day, but the piece had sold for less than I was willing to bid. Very disappointing and a great lesson learned. I will be removing the app.
During a live auction it is lagging and only has an option to increase the bid by a set amount so if someone else places a bid right before you click the next bid increment you get stuck paying that amount. Now imagine hundreds of people clicking on the next bid increment and you could be stuck grossly overpaying for an item. Terribly for buyer but great for the seller, almost like a scam when it comes to live bidding. Deleting the app
Slow, freezes frequently and does not stay up with live auction
This app is slow, freezes regularly and worse does not stay up to date or in sync with live auctions. Can’t tell you how many items I have lost because it failed to stay in sync. Needs significant work.
No one will answer your calls if you run into a problem. Email only. Billed my credit card but retracted money from the auctioneer I purchased from. Then told me to pay with card again to resolve issue. Fraudulent and very shady company. Buyer beware! The worst customer service, period. Till this day no one has called after many many complaints and tons of emails. Thankfully American Express handled it buy retracting my money. They never could get in touch with anyone either.
Back button no longer works from individual lot screens
Two updates ago the back button on the top left of the screen quit working when on a page for an individual lot. I can only go forward into the auction details, unless I reboot the app. This makes it frustrating to look at individual lots.
I thought when you put your Address that you provide that’s automatic well I found out wrong they provide the wrong address and I paid first class for an item so now that item is going back and they respond to me I should call the carrier first off all it wasn’t my fault I provide the right address on my profile and now I have to do the work so I can get my item what a customer service last time Ill be buying from this auction house.
The app works great, unfortunately after winning a bid, I realized I was going to pay over 50% of the item in buyer fees, taxes, shipping and service fees... so... I’ll probably just stick with Etsy, 1st dibs and EBay moving forward. Nothing like an initial “YES I WON” followed by a “DDAAAAMMNNN” when you see an invoice. Lots of great stuff but you will pay a serious premium...
I was SCAMMED by this site and the seller. DO NOT TRUST THEM. I won an ‘auction’ for a work by a famous artist. After winning the auction, the seller was very aggressive and demanded payment by cash or Amex only (I suspected other credit card companies had banned them). At this point, I did more research on the item, and I discovered it was a FAKE! I emailed Live Auctioneers and the seller with proof that the item was a fake. Both parties refused to help. At this point, the seller became more aggressive and threatened to affect my credit. I consulted an attorney who stated that the cost of the item was less than the potential legal fees. She advised me to just pay for the FAKE item. Just to stick it to me, the seller never actually sent me the FAKE item for which I was forced to pay.
For whatever reason, on the iPhone XR app, when I try to enter the live draft, it takes me in for maybe a second and then goes back. I usually have to enter 6 - 7 times before it lets me stay in our I just give up.
I love Live Auctioneers. I buy a lot of stuff at auction. I’m purely writing this review because the app is extremely glitchy and seems to be getting worse, making it more and more cumbersome to shop on the app efficiently. Going back never brings me back to the same spot on the page. Scrolling even seems to be an issue. It’s very irritating.
Biggest red flag is that they allow sellers to shill bid (bid on their own items to artificially bring up the price) and the bids are non-binding by the sellers, but are binding for the buyer!! meaning they can cancel your winning bid and not send you the item if you won. This is on top of very high buyers premiums in some cases. Lastly, authenticity not guaranteed by the app nor most sellers. In my opinion, if you are looking for scoring good deals, look elsewhere.
First, this app is difficult to use. It’s impossible to find messages sent to auction houses or to the help line. And second, when I called out antisemitic language used in their sales, I received a response that essentially said “yeah, we agree, that’s an antisemitic description but we don’t have anything in our policies that says that’s now allowed and we’re not going to change our policies”. Not an organization I’d like to support.
Loads of spam, Bidders at disadvantage to those in room
Mostly a good site, but 2 problems. One: Even if you turn off notifications, LiveAuctioneers let’s auction houses spam you. Two: you can bid first but if someone in person just matches your bid—they don’t have to beat it—the other bidder can win. Lost a big item that way.
This app used to be so much better, now you can’t bid on an item when it’s live, the app doesn’t automatically move from item to item - you have to go out & back in of live auction constantly to see an update, and you can’t see the bidding as it moves from floor to liveauctioneers. I lost alot of items I would have bid on had it worked. I won’t be using this app at all anymore, such a shame.
Want to pay four times the worth of an item? Bid on this site. Folks, they are selling t-shorts for $500, with nothing special about them. Watches generally go for twice what their actual cost is retail. And don’t get me started on the shipping fees… Plus, there are scams abound. Save your money. Buy straight from reputable dealers, or right from the manufacturer.
LiveAuctioneers is the world's trusted marketplace for unique and one-of-a-kind items. Discover and bid on hundreds of thousands of treasures, from vintage jewelry and Mid-Century Modern furniture to rare, collectible coins and works of fine art. With live auctions added daily from 5,000+ auctioneers, there's something for all treasure-seekers, whether you're a passionate collector, seasoned buyer, or casual shopper. How it works: • Browse and search across hundreds of thousands of antiques, collectibles and luxury goods • Easily contact auction houses with questions • Place bids before auctions begin or watch auctions when they are live and bid in real-time • Check back often and follow searches as new items are added daily LiveAuctioneers is the easiest and most trusted way to find and bid in auctions locally and from afar. • Bid in auctions from 5,000+ auctioneers (it's like having thousands of auction apps in one) • Thousands of items added daily • Find auctioneers near you • Follow searches to be notified when matching items are added • View items matching followed searches • View auctions and items from followed auctioneers • Browse items by category • Search for live and upcoming auctions • View auction descriptions and catalogs • Register to bid in auctions • View item images, descriptions, and auctioneer information • Easily message auctioneers • Leave a bid on any item before auctions start • Watch live auctions and bid live in real-time • Save items, and view a list of all of the items you've saved • View a list of all of the auctions you've registered for • View a list of all of the items you've left bids on before auctions start • Search for sold items and access our entire sales database to research sell prices • Get push notification alerts when items you save or bid on are almost up for auction "My go-to place for the things in my collection!" - Dwight "LiveAuctioneers is a great auction site, with all the best online auctions in one site. Excellent way to keep track of your bids and wins." - Betty "Best variety of auctions; excellent customer service." - Stephen "My only criticism of LiveAuctioneers is that it's addictive! I've found incredible deals on rare and niche pieces of vintage furniture close to me that I wouldn't have found otherwise. A new way to find and shop for antiques, and WAY better selection than eBay, Etsy, or 1stDibs." - Casey
